Research facilities
There are many ecological research facilities at NIOO: from experimental mini-ponds to research vessels, and from living labs to bacterial culture collections.
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Aquatic laboratories
The aquatic laboratories facilitate researchers working with aquatic samples, sediments or organisms. They include laboratories with specialised equipment for aquatic analyses, dedicated rooms for controlled experiments, and they give access to separate storage areas for field equipment, sample storage, chemicals and disposables stocks. -
Chemostats
Chemostats are bioreactors used for cultivation of phytoplankton and/or zooplankton. They can be operated as batch (no dilution rate), as chemostat (fixed dilution rate) or as turbidostats (dilution rate dependent on turbidity). They can be operated as open or closed system, and also axenically. -
Fatty acids determination and quantification
Fatty acids such as Phospholipid (PLFA), neutral lipid fatty acids (NLFA) and Ergosterol (total fungal biomass) are used to assess microbial biomass and community structure in soil and other types of environmental samples. This facility provides all the equipment and knowledge required for the determination and quantification of PLFA, NLFA and Ergosterol. -
Flowcytometry and cell sorting lab
Flowcytometry (FCM) is a technique that distinguishes individual particles based on light scatter and fluorescence. A large advantage is that FCM can analyse and sort cells at a very high speed of up to 10,000 cells/second. -
Greenhouse and trace gas analysis facilities
The NIOO greenhouse and trace gas analysis facility is part of the chemical analytical lab with equipment and facilities to asses gas concentrations in atmosphere or in soil gas or soil moisture. Gases (CH4, CO2, N2O, CO, H2,C¬2H4 can be measured over a wide concentration range and even to below-atmospheric levels (ppb) or in stable isotope studies (13C/12C in CO2, CH4). -
Nematode extraction & determination
Nematode communities play an important role in soil ecology research. To analyse different type of plant-soil nematodes, NIOO has a facility for extracting soil and root nematodes by Oostenbrink funnel and mistifier. -
Sperm lab
The sperm lab houses state-of-the-art equipment used for the analysis of sperm.This includes a computer-assisted sperm-analysis (CASA) system for accurate and automatic assessment of sperm motility and a microscope/camera/software combination for digital image analysis of sperm morphology. -
Stable isotope facility
The NIOO stable isotope facility is part of the chemical analytical lab, with equipment and facilities to perform stable isotope tracer experiments. Stable isotopes (13C) can be analysed in PLFA, gases (CO2/CH4) , (13C/15N) solid material (e.g. soil, plant material, bird feathers) as well as in DNA and RNA and breath samples of birds (D/H). -
Volatile profiling and mVOCs database
Plants and microorganisms emit a wide range of chemically diverse volatile compounds. These volatiles mediate swift chemical interactions and communication in both aquatic and terrestrial environments, and carry out important ecological functions.