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    Mesocosm facility

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Mesocosm and Aquarium Facility

The Mesocosm and Aquarium facilities at ECU, Joondalup are fully equipped to enable high quality experimental research of aquatic ecosystems. The mesocosm is a fully automated greenhouse with temperature control managed through a wet wall, extraction fans and adjustable air flow through the roof. Within the mesocosm are twenty four 500L fibreglass tanks with independent flow through 100 L sump tanks with water filtration and temperature control by heater chillers units. There are three rooms which house aquarium facilities, two of them with temperature-control. These rooms can be set up in different configurations but are suited to smaller tanks of 50L or less arranged on shelving. All facilities are plumbed to both seawater and rainwater from storage tanks on site. Fresh, marine and hypersaline experiments are possible for microbes, plants and animals where temperature, salinity, light, CO2 and pH can be manipulated. These facilities are available to research staff and HDR students in the School of Science.

List of equipment

  • 500 litre fibreglass tanks
  • 100 litre fibreglass tanks
  • Various sizes of glass aquaria
  • Teco TK2000 heater chiller unit’s
  • Teco TK150 chiller unit’s
  • Pentek filter housing’s
  • Titanium heaters 500W
  • Titanium heater with controller 2400W
  • Aquatronica aquarium control system with conductivity and temperature probes
  • Dupla CO2 Reaktor 500 with Aquatronica controller
  • G2 Aqua air LED lights
  • Growpro full spectrum LED grow lights
  • Aquapro low voltage pumps
  • Reefe low voltage pumps

Current projects in the facilities

  • Pressure-response relationships, building resilience and future proofing seagrass meadows. This project is part of the WAMSI Westport Marine Science Program led by A/Prof Kathryn McMahon from ECU and Dr Simone Strydom from DBCA with Research associates Nicole Said and Chanelle Webster and Research Assistant Natasha Dunham.
  • Pressure-response relationships of benthic filter-feeders to predict dredging impacts. This project is part of the WAMSI Westport Marine Science Program led by Prof Glenn Hyndes at ECU and Dr James Tweedley from Murdoch University with Jess Billinghurst, Leah Beltran, Brayden Cockerell and Henry Carrick as Research Assistants.
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