TV/VCR and radio/CD/tape player, sofa and easy chair, and clothes closet. Up a circular staircase is the loft bedroom with a clothes bureau. There were ten apartments in Biosphere 2, the extra two were allocated for visiting scientists who may use them in the future.
Before closure, the crew had the opportunity to decorate their ‘pads’ with whatever they wanted. So, we had our favorite paintings, souvenirs from travels around the world, books, and music collections. We also chose rooms with views that we liked—though all the views were out of this world. Some looked out over the agriculture area and south to the Santa Catalina Mountains, others looked out over the ridge to the west and were good for sunset-watchers. Some had a view of the area in front of the habitat, where gleaming, white tents sprung up during special events at Biosphere 2.
Laser transformed his apartment into a video studio with gear for making documentary films. A piece of blue plastic in his window mystified visitors until he explained that he was protecting his equipment from harsh sunlight. Linda decked out her apartment with beautiful artifacts from native cultures around the world. Roy’s apartment was decorated with art pieces from artist friends. Mark’s was dominated by his huge library of books, Australian Aboriginal carvings, and colorful paintings.
Most of the crew kept a personal record of their experiences, and before turning in at about 9:15, Mark made his daily entry in his computer. Others kept long-hand notebooks. By 10:00 PM, the hallways of the habitat were dark, although light seeped out from under the doors of a few apartments.
For all eight of us, another day of the 731 days we would spend in Biosphere 2 had come to a close. As we drifted into sleep, our world continued to hum around, above, and beneath us. Almost all of the crew have remarked upon the special intensity of dreams inside Biosphere 2, but no one noted any particularly unusual dream that night. A few of us may have noticed the sliver of the new moon rising outside, refracting through the beautiful geometric glass sky of our miniature world.
Nestled in the foothills of the Santa Catalina mountains north of Tucson, Arizona, the 3.15 acres Biosphere 2 facility is the world’s largest closed ecological system. Inside are tropical rainforest, savannah, desert, mangrove marsh, coral reef biomes, a half-acre farm, and human living area.
Schematic of Biosphere 2, built for one hundred years of operation, each of its biomes covered about half an acre and with deep soil/sediment tanks that were lined with stainless steel below ground and airtight space frame roofs above. The white geodesic domes covered its two variable volume “lungs” which allowed the facility’s air to expand and contract without damaging the structure.
Biosphere 2’s Mission Control housed a key part of the facility’s “Nerve System,” allowing outside scientists and IT specialists access to the data being collected.
Biosphere 2’s operation required the expertise of many scientists and engineers. A sophisticated real-time data and sensor computer network, state-of-the-art for its time, facilitated the flow of information to and from the facility.
Taber in the Analytic Laboratory in Biosphere 2. The lab used no toxic chemicals and was equipped to make very detailed analyses of our air and water.
In addition to automatic sensors distributed around Biosphere 2, hand-collected samples of air, water, biomass, and soil were gathered for periodic analysis and to augment research studies. Here, air samples are collected in the savannah.
Biosphere 2’s constructed coral reef included around three dozen coral species, of which only one was lost during the experiment. Its operation yielded important insights into the potential impacts of climate change on ocean health.
This map of the coral reef was done within two weeks of the end of the two-year closure. Living stony coral species are colored, with thin black lines representing seagrasses. Black colors represent dead colonies of all species. Depth was measured to generate a bathymetric contour map which was digitized and merged with the coral file to generate the final image.
Several times a week, Gaie dove in the Biosphere 2 ocean to garden the corals and inspect the health of the reef.
The coral reef biome involved daily management and careful observation which included measurements of ocean water chemistry, weeding algae to remove nutrients, maintaining the pumps, wave machine, and other technical support systems.
A botanist in a new world, Linda measures inter-nodal lengths on a desert plant. Research conducted before, during, and after the closure experiment tracked the development of all the wilderness biomes.
In the rainforest, Linda reseeds planting pockets of the cloud forest mountain overlooking the lowland forest area. Fast-growing trees formed the initial canopy, protecting light-sensitive ones which will dominate the rainforest as it matures.
The desert was modeled on coastal fog deserts like that of Baja, California. Each biomic area includes a variety of ecosystems with characteristic soils, streams/waterfalls/pools, and vegetation.
The rainforest soon after closure, looking towards the cloud forest mountain. Water overflowed the pool at its top, creating a waterfall into Tiger Pond at its base and flowing through the meandering stream of the varzea, the low-lying floodplain rainforest.
The intensive half-acre farm had 18 plots, including rice paddies with rotating seasonal crops. The farm was one of the world’s most productive, supplying over 80% of the biospherian diet for two years with more than 80 crops for food variety.
The mangrove marsh biome was modeled on an Everglades, Florida estuary. Its zones went from freshwater marsh through five more ecosystems of increasing salinity, including oyster beds, white, black, and red mangroves. The mangrove marsh grew rapidly and studies confirmed
