| Biosphere 2 | |
|---|---|
 Exterior of Biosphere 2 | |
  Location within Arizona  Biosphere 2 (the United States) | |
| General information | |
| Type | Research facility[1] |
| Location | Oracle, Arizona, United States |
| Address | 32540 S Biosphere Rd, Oracle, AZ 85739 |
| Coordinates | 32°34′44″N 110°51′02″W / 32.578778°N 110.850594°W |
| Elevation | 3,820 ft (1,164 m) |
| Construction started | 1987 |
| Completed | 1991 |
| Owner | University of Arizona |
| Technical details | |
| Floor area | 3.14 acres (12,700 m2) |
| Grounds | 40 acres (160,000 m2) |
| Website | |
| biosphere2 | |
University of Arizona Biosphere 2 is an American Earth system science research facility located in Oracle, Arizona. Its mission is to serve as a center for research, outreach, teaching, and lifelong learning about Earth, its living systems, and its place in the universe.[1] It is a 3.14-acre (1.27-hectare)[2] structure originally built to be an artificial, materially closed ecological system, or vivarium. It remains the largest closed ecological system ever created.[3]
Constructed between 1987 and 1991, Biosphere 2 was originally meant to demonstrate the viability of closed ecological systems to support and maintain human life in outer space[4] as a substitute for Earth's biosphere. It was designed to explore the web of interactions within life systems in a structure with different areas based on various biological biomes. In addition to the several biomes and living quarters for people, there was an agricultural area and work space to study the interactions between humans, farming, technology and the rest of nature as a new kind of laboratory for the study of the global ecology. Its mission was a two-year closure experiment with a crew of eight humans. Long-term it was seen as a precursor to gaining knowledge about the use of closed biospheres in space colonization. As an experimental ecological facility it allowed the study and manipulation of a mini biospheric system without harming Earth's biosphere.
Its seven biome areas were a 1,900-square-meter (20,000 sq ft) rainforest, an 850-square-meter (9,100 sq ft) ocean with a coral reef, a 450-square-meter (4,800 sq ft) mangrove wetlands, a 1,300-square-metre (14,000 sq ft) savannah grassland, a 1,400-square-meter (15,000 sq ft) fog desert, and two anthropogenic biomes: a 2,500-square-meter (27,000 sq ft) agricultural system and a human habitat with living spaces, laboratories and workshops. Below ground was an extensive part of the technical infrastructure. Heating and cooling water circulated through independent piping systems and passive solar input through the glass space frame panels covering most of the facility, and electrical power was supplied into Biosphere 2 from an onsite natural gas power plant.[2]
Biosphere 2 was only used twice for its original intended purposes as a closed-system experiment: once from 1991 to 1993, and the second time from March to September 1994. Both attempts ran into problems including low amounts of food and oxygen, die-offs of many animals and plants included in the experiment (though this was anticipated since the project used a strategy of deliberately "species-packing" anticipating losses as the biomes developed), group dynamic tensions among the resident crew, outside politics, and a power struggle over management and direction of the project. The second closure experiment achieved total food sufficiency and did not require injection of oxygen.[5]
In June 1994, during the middle of the second experiment, the managing company, Space Biosphere Ventures, was dissolved, and the facility was left in limbo. Columbia University assumed management of the facility in 1995 and used it to run experiments until 2003. It then appeared to be in danger of being demolished to make way for housing and retail stores, but was taken over for research by the University of Arizona in 2007. The University of Arizona took full ownership of the structure in 2011. Research continues at the facility while also being a place that is open to the public.
Biosphere 2 is one of two enclosed artificial ecosystems in the Americas[6] that are open to the public, the other being the Montreal Biodome.
- ^ a b Zimmer, Carl (March 29, 2019). "The Lost History of One of the World's Strangest Scientific Experiments". The New York Times. Archived from the original on August 26, 2023. Retrieved March 29, 2019.
- ^ a b "Fast Facts: Biosphere 2". biosphere2.org. University of Arizona. Archived from the original on September 16, 2018. Retrieved June 23, 2019.
- ^ Bahr, Jeff (2009). Amazing and Unusual USA. Publications International, Ltd. p. 238. ISBN 978-1-4127-1683-3.
- ^ "Biosphere 2". Encyclopedia.com. Archived from the original on February 11, 2017. Retrieved February 9, 2017.
- ^ Marino, Bruno D. V.; Mahato, Tilak Ram; Druitt, John W.; Leigh, Linda; Lin, Guanghui; Russell, Robert M.; Tubiello, Francesco N. (June 1999). "The agricultural biome of Biosphere 2". Ecological Engineering. 13 (1–4): 199–234. doi:10.1016/S0925-8574(98)00100-1.
- ^ "About Montreal Biodome". Space for Life | Montreal Biodome.