MRI: MRI: Acquisition of a X-ray Machine at Chicago Botanic Garden

芝加哥植物园（CBG）获得一项奖励，购买一台柜式x光机，以支持种子生物学和生态学的研究，用于生态系统的保护和恢复。x光机对于扩大直接保护活动的范围和影响至关重要，这些活动为社会提供了多样化和广泛的利益。这些活动包括全球濒危植物分类群和高草草原植物的种子库，以及保护和恢复本地植物种群及其栖息地。改善CBG为植物保护中心和成功种子（分别为稀有植物和恢复相关植物的国家本地植物种子库项目）长期保护的11,000多个种子库的管理。新的x光机也将加强CBG的教育使命。了解和使用这台机器将提高保护专业人员、研究生和我们的科学职业连续体（SCC）项目参与者的研究培训质量，该项目让初中、高中和本科生（包括REU参与者）参与科学研究，重点关注历史上被排除在科学领域之外的群体。由CBG和西北大学提供的植物生物学和保护项目的研究生将使用它进行研究，来自地方、区域和国家保护机构、政府机构和其他研究机构的教师和访问科学家也将使用它。重要的是，新的x射线设备将满足国家基础设施的需求。该设施在芝加哥和中西部上游地区建立了急需的能力，以开展与种子有关的基础和应用研究，并保护和恢复本地植物及其栖息地。x光机将使CBG能够提高其在生态学、进化、保护生物学、恢复生态学、授粉生物学以及保护方法和实践方面的知识。CBG研究包括小的、碎片化的植物种群的生物学；珍稀、濒危本土植物和外来入侵植物的种群统计；植物和传粉媒介对环境变化的响应；种子功能性状；观赏植物的入侵潜力；种子转移区遗传；和更多。CBG的科学家们将使用x光机来评估种子中的胚胎形成，测试种子的活力，通过改进的植物适应性测量方法来更好地模拟植物人口统计，并观察蜜蜂的脂肪储备，以及其他用途。x射线成像既快速又无破坏性，并且允许人们进行没有它就不可能进行的研究——例如，测量种子胚胎的特征，然后将它们与单个种子的发芽联系起来。最后，x光设备将促进关于改进种子库方法的研究，使整个社会受益。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

An award is made to the Chicago Botanic Garden (CBG) to purchase a cabinet x-ray machine to support research on seed biology and ecology for applications in ecosystem conservation and restoration. The x-ray machine is critically important for expanding the scope and impact of direct conservation activities, which provide diverse and broad benefits to society. Such activities include seed banking of globally imperiled plant taxa and plants of the tallgrass prairie as well as conserving and restoring native plant populations and their habitats. Improved curation of CBG’s over 11,000 seed collections banked for long-term conservation benefits Center for Plant Conservation and Seeds of Success, the national native plant seed banking programs for rare plants and restoration-relevant plants respectively. The new x-ray machine will also enhance CBG’s educational mission. Learning about and using the machine will improve the quality of research training for conservation professionals, graduate students, and participants in our Science Career Continuum (SCC) program, which engages middle school, high school, and undergraduate students (including REU participants) in scientific research focusing on groups historically excluded in science. Graduate students in the Plant Biology and Conservation Program offered by CBG and Northwestern University will use it for research, as will faculty and visiting scientists from local, regional, and national conservation institutions, governmental agencies, and other research institutions. Importantly, the new x-ray equipment will fill a national infrastructure need. The facility builds much-needed capacity in Chicago and the upper Midwest to conduct basic and applied seed-related research and to conserve and restore native plants and their habitats.The x-ray machine will enable CBG to increase its capabilities to advance knowledge in ecology, evolution, conservation biology, restoration ecology, pollination biology, and in conservation methods and practice. CBG studies encompass the biology of small, fragmented plant populations; demography of both rare and threatened native plants, and invasive plant species; plant and pollinator responses to environmental changes; functional traits of seeds; invasive potential of ornamental plants; genetics of seed transfer zones; and more. CBG scientists will use the x-ray machine to assess embryo formation in seeds, test seed viability, better model plant demography with improved measures of plant fitness, and observe fat reserves in bees, among other uses. X-ray imagery is both rapid and non-destructive and allows one to conduct research that would be impossible without it – for example, measuring seed embryo characteristics and then linking them to germination of individual seeds. Lastly the x-ray facility will facilitate studies on improving seed banking methodology, benefiting society at large.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.