Equipment: MRI-TR1: acquisition of a multi-chamber integrated gas-exchange and fluorescence instrument for multidisciplinary research and applied learning in biology and chemistry

The National Science Foundation Office of Integrative Activities awarded Missouri Western State University $111,547 on August 1, 2026, to acquire a LI-6800 Integrated Gas Exchange and Fluorescence System with plant, aquatic, soil, and insect chambers under the Integrative Activities program (CFDA 47.083). The instrument will enable multidisciplinary research and hands-on student training in plant science, ecology, environmental science, microbiology, chemistry, and agriculture at the St. Joseph, Missouri campus through July 31, 2029.

The system will allow researchers and students to quantify how plants, algae, insects, soils, and aquatic organisms respond to environmental conditions and interact with one another, yielding data on ecosystem function, agricultural productivity, and environmental quality. Research enabled by the equipment will investigate plant responses to environmental stress, identify naturally occurring compounds that improve crop resilience, evaluate environmentally friendly alternatives to conventional agricultural inputs, and monitor ecosystem condition using field measurements, remote sensing, and advanced analytical approaches. The project will also support development and application of artificial intelligence tools for metabolite discovery and interpretation of remotely sensed environmental datasets, accelerating scientific discovery and improving environmental monitoring. As a primarily undergraduate institution, Missouri Western will use the instrument to provide advanced technology training typically unavailable at institutions of this type, addressing challenges related to food security, sustainable agriculture, water quality, and natural resource management.

Abstract

This project supports the acquisition of a LI-6800 integrated gas exchange and fluorescence system at missouri western state university (mwsu), which will expand research, education and workforce development in plant science, ecology, environmental science, microbiology, chemistry and agriculture. The instrument will allow researchers and students to directly quantify how plants, algae, insects, soils and aquatic organisms respond to environmental conditions and interact with one another, providing critical information about biological processes underlying ecosystem function, agricultural productivity and environmental quality. The project addresses challenges related to food security, sustainable agriculture, water quality and natural resource management. Research enabled by the instrument will investigate plant responses to environmental stress, identify naturally occurring compounds which improve crop resilience, evaluate environmentally friendly alternatives to conventional agricultural inputs and monitor ecosystem condition using field measurements, remote sensing and advanced analytical approaches. The project will also support development and application of artificial intelligence (AI) tools for metabolite discovery and interpretation of remotely sensed environmental datasets, accelerating scientific discovery, supporting development of AI-enabled predictive tools and improving environmental monitoring. As a primarily undergraduate institution, mwsu will use this instrument to provide hands-on training with advanced technologies often unavailable at institutions of this type. The proposed acquisition of the LI-6800 integrated gas exchange and fluorescence system with plant, aquatic, soil and insect chambers will establish a shared platform supporting multidisciplinary investigations across terrestrial and aquatic systems. The LI-6800 uniquely enables quantitative measurements of photosynthesis, chlorophyll fluorescence, respiration, transpiration, soil carbon flux and whole-organism metabolism in terrestrial and aquatic systems under controlled conditions. These capabilities will provide physiological and ecological data currently unavailable at mwsu and will support advances in sustainable agriculture, biotechnology, environmental monitoring and AI-assisted analysis of metabolomic and remote sensing datasets. The instrument will also strengthen interdisciplinary collaborations while substantially expanding undergraduate research and training opportunities. This project aligns with the NSF?s biotechnology and artificial intelligence (AI) priority areas. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.- subawards are not planned for this award.