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Research Facilities
![[picture of two grad students analyzing protein bands on X-ray film]](2GRAD.JPG)
The Department of Botany is located in Birge Hall on the campus of the University of Wisconsin, and provides several important facilities for research in the plant sciences. The Biology Library in Birge Hall has an extensive collection of over 40,000 books and journals, with primary emphasis on plant systematics and ecology; this collection is complemented by the massive holdings in plant physiology, biochemistry, and molecular biology in the Steenbock Memorial Library and the Health Sciences Library.
2005 A Better Look at Plants -- A facility for plant microscopy was born on the B1 floor of Birge Hall. Funding was secured from a NSF grant, UW Grad School, Botany Dept, L&S College, CALS, Genetics, Horticulture, Biochemistry Departments. Two exceptional microscopes were purchased: a confocal microscope (Zeiss 510 META) and an environmental scanning electron microscope (FEI Quanta 200 ESEM). Neither instrument is available to biologists elsewhere on campus. The new microscopy facility also includes a general purpose microscope room, a prep room with fume hood, a sectioning room, a dark growth room, and a computer room for analyzing results.
Research equipment includes an electron microscope; light microscopes with phase, Nomarksi, and ultraviolet optics; cryostat; sterile laminar flow hoods for cell culture; several recording spectrophotometers; a Hewlett-Packard recording gas chromatograph; a Beckman HPLC system; several refrigerated centrifuges and three ultracentrifuges; a full range of equipment for electrophoresis, immunoelectrophoresis, isoelectric focusing, and DNA amplification via the polymerase chain reaction; a monoclonal antibody facility; several infrared gas analyzers for the laboratory and field measurement of photosynthesis, including a system to stop metabolism quickly so that useful biochemical analyses can be conducted simultaneously; equipment for conventional and patch-clamp electrophysiology; five LI-COR LI-1600 steady-state porometers; several muffle furnaces; two liquid scintillation counters; and numerous growth chambers. A number of the faculty have direct access to an automated DNA sequencer. Computing facilities include timesharing on the Computer Center's VAX cluster, network access to a Cray X/MP-48 supercomputer, and numerous microcomputers within the Department connected to the WorldWideWeb. An 8,000 square foot greenhouse complex is attached to Birge Hall, for the sole use of the Department of Botany. Facilities for hydroculture are available in the greenhouse complex. The Department also has ready access to the growth chambers of the Wisconsin Biotron, providing outstanding controlled-environment facilities. The Laboratory for Biology and Biophysics and the Wisconsin Million-Volt Electron Microscope Facility are important campus resources.
Visually striking, systematically arranged plant displays in the Botany garden near Birge Hall are an outstanding teaching resource as well as an aesthetic delight. The State of Wisconsin Herbarium in Birge Hall contains over 900,000 specimens, specializing in plants of Wisconsin and the Midwest, and well as several areas in Central and South America. Students and faculty conducting field studies in northern Wisconsin have access to research facilities at Trout Lake Station in Vilas County and Kemp Biological Station in Oneida County. Nearly 300 scientific areas maintained by the State of Wisconsin are outstanding resources for ecological and systematic studies. Research is also conducted at the nearby UW Arboretum (1,200 acres of restored native plant communities), the Harvard Forest, Duke Forest, and several locations in South America and the Pacific.
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File last updated: July 23, 2002 |