mesocosm

[mee-zuh-koz-uhm, mez-uh-]

noun

Environmental Science.

1. a relatively large, controlled outdoor experimental environment or ecosystem, as opposed to one in a laboratory.

   The research facility, with 50 3,000-liter shallow freshwater mesocosms, is one of Europe's largest.

Word History and Origins

Origin of mesocosm¹

First recorded in 1980–85; meso- ( def. ) + -cosm ( def. )

Example Sentences

“You have so little space and a limited system. In the mesocosm, you are manipulating a natural system.”

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These mesocosm canopies looked much like a pop-up canopy tent, but with mesh screen sides.

Read more on Salon

Best says that her mesocosm experiments are more sophisticated and realistic than lab studies, but less easy to control.

Read more on Nature

In each mesocosm, one plant was surrounded by a mesh penetrated by holes half a micron across.

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Then, four days from the end, one of the 40-micron meshes in each mesocosm was rotated to sever any hyphae that had penetrated it, and the central plant was then infested with aphids.

Read more on Economist