AN INCREDIBLY SHRINKING WORLD
The Oregon Nanoscience and Microtechnologies Institute
has the potential to jump-start the region’s economy and change the way we live.

By Patricia Filip


Graduate student Tian Qin assists in a project that uses single-celled marine organisms to produce nanostructured semiconductor materials.

What the microchip did for electronics and computing, microtechnology and nanotechnology can do for mechanical and chemical devices. Making things smaller can make them stronger, lighter, more efficient and more economical to produce.

Many in government, academia and industry are counting on these technologies to nudge the region’s derailed economy back on track. And Oregon State, as well as Oregon’s other public research universities, are teaming up to help make this happen.

Casting aside traditional rivalries, the Ducks, the Beavers and the Vikings are now major partners in Oregon’s first signature research center, the Oregon Nanoscience and Microtechnologies Institute (ONAMI).

Since its inception in May, ONAMI has been hailed by political, industrial and academic leaders as a key element in Oregon’s economic future. In addition to Oregon’s three largest public research universities, ONAMI involves the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, the state of Oregon and a world-leading high technology cluster in Oregon and southwest Washington, which includes such companies as Intel and Hewlett Packard.

	Goran Jovanovic, associate professor of chemical engineering, explains how researchers contributed to development of a portable kidney dialysis machine.
	Graduate student Clayton Jeffryes, ’02, ’05, cultures diatoms in a lab to produce nanoscale materials for high tech applications.