Canada began research on biological life support systems (i.e. plants for food, water and atmosphere management) with applications in space in the early 1990s. Since that time Canada has evolved as a worldwide leader in biological life support system research and technology development. The rapid growth of Canadian expertise should not surprise the average Canadian.
1. Canada has a climate which provides challenges for plant production
2. The greenhouse industry has evolved to supply some of our needs
3. The "connections" between the academic world and industry are strong in Canada, resulting in quality technology transfers between the sectors
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So what is the point of bringing this article link to the blog? Aside from advertising our position at CESRF? It is the third point of course: technology transfer. In 2010 Intravision Group (IVG) established a cooperation with CESRF to engineer and support the adaptation of narrow bandwidth light technology -- specifically light emitting diode (LED) technology -- to the facilities sealed environment and variable pressure chambers. Ever since studies on plant growth and development including; measuring photosynthetic gas exchange, air quality, nutrient uptake and control technologies, under hypobaric conditions, have developed a range of CEA recipes placing Intravision at the forefront of biological lighting technology and development.
It is from the knowledge we gain studying plants in the chambers that we are able to integrate Intravision technologies commercially and advance controlled environment agriculture towards viability -- from a biological and energy perspective -- marrying biology, applied physics and innovative engineering expertise to deliver leading solutions to our sector partners.
