Rothamsted Experimental Station
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Image:20050828-007-rothamsted.jpg The Rothamsted Experimental Station, one of the oldest agricultural research institutions in the world, is located at Harpenden in Hertfordshire, England.
It was founded in 1843 by John Bennet Lawes on his inherited 16th century estate, Rothamsted Manor, to investigate the impact of inorganic and organic fertilizers on crop yield. Lawes, a noted Victorian era entrepreneur and scientist, had founded one of the first artificial fertilizer manufacturing factories one year earlier in 1842.
Appointing a young chemist, Joseph Henry Gilbert, as his scientific collaborator, Lawes launched the first of a series of long-term field experiments, some of which continue to this day. Over the next 57 years, Lawes and Gilbert established the foundations of modern scientific agriculture and the principles of crop nutrition.
By the 1900s, the vast amount of data accumulated from these "Classical Field Experiments," together with the inherent variability of agricultural field experimentation, inspired a more rigorous approach to statistical methods. Ronald Fisher, Frank Yates, William Cochran, Oscar Irwin and John Wishart worked at Rothamsted, performing pioneering work in 20th century statistics and genetics. Indeed, many consider Rothamsted to be the birthplace of modern statistical theory and practice.
Partly through these methods, researchers at Rothamsted have made significant contributions to agricultural science, including the discovery and development of systemic herbicides and pyrethroid insecticides, as well as pioneering contributions to the fields of virology, nematology, soil science and pesticide resistance. During World War II, aiming to increase crop yields for a nation at war, a team under the leadership of Judah Hirsch Quastel developed 2,4-D, still the most widely used weed-killer in the world.
In 1987 Rothamsted, the Long Ashton Research Station, and Broom's Barn Experimental Station merged to form the Institute of Arable Crops Research (IACR). The station is now operated by a grouping of private organizations under the name of Rothamsted Research and is mainly funded by various branches of the UK government through the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council.
Books
- A History of Agricultural Science in Great Britain 1620-1954, by E. J. Russell (1966) London, George Allen & Unwin. Sir John Russell was director of Rothamsted from 1912 to 1943, and his book emphasises the role of Rothamsted in the development of agricultural science in Britain. E. J. Russell FRS
Now known as Rothamsted Research