This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).
The College of Engineering at Boise State University has experienced rapid growth since its inception in 1996, due to exceptional student interest and community support. Located in a vibrant high-technology manufacturing community and the largest metropolitan area in Idaho, the college has expanded from initial enrollments of 650 to over 1,800; degree offerings have increased from three to 24, including masters and Ph.D. program options; three new engineering departments have been added; and research activity has grown significantly. The College's Micron Engineering Center (MEC) building comprises four stories and 69,000 gross square feet, providing laboratory and office space for the engineering programs. The initial design of the MEC building anticipated research predominantly focused on design and characterization of electronic devices. With growth in the college's programs and the addition of new faculty, an emerging research emphasis has been placed on electronic materials processing and characterization, with collaborations developing in emerging research areas including novel memory materials, energy production, biotechnology, and micro-nano machinery. This has created a significant demand for research laboratories that can support "wet lab" activities. To meet this need in part, the university has systematically upgraded the MEC building to provide wet lab capabilities, adding four additional wet labs for a total of eight. At this time, the college still needs adequate laboratory space to accommodate additional growing research needs. In previous laboratory upgrades over the past eight years, the base building systems had adequate expansion capacity to allow for the additional HVAC and electrical requirements of the renovated laboratories. At this point, however, not only will the individual laboratory space require renovations to support specific research activities, but the base building systems correspondingly need upgrade. Under this award, Boise State University will renovate twelve laboratories in the MEC building, totaling 11,640 square feet. Renovations include increased electric distribution; installation of a building chilled water system; installation of chemical fume hoods, chemical storage cabinets, sinks and safety showers; development of ground floor vibration isolation; and installation of general laboratory utility distribution systems.
Intellectual Merit: Sixty one funded research programs and 29 researchers utilize the MEC facility. Additional wet process laboratory capacity is required to allow for further growth in the emerging research areas of materials, device fabrication, and characterization. Renovations to the MEC laboratories will impact current researchers in the college, and enable opportunities for college growth in faculty. This award provides 15 additional fume hoods in the MEC building, significantly expanding the ability to grow research activities. Upgrades to the MEC facility will allow researchers to expand their individual careers, train additional students, and contribute to the research goals and discoveries of the nation.
Broader Impacts: Boise State University serves the city of Boise and adjacent metropolitan area and provides research training at all academic levels. Students at all levels have opportunities to gain research experience as early as their freshman year, and maintain their involvement on a project throughout their undergraduate and graduate career. These renovations will allow Boise State University to broaden participation in engineering research to underrepresented students. The university participates as a subaward in an NSF-supported Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation (LSAMP) award and recently received an NSF-supported Science Talent Expansion Program (STEP) award. Together, these programs will provide research assistantships for 140 underrepresented and lower division students. With the increased research capacity provided by the facility renovations, Boise State University will be able to increase the involvement of students in meaningful, next-generation research, impacting their ability upon graduation to investigate, develop and lead scientific discoveries as the next generation of engineering leaders.
NSF Program: Academic Research Infrastructure Program: Recovery and Reinvestment (ARI-R2) Principal Investigator: Dr. Mark Rudin, Vice President for Research and Economic Development, Boise State University Overview: The ARI-R2 project, "Research Infrastructure Upgrade-Micron Engineering Center" has provided the opportunity for Boise State University to significantly upgrade the research capabilities in the College of Engineering’s Micron Engineering Center. With these upgrades, the college was able to convert existing "dry lab" research space into "wet labs" supporting materials science research. Overall, approximately 8,054 ft2 in 10 separate labs were converted into wet labs with the addition of critical infrastructure including chemical fume hoods, safety showers, de-ionized water, process chilled water, compressed air, vibration isolation, increased electrical power, compressed gas handling, chemical storage, acid waste treatment, and chemical resistant laboratory countertops with sinks. This expansion of wet lab space provided existing researchers the facilities required to grow their research programs, and also allowed the college to provide laboratory space to hire four new faculty members. Possibly the most significant impact of the ARI-R2 project however, is the increase in the number of students engaged in research activities. In the past year alone, the researchers assigned to the ten renovated labs have been able to expand the number of employed students from 38 to 56, an increase of 47%. The opportunity for both graduate and undergraduate students to engage in research activities provides a significant learning experience that can impact both their academic experience their entire professional career.
