10 Insane Facts About Biosphere 2, The Largest Contained Experiment Ever

The Biosphere 2 project has some bizarre, secret cult origins. T.C. Boyle's 2016 novel The Terranauts (which is loosely based around the Biosphere 2 experiment) omitted them because they're actually kind of unbelievable. Yet, it happened. In the words of Bad Religion, sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. A fellow by the name of Johnny Dolphin was the primary architect and creator of the Biosphere 2 project. He was not born Johnny Dolphin, however. He began his life as John P. Allen. John P. Allen was a noted metallurgist who dabbled in theater. He worked in Arizona with the avante garde theater group Caravan Of Dreams. The troupe evolved into a small following. Depending on who you ask, it then morphed into an apocalyptic doomsday cult. At this point, Allen began penning books under the pseudonym Johnny Dolphin. Dolphin believed the solution to Earth's impending doom was space exploration and Martian colonization. As luck would have it, the original inhabitants of the Biosphere 2 were members of the Caravan of Dreams. All involved hoped the Biosphere 2 would lead to similar projects on Mars.

She broke the glass seal, that is. One of the key components of the experiment was complete self-sufficiency. Nothing could enter or exit the sealed Biosphere. However, after eight months of being inside, Bionaut Jane Poynter cut off the tip of her finger in a cooking accident. The Medical Officer sewed the tip back on, but it didn't take - it shriveled up and turned black within days. Mission Control decided to remove her to receive medical attention. From there, things only got worse for the mission. Poynter returned with two duffel bags, stuffed with unknown goodies and tools. To this day, their contents are still unknown. As a result, many have questioned the credibility of the entire experiment.

Every good thriller has a twist. The biggest twist in the tale of Biosphere 2 is that the Caravan of Dreams was basically harmless. However, Steve Bannon, the man who seized power of the grand experiment, was not. Most known as Donald Trump's Chief Strategist, Bannon also founded the alt-right news site Breitbart. But back in the early '90s, he ran the investment firm Bannon & Co. in Beverly Hills, CA. Bannon & Co. took over the Biosphere 2 project when its funds dried up. The original eight Bionauts had completed their 2 years inside and a new crew resided within. At the time, Earth sciences interested Bannon, so he shifted the project's focus from the human element to mineral and environmental studies. Because of Bannon's lack of concern for the human participants, Bionauts from the previous crew feared for the lives of those inside. They took action, breaking through the Biosphere defenses in three separate places in April of 1994. The crew was warned, but the project was ruined. Nobody attempted to live in the Biosphere again, and the project never recovered.

One of the primary goals of Biosphere 2 was to create a self-sustaining atmosphere. The rainforest would clean the air of harmful carbon dioxide gasses, and the trees would release oxygen back into the atmosphere. However, it remains a mystery whether or not the Biosphere was truly self-sustaining. Scientists snuck in a massive carbon dioxide scrubber in case the gas reached dangerous levels. Engineers designed the scrubbers for submarines to keep the sailors breathing clean air. They provided the same service for the Bionauts. Unfortunately, they were in constant operation, leaving the entire project a bust, since the whole purpose of the project was to gage the necessary conditions for self-sustaining (non-manipulated) environment.

One of the side effects of the low crop yield of the first year of Biosphere 2 was that the medic, Dr. Roy Walford, was able to test his ideas on healthy starvation. At 69 years old, Dr. Walford had spent decades focused on increasing life longevity. In his studies, he discovered that thin mice outlived heavy ones, and his findings convinced him that a healthy, low-calorie diet was the key to living longer. In fact, he predicted that humans could live 120 years on what he named the CRON diet. So, when the carbon dioxide levels rose, and crops began dying, he was able to test his hypothesis on the Bionauts. At first, it appeared he was correct. The men dropped 18% of their body weight, and women lost 10%. Their blood sugar, blood pressure, and cholesterol levels all dropped. Unfortunately, there were side effects to the dramatic weight loss. As their bodies burned up the fat reserves, stored toxins were released and flooded their blood. The Bionauts complained about sluggishness and mental fatigue, and food theft became a problem among them. Some observers speculate that the food rations contributed to the group's internal fighting.

The Bionauts grew and raised their own food on a half-acre organic farm inside the Biosphere, and it was important that they raise high-yield crops with such a small plot in order to have the little nutrition that they did. Sweet potatoes and carrots, in particular, thrived in the Biosphere 2 environment and quickly became the staples of the their diet. Sweet potatoes and carrots are high in beta carotene; beta carotene, in turn, is what gives sweet potatoes and carrots their orange hue. The Bionauts ate such an abundance of sweet potatoes that all of their skin glowed orange like Willy Wonka's oompa loompas.

It shouldn't surprise anyone that cockroaches thrived in the Biodome. They can make do in just about any environment. What is surprising is that they managed to make it inside such a tightly monitored and closed environment. At night, cockroaches flooded the kitchen once the lights went out. In order to combat the infestation, the crew would grease coffee cups with KY Jelly. Dr. Roy Walford requested four tubes of the stuff for gynecological exams before closure, but he was given four cases. The Bionauts would bait the cups with papaya at the bottom of the mug. The roaches would climb inside, but they couldn't scale the slippery sides to escape. They were then ground up and fed to the chickens.

As the experiment progressed, the crew began to splinter. With oxygen and food levels low, half of the crew wanted to break closure for more supplies in order to continue their scientific studies. The other half believed that survival without assistance - no matter the costs - was the most important aspect of the mission. Heated arguments often resulted in the crew spitting in each others faces. Relations got so bad that the groups quit speaking. Mission Control brought in a psychologist to see if they had gone mad. The psychologist blamed it on a power struggle and did not intervene.

For such a grand scientific experiment, there were surprisingly few scientists on the crew. Of the original eight members, there was only one doctor, Dr. Roy Waldorf, who was in charge of their health. John Allen (AKA Johnny Dolphin) selected the other members based on how well they did in a series of challenges. They lived in Australia with Aboriginals for a year; they worked a farm; they lived on a boat; they performed in an improvised play. It was like winning Survivor to compete on Big Brother.

Although the initial experiment failed, the Biosphere unit led to some amazing discoveries. The University of Arizona and then Columbia University purchased the buildings after the crew mutinied against Steve Bannon. Both Arizona and Columbia used it as a massive laboratory. Scientists were able to alter the environment to mirror Earth, and they could even see how the planet will appear in the future because of the Biosphere 2's design. One significant thing that they discovered was that high carbon dioxide levels in the oceans were causing the coral reefs to die off through ocean acidification. They did this by boosting the carbon dioxide in the ocean in the Biosphere and recording what happened afterwards. Until then, the slow dying off of the Great Barrier Reef was a mystery. So something good did come from this insane fever dream after all.