Frequently Asked Questions about
Controlled Environments and the Phytotron
What is a controlled environment facility?
What are the advantages of using the National Phytotron?
What is the role of the National Phytotron in global change
research?
What is a controlled environment facility?
Controlled environment facilities permit investigators to create experimental
systems in which biotic and/or abiotic variables and factors are controlled
by the investigator.
What are the advantages of using the National Phytotron?
We can reproduce different types of environments, ranging from the arctic
to the desert to the tropics. Researchers can maintain precise control
over environmental conditions (e.g., soil type, air temperature, light
levels, carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration, relative
humidity, nutrients) and the organisms under study (e.g., mixtures of
plant and animal species and their spatial arrangement). Such a degree
of rigor and control is virtually impossible to achieve under natural
field conditions. Other advantages include the ability to study without
disturbing the organism, the ease of replication and manipulation, and
relatively low research costs. With the large number of chambers available,
experiments can be designed to explore key interactions among multiple
stressors, e.g., temperature, CO2, and air pollutants.
This provides the opportunity to gain increased understanding of the
complex interactions between plants and their environment in studies
of global change.
What is the role of the National Phytotron in global change research?
While direct observation of ecosystem responses in manipulative field
experiments is an important approach to the study of global environmental
change, the sheer number of environmental variables that simultaneously
affect ecosystems poses serious constraints. To adequately test null
hypotheses - and to successfully tease out a signal (effect) against
a background of noise (random variation) - it is necessary to have adequate
replication and control, something that is often impossible to do in
nature. The National Phytotron plays a key role in experimental research
on global change by providing researchers with tools to aid in disentangling
the complexities of natural ecosystems.