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Biosphere II funding and research cut back
perfessor multigeek writes "Columbia U. is starting to pull out of Biosphere II. According to the New York Times (reg req. blah, blah) Columbia, under a new, more "pragmatic" leadership, disappointed with the science coming out, and short of cash with the stock market drop, is starting to pull funding and academic programs from Biosphere. Funny, none of the current articles even mention the original purpose, just this past week made more crucial, of preparing for building a synthetic biome in space or on Mars. Arrgh!"
I just happened to be out at Biosphere 2 last a week and a half ago...
On the tour, the guide was Emphatic about the original intent of the Biosphere being to observe the effects of the system, denying that it was ever to even be self-sufficient (a misnomer, as is a closed system... the rationale is that the Earth isn't a closed system, so why should this be?)
So, according to the official PR, Other planets were never a goal.
As for the science that's going on right now, they're studying the effects of various levels of carbon dioxide on photosynthesis right now... there are only 3 other experiments going on due to a lack of funding.
The science might be more valuable in finding out what's going to happen (if/as) global warming starts.
I met an engineering consultant for the original Biosphere Project a few months ago. He had a rather low opinion of the entire venture.
One of his stories was about how they didn't do a good job of taking care of the beehives in the dome somehow. As a result the bees died (i.e. went "extinct"). In order to maintain their food supply, the people living in the dome ended up having to run around like mad doing hand pollination of thousands of little flowers! Ouch!
When I finished school I moved to Arizona in '87 or so to be near my sweetie (who is still my sweetie.) I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life so I got a temp job digging ditches for the U of A's Environmental Research Lab (ERL) which was out by the Tucson International Airport. If you ever dug a ditch in Arizona you can appreciate what a sucky job this was, the calcified sediment is something to behold, but I was never in better shape in my life.
Anyway, the job was pretty mindless and it gave me plenty of time to consider what I wanted to do with my life. When one day my boss told me to get in the van he had a job for me, in previous times this meant a trip to the chancellors house to dig ditches for him. So I got in the van and we drove up to Oracle where they were building the BioSphere II. Man was it cool, but it was my lot in life to dig a bunch of ditches for communcations lines and power lines and such. I was there a few days. I only dug ditches for a few months or so.
I decided that computers might be a good place to direct my energies I got a job in an R & D group. But I do think back on my time with a shovel when ever I look at my somewhat rotund figure. Although all the pictures my wife has of me during that time are of me sleeping in my chair. I was tired a lot.
I did get to do some more work for them later while at the University of Arizona in the Molecular & Cellular Biology Department. It was while the goofballs were still in charge. I was really disappointed to learn how nutty those guys were, but I guess I should have expected it. I was very happy when Columbia stepped up when it all fell apart but I was disappointed they never really did much with it.
Jer,