Biosecurity

Plant health and host/pathogen interactions: our laboratory facilities are licensed for work with quarantine listed plant pathogens, either on host plant material, soil or as pure cultures. We also have facilities to support research on pathogen diagnostics.

Controlled Growth Environments

A selection of controlled environment growth cabinets are available for growth study projects and culture collections including:

• Growing diatoms in pure cultures
• The micro-propagation of Rhododendrons that cannot be propagated by conventional means
• Plant growth studies in response to climate change scenarios
• Experiments on seed germination
• Quarantine listed pathogens

Chemistry and physiology

We have a LI-COR-6400XT Portable Photosynthesis System for investigations into plant physiology to measure photosynthetic activity and efficiency.

We undertake Thin Layer Chromatography for analysis of secondary metabolites as part of our lichen taxonomy programme.

We are establishing a DART-MS platform in collaboration with the University of Edinburgh to support research into timber identification.

Using lichens to test how species might acclimate and/or adapt to climate change we measure chlorophyll fluorescence using a PAM (Pulse Amplitude Modulated) fluorometer. This evaluates photosynthetic efficiency under simulated climatic conditions in plant growth cabinets. We are investigating how plants and fungi cope under future climate change scenarios.

We measure tolerance of plants and fungi to increasing levels of nitrogen pollution. We have invested in equipment that measures surface hydrophobicity, to reveal the speed with which water, and pollutants, are absorbed into plant and fungal tissues.