The University is part of a multimillion dollar collaborative effort focused on groundbreaking studies aimed at bringing in federal funding and expanding research opportunities. Construction of a new
underground building is slated to begin within a year.
Rich Linton, University vice president for research and graduate studies, said the Oregon Nanoscience and
Microtechnologies Institute combines “university and
industry research to integrate … nanoscale science
and microengineering to allow practical technology to be developed.”
ONAMI is a collaboration between the
University; Oregon State University; Portland State
University; the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, Wash.,; the state of Oregon; selected
researchers from the Oregon Graduate Institute and
the Oregon Health & Science University; and the world-leading “Silicon Forest” high technology industry cluster of Oregon and southwest Washington, according
to the institute’s Web site, www.onami.us. Linton said the University’s main contribution to ONAMI is in the realm of nanotechnology, while OSU contributes in the area of microtechnology.
“We’re talking about atomic dimensions, the ability to manipulate atoms and molecules at that scale,”
Linton said.
Linton described the Materials Science Institute, which makes materials at the nanoscale, as the University’s main link to ONAMI. The Materials Science Institute’s purpose is to study the structure and properties of materials, to educate in the sciences of materials and to serve Oregon as a resource in these sciences, according to its Web site.
History of ONAMI
Collaboration among OSU’s Center for Microtechnology-Based Energy, Chemical and Biological Systems and the University’s Materials Science Institute and Center for Advanced Materials Characterization in Oregon began in 2000.
University chemistry professor Jim Hutchison said this collaboration, called Multi-Scale Materials and Devices, began when OSU professor Kevin Drost approached the University and asked whether nanoscience could improve the performance of microtechnology. The results of this initial collaboration were microscale reactors. In contrast to large flasks, which have trouble cooling down while chemicals mix inside, microscale reactors are a series of tiny tubes strapped together and lined with nanoscale materials that
encourage speedy reactions.
In 2003, PSU’s Center for Emerging Technologies joined the collaboration, and the 2003 Oregon State Legislature established ONAMI with a $21 million investment, according to ONAMI’s Web site.
Hutchison is now a member of the institute’s Leadership Team.
“In that role, I probably think about ONAMI every day,” he said.
ONAMI Executive Director Skip Rung said University chemistry professor Dave Johnson and Drost had been working with industry for some time already, but formal collaboration began in 2002 when Rung and OVP
Venture Partners partner Dave Chen began inviting industry representatives to meetings. Rung said Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., expressed support for this move.
Intel; Hewlett-Packard; FEI Company; Electro Scientific Industries; LSI Logic/Nantero; OVP Venture Partners; Schwabe, Williamson & Wyatt; Pacific Northwest National Laboratory; Xerox; Molecular Probes; and Bend Research are ONAMI’s major industry affiliates, Rung said.
“They’re major technology
employers in the state that have an
interest in a healthy education
system,” Rung said.
Hutchison said other companies can be involved with ONAMI at
lesser levels.
“ONAMI is pretty open,” he said. “Lots of people can contribute.”
Rung added that the list of
companies involved continues
to grow.
“We just haven’t gotten around to everyone yet,” he said.
One possible future collaborator is long-time University supporter Nike.
“Nike has had some interaction with the Materials Science Institute through our polymer internship program,” Hutchison said. “They’ve been fairly interested in our green chemistry program.”
Green chemistry, which Hutchison and fellow chemistry professor Ken Doxsee developed at the University, focuses on reducing, recycling or eliminating the use of toxic chemicals in chemistry.
“We have a lot of mutual interest in green chemistry because Nike was one of the first companies in the world to embrace green chemistry,” Hutchison said.
Hutchison said Nike’s involvement with ONAMI is not direct but is restricted to University organizations that feed into ONAMI.
“They haven’t taken a strong leadership role in (ONAMI),” Hutchison said. “They’re participating but not leading. Their participation is growing. We would very much like them to continue to be interested in ONAMI and keep working along these lines.”
ONAMI’s benefits
Linton said the state of Oregon is limited in its ability to direct financial resources to universities, and ONAMI will economically help the
universities and the state in general.
“We’re looking for ways to connect our research more directly to the economic vitality of the state,” Linton said. “It takes that kind of combined effort to move us forward as a state in that area.”
Linton said the University
contributes about one-third of
ONAMI’s $20 million budget, mostly in the form of federal grants to
University faculty.
“Sum all that together, the University’s been investing multiple millions of dollars in the past few years to support the ONAMI effort,” Linton said.
Linton added in an e-mail that ONAMI as a whole receives more than $10 million per year in non-state funds, mostly in the form of grants from federal agencies such as the
National Science Foundation, and the University receives at least $5 million in grants per year for equipment,
faculty research, graduate student training and initiatives such as
green chemistry.
Funding for ONAMI research
affects University students even at the undergraduate level.
“It broadens the possibility for students to get mentors, to find experts to solve a problem, to put together an awesome research team that’s world-class,” Hutchison said. “That’s really what ONAMI is all about.
“Because ONAMI influences the research of all its participants, any student who’s doing research will be influenced by ONAMI or have
opportunities with ONAMI,”
Hutchison said, adding that most
undergraduate chemistry majors do research at some point in their time at the University.
These research opportunities are likely to continue, as the state
government is making plans to fund ONAMI for the next biennium.
“The Governor’s proposed (fiscal year) 05-07 budget includes an additional $7 million in state funds for the statewide ONAMI programs, and is included in Senate Bill 838,” Linton wrote in the e-mail.
Rung said ONAMI has already
had positive effects on Oregon’s economy by providing research contracts with funds that help educate graduate students.
“One of the most strategic things we do is employ graduate students,” Rung said. “Those are jobs, but they turn into degrees.”
Rung said patents are another economic benefit ONAMI provides to the state, citing two patents Hutchison recently received as examples.
“ONAMI has the potential to
help the universities with patenting costs,” said Don Gerhart, director
of the University’s Office of
Technology Transfer.
The Office of Technology Transfer, which makes University-developed innovations available to the private sector to bring the innovations into societal use, received 40 invention disclosures during the 2004 fiscal year. Invention disclosures have the potential to become patents after years of paperwork.
ONAMI’s applications
The institute’s research focuses on the integration of nanotechnology and microtechnology, according to its Web site. The f
ield is divided into four types of activity: integration of nanomaterials and nanostructures into microscale systems to greatly enhance performance; using microtechnology for the efficient large- scale manufacturing of nanomaterials; interaction between functional nanoparticles and living cells; and
attaching nanoparticles to bio-
molecules to build electronic systems for microtechnology.
Applications for this work include cell-based biosensors for homeland security and drug discovery,
medical diagnostics, facilitating the
absorption of medicines within the human body and the world’s first transparent transistors.
Linton said ONAMI does work on sensing devices that the Department of Homeland Security could use in inspecting borders and ports. He added that while the Department of Homeland Security does not directly fund ONAMI, the two organizations
benefit from each other indirectly.
“I think ONAMI will benefit … from the funding going into the Department of Homeland Security,”
Linton said.
ONAMI partner Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, one of nine U.S. Department of Energy multi-program national laboratories, does research in the areas of computing and information technology, energy, environment, fundamental science, health and safety, marine sciences, national security and nuclear technology. According to the laboratory’s Web site, nearly half of its $580 million annual business volume reflects work in national security programs for the Departments of Energy, Homeland Security, Defense and other federal agencies.
“PNNL is one of our four lead collaborators, and we think there are some great collaborations working together in the area of homeland
security,” Rung said.
Hutchison said to his knowledge, homeland security work is not being done at the University.
Hutchison said PNNL researchers sometimes use the University’s Time-of-Flight Secondary Ion Mass
Spectrometry machine, which helps determine the composition of materials. It is shared with ONAMI affiliates and others through the Center for Advanced Materials Characterization in Oregon. Hutchison said CAMCOR, an arrangement for sharing University scientific equipment, initially began in the Materials Science Institute but has since become a separate University-wide entity, and he expressed hope that CAMCOR would help spread ONAMI further.
“This instrument is one that they didn’t have, so it’s been a fantastic collaboration to have them come down and use our instruments, too,” Hutchison said.
Rung said ONAMI has received two contracts from the U.S. Congress in defense appropriations. One contract, a U.S. Army-based project, is Miniature Tactical Energy Systems, which makes heating, cooling and power systems for soldiers in vehicles. The Inherently Safer Nanomaterials and Nanomanufacturing initiative, sponsored by the U.S. Air Force, makes coatings for aircraft surfaces, among other things. Hutchison is the program manager for this initiative.
Rung said ONAMI doesn’t view the U.S. Armed Forces differently from other customers.
“This is something that they need like anyone else,” Rung said, “nothing to do with weapons or anything like that.”
Separate from ONAMI, PNNL is also connected with the University through the Technology Entrepreneurship Program, a collaboration between the Office of Technology Transfer, the Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship and the School of Law.
“PNNL is very interested in forming regional collaborations across the Northwest,” Gerhart said.
TEP, now in its third year, is an opportunity for law and M.B.A. students to practice developing business plans.
“They look at this collection of technologies that come in from PNNL and the Office of Technology Transfer at the U of O,” Gerhart said. “These are all real technologies, not an academic exercise with no meaning in the real scheme of things, … and each team picks an innovation that they want to perform an in-depth assessment on.”
ONAMI’s new home
While ONAMI currently exists at the University primarily through communication between various separately housed departments, plans to give the institute a physical presence on campus are in action. Linton said the University has received $9.5 million in state bonds to build the University’s ONAMI component, as part of the Legislature’s initial $21 million investment into ONAMI. Rung said OSU and PSU also received $9.5 million and $1 million respectively to renovate buildings used for ONAMI work at those institutions.
Originally, Linton said, the plan was to construct the new building in the Riverfront Research Park on the north side of Franklin Boulevard. Linton said this plan had to be changed because it was found that the vibration caused by trains running nearby would cause problems for sensitive work done inside.
“When the site was tested, it didn’t come up to the most stringent standards that nanomaterials
require,” Linton said.
The new plan is to house ONAMI on the east side of the current science complex, between Huestis and Deschutes Halls. The building may not be visible to passers-by.
“Because of the vibrational issues, it turns out an underground site is ideal,” Linton said.
Hutchison said the only thing above ground may be a light tower to let natural light down.
“The idea is that that region of campus is an open-space area, and it needs to stay open space,” Hutchison said. “The plan is, there’ll still
be grass in that area. You’ll still
be able to see through to
Franklin (Boulevard).”
Hutchison said design sketches will be generated within the next month after meetings with planners and the new building’s potential users. Linton said the next step is for the Campus Planning Committee to approve the building.
“There’s funding in hand, and we’re optimistic we’ll get construction started within the next year,” Linton said.

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