Series consists of research notebooks, committee documents and correspondence from the Prairie Regional Laboratory registry system, including files on various aspects of lingnin, wheat straw, butylene glycol, myogen enzymes, furfural, mycology, safflower, aeration, etc. Also included is information related to studies of the establishment of a starch-gluten industry in Western Canada, agricultural residues, etc. The committee files related to the Prairie Regional Committee, the Special Western Agricultural Committee, the Co-ordinating Committee on Western Crop Investigations, the Associate Committee on Grain Research, the Associate Committee on Plant Disease, the Associate Committee on Plant Breeding, the Associate Committee on Animal Nutrition, the Associate Committee on Animal Science, etc.
National Research Council Canada. Prairie Regional Laboratory : A prairie research unit had been in existence for many years, with individuals working out of the University of Saskatchewan and the Division of Applied Biology in Ottawa. In 1943, however, the NRC formally put into place plans to construct a laboratory on the campus of the University of Saskatchewan. The PRL was officially opened on 8 June 1948, as part of the Division of Applied Biology, with Dr GA Ledingham as leader. The mandate of the new laboratory was to promote studies on the use of agricultural surpluses (for example: wheat) and farm waste products (for example: straw). By 1950, the laboratory was in full operation and projects related to prairie agricultural issues were transferred from the Ottawa laboratory.
With the discovery of oil and gas reserves on the prairies in the early 1950s, the PRLs research agenda changed somewhat, with greater efforts made to understand the 'fundamental chemistry of agricultural materials'.
In 1983, the PRL became the Plant Biotechnology Institute (PBI), and while the interests of the new Institute were somewhat broader than those of the PRL, the work of the PBI remained focussed on the agricultural products of Western Canada.
