The University of Arizona is now running the Biosphere 2 facility that mirrors the different biomes of the Earth under a 3-acre enclosure. The facility includes a tropical rainforest, grassland savanna, saltwater ocean, mangrove wetland, and a farm. The original 10-year mission to rotate crews in and out for scientific observation was curtailed in 1994, and the facility was run by Columbia University through 2003. The University of Arizona has a $30 million grant from the billionaire founder Ed Bass, and they intend to run the facility as a climate change laboratory, specifically studying the impact of climate change on water patterns. A long-term experiment underway involves the study of water movement on hillsides to see how temperatures and CO2 level increases effect the movement of water using a network of sensors.
Read more about this effort in this story in Tucson Weekly.
