The project DIGITALMARINE is a strategic partnership (Erasmus + programme) gathering 6 universities* and aiming at developing an online platform dedicated to the use of marine organisms in life sciences.

The platform contains different supports (filmed conferences, commented slideshows, cartoons and video animations) adapted to self-learning process for master students in order to promote innovative teaching method such as flipped class-room.

This platform is associated to a spring course taking place in marine station (the Schmid Training Course, UE MU4BM113) involving students in practical work but also in conceptual questioning about research performed on marine organisms. Fundamental knowledge having been studied before thanks to the platform, time can be released for interactions with researchers and for exercises. About twenty researchers being involved in this partnership, a broad range of organisms will be presented: acoels, annelids, brown algae, cephalochordates, cnidarians, crustaceans, echinoderms, placozoans, poriferans, sharks, urochordates.

An educational engineer and a graphic designed have been recruited to elaborate the digital support in collaboration with the different scientists.

This international research training will then constitute a hybrid teaching combining self-learning and practical lab work in which students from partner universities will participate. In addition, the course won’t be limited to one specific field of biology but will explore different disciplines: evolution, life cycle, tissue regeneration, neurobiology, cell biology, cellular morphology and marine biotechnology. Master students will account for the prevailing target users of our on-line resource but it might also be used in lifelong training: scientific workers coming from the academic world or from industry might be willing to use this the platform.

Finally, a handbook on the above-mentioned marine models will be published by November 2021.