Exeter’s new super lab

New advanced plant growth chambers at the University of Exeter will help scientists recreate climate conditions including wind and rain to advance research into global food security problems.

The new facility aims to boost plant research to address an urgent global crisis. More than ten years ago, the United Nations issued the stark warning that we need to double global food production by 2050 to meet demands from the world’s growing population. Serious obstacles to achieving this goal include crop pathogens, pests and a global decline in pollinators.  

For the first time, the new facility will enable university researchers to recreate weather conditions including wind and rain in a controlled environment, which has so far been challenging. It will also be available to the global research community who want to control more variables that impact plant growth to replicate what really happens in nature.

Known as the Global Meteorological Simulator (GMS), the facility is one of just a few in the world and thought to be the only one of its kind in a university setting. Funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) and the University of Exeter, the new plant growth chambers will mimic current and future weather simulations from around the world. The GMS consists of four separate chambers each containing different plants – so a tropical storm might rage in one, while cool mist fills another.

Scientists will use the £1.5 million simulator to study plant diseases, investigating how weather conditions affect plants, and their pollinators, pests and disease-causing microbes.