Editor’s note: This is the first part in a two-part series detailing developments in the UA’s operation of Biosphere 2. The UA looks to tackle “”grand challenges”” and inform the public about science ...

An international team of researchers has descended on University of Arizona’s Biosphere 2, sealing off the complex’s rain forest, to conduct a one-of-a-kind study examining the impact of droughts on ...

Last month, when John Druitt prepared to seal himself off for a year inside a huge glass dome in the Arizona desert, there was no shortage of people wondering about his sanity, including himself. He ...

ORACLE, Ariz. — Plopped in the Sonoran Desert, just outside Tucson, Ariz., sits a massive, multilevel greenhouse that's probably best known as the inspiration for a Pauly Shore movie. A slick, stepped ...

Biosphere 2 was a highly ambitious experiment to simulate a self-sustaining Mars colony in the Arizona desert. Eight men and women locked themselves inside for 2 years and experienced one incredible ...

Biosphere 2, a facility dedicated to the research and understanding of global scientific issues, is reopening. A bunch of scientists won't live in it this time. Instead the new owners of the Biosphere ...

ORACLE, Ariz. – They lived for two years and 20 minutes under the glass of a miniature Earth, complete with an ocean, rain forest, desert, grasslands and mangroves. Their air and water were recycled, ...

2005-02-20 04:00:00 PDT Oracle, Ariz.-- It was a New Age garden of Eden, hermetically sealed under glass in the Arizona desert. It was a glimpse into the far-distant future, a taste of what life might ...

ORACLE, Ariz. — Walking through the air lock of Biosphere 2, I was grateful that the two thick steel doors didn’t slam shut behind me. Unlike the research facility’s original occupants, who were ...

No one sent out for pizza. Coffee was a once-a-week luxury. Meat was served only on Sunday, and Thanksgiving was a turkeyless affair. Even in the hardest of times, however, there were beets, bananas ...