Contact: William Mitsch, (614) 292-9774
Written by Holly Wagner, (614) 292-8310[email protected]
Wetland Research Park Enters High-Tech Era With New Facility
COLUMBUS, Ohio, Nov. 16 - Researchers from five Ohio universities and colleges today unveiled plans for the next phase of the Olentangy River Wetland Research Park (ORWRP) on the campus of Ohio State University. This phase - the construction of the $2.8 million Ohio Center for Wetland and River Restoration - is scheduled to begin in April 2001.
The center is a cooperative venture of Ohio State, Shawnee, Youngstown and Wright State universities and Kenyon College, said William Mitsch, a professor of natural resources at Ohio State and the director of the ORWRP.
The new facility will allow scientists and the public to monitor conditions in the wetlands through a variety of high-tech sensors. Specially designed monitoring systems will give researchers vital information such as water temperature and the amount of nitrogen being retained by each wetland, according to Mitsch.
At least two "swamp cams" positioned in the research park will allow researchers to monitor how ducks and other wildlife are using the area. The plans also include adding control systems that automatically deliver the right amount of water to the experimental wetlands.
"We want to go high-tech and use the latest tools to continuously monitor the wetlands and collect data for researchers," Mitsch said.
Most of the information gathered in the new facility will be available not only to scientists, but to the public as well. "Our wetlands research will be on display for the public even more than it is now," Mitsch said. "The visitors' lobby in the new building will display instant readouts of information taken directly from sensors in the wetlands." The ORWRP is accessible to the public via a bike path that runs adjacent to the Olentangy River.
In addition, he said "results will be connected to the Internet so that every school kid in the world can find out what's going on at this university research station."
The new building, designed by the Columbus architecture firm NBBJ, will also house reference and conference rooms, two labs, an operations room used for collecting the data from the sensors, and faculty offices. Also, Mitsch said once construction of the new building is under way, two more wetlands - constructed to clean runoff from the building of the center - will add to the 25 acres of wetlands already in place at the 30-acre site.
The 9-year-old ORWRP is a kind of natural "supermarket" in that it is where terrestrial and aquatic life come to eat, Mitsch said. Currently on site are four wetlands: two kidney-shaped marshes primarily used for research; one billabong wetland ("billabong" is an Australian term for a wetland along a river); and the wooded corridor stretching along the bank of the Olentangy River.
Mitsch and his colleagues from the other four Ohio universities and colleges formed a wetland consortium in 1999 to develop the research and education center. To date, the $2.8 million building project has received $1.2 million from the Ohio Board of Regents and $300,000 from the Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center for a total of $1.5 million. "We are still looking for more than $1 million in private donations to make this building a reality," Mitsch said.
Editor's note: A drawing of the research and education building is available in jpg format. Please contact Holly Wagner at the number and e-mail below for images.
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