Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment

The Institute has extensive research facilities available to students, staff and collaborators.

The quality and scale of research outputs of the Institute are greatly enhanced by a significant increase in the scope of the existing infrastructure established on the Hawkesbury campus together with the infrastructure provided by the $40 million Education Investment Fund for Climate Change and Energy Research. 

The Institute has excellent field-based and controlled environment facilities including the whole tree chambers and FACE that simulate future CO₂ levels and climate, rainout shelters that simulate seasonal drought, an Eddy flux tower that measures water and CO₂ fluxes at the forest ecosystem level, and an insectary for investigating the interaction between plants and insects under environmental change. The Institute also continues to invest heavily in new equipment and infrastructure each year.  

New laboratories located within a recently refurbished building include advanced facilities for research in cell biology/microbiology and molecular genetics/genomics including a new generation, fast throughput genome sequencer. These facilities enable a range of genomics-based analyses including the rapid identification of biodiversity in soil microbes, plants, insects and animals, and the detection and identification of specific genetic traits, such as those conferring water and nutrient use efficiency in plants. We are also pursuing additional equipment and infrastructure to support genetic transformation and bioinformatics capabilities to enable complete genomic and transcriptomic focused research.