#108 - The Dope Scientist

Neil Mattson, PhD, is a professor at Cornell’s School of Integrative Plant Science, a greenhouse extension specialist, and this episode’s guest. Joining Michael and Greg from the floor of HortiCann in Denver, we start our chat with the cyclical attempts LEDs have made at breaking into this field, and how maybe this is the time they dethrone high-pressure sodium lamps, even it means rebuilding a bunch of heating systems to do it. As a researcher we ask him what the real metrics are for horticultural light - lumens per watt is great for warehouse, but when that warehouse needs to produce rather than store food, it becomes a question of biomass efficacy and micromoles per joule. The conversation drifts away from the particulars of the GLASE project and more into how our understanding of light is creating new specialties in engineering, design and agricultural sciences; these may not turn into full fields of study, but will turn into professions fairly soon. The LEDifiction of the built world is coming for indoor farming, but given how much energy some of these facilities use we’re going to need better sources of power if we’re really going to improve climate conditions. Also in this episode, a discussion of the future of cultivation, the co-evolution of human beings alongside plant-life, and other ideas from the show floor.