Big Sky Times

After setting research expenditure records in each of the last four years, Montana State University will host its first-ever Research Development Day on Thursday, Jan. 12. The event is designed to catalyze and accelerate new research efforts on campus while fostering connections among MSU researchers, practitioners and sponsors. 

“I think it’s going to be a great coming-together – it’s about knowing national priorities and what MSU’s role can be,” said Alison Harmon, MSU’s vice president for research and economic development. “Our research expenditures have grown rapidly over the last decade. If we want to continue to support that, there’s a need for more guidance and connections for faculty.”

In the fiscal year ending in June 2022, the university’s research spending topped $200 million for the first time, notching a 4% increase over the previous year’s total. The majority of that funding, 89%, came from federal agencies, including the departments of Defense and Agriculture, the National Science Foundation and NASA. Private donations in the last fiscal year accounted for 8% of total expenditures, and the remainder came from the state.

MSU is also one of only 146 institutions in the U.S. to receive an R1 designation for research activity from the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education, and one of only two institutions with an enrollment profile of “very high undergraduate.”

Nicole Motzer, director of MSU’s Office of Research Development, said Research Development Day is designed to build on that momentum by increasing the likelihood of MSU science bringing in external funding and growing the university’s existing research portfolio.

Motzer said cultivating relationships with agencies is important for MSU researchers for several reasons.

”These are the people who not only make the final decisions about whether a grant proposal will be funded or not, but often determine future directions and priorities for their funding programs,” she said. “Having agency representatives at Research Development Day is a chance for MSU researchers to gain firsthand insights into what program officers want to fund, as well as how to write successful proposals and assemble a team that is as competitive as possible in the increasingly competitive area of research funding.”

Representatives from NASA EPSCoR, the National Institutes of Health, NSF, Army Research Office, USDA and Western SARE, and the federal departments of Education, Energy and Education will attend. Alicia Knoedler, head of the NSF’s Office of Integrative Activities, will deliver the keynote speech.

Motzer and Harmon added that the event will bring together individuals from across the university’s colleges, MSU Extension, and dozens of research centers and institutes, as well as heighten awareness of Montana’s research needs at the national level.

“We hope this event will join other MSU activities, like Grant Writing Bootcamp, in demystifying the complex, ever-changing processes of proposal development and submission,” Motzer said. “We also want to provide program offices in other parts of the country with a better understanding of the incredible research potential we have here in Montana."

Since the start of the 2022-23 fiscal year in July, MSU has announced numerous research awards and projects, including:

• A $10 million anonymous gift, which will promote precision agriculture, youth development, agriculture scholarships and endowments focused on programs based in the MSU College of Agriculture and MSU Extension. The largest portion of the gift, $5 million, will endow a dedicated faculty chair in precision agriculture to lead development of new technologies and their data-driven applications for the future of Montana's largest industry. The gift will provide $3 million to MSU Extension's 4-H youth development programs. Also receiving support will be a new scholarship fund supporting MSU students pursuing a degree in the College of Agriculture and the Dan Scott Ranch Management program.
• A $6.5 million NASA grant that will enable several hundred undergraduate students from around the country to take part in MSU’s Nationwide Eclipse Ballooning Project, during which they will spend 15 months preparing to launch high-altitude balloons and conduct scientific experiments during the total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024. The programbuilds on the success of the 2017 Eclipse Ballooning Project founded at MSU to give students an opportunity to conduct high-level science experiments during what was the first total solar eclipse visible from coast to coast in the U.S. in 99 years.
• A $4.47 million, three-year Department of Homeland Security contract award that will draw on advanced computingand data science techniques to develop innovative tools for identifying computer code that could be exploited by cybercriminals or foreign enemies. The project builds on nearly five years of helping the Department of Defense and DHS improve methods for resisting cyberattacks. MSU's computer science researchers are leading a new effort to reduce software vulnerabilities across a wide range of systems.
• A $2.25 million award from the U.S. Department of Transportation to a consortium that includes MSU's Western Transportation Institute. It will provide outreach and technical assistance to American Indian tribes across the Upper Great Plains and Intermountain West. The work will be conducted in cooperation with the Federal Highway Administration and the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
• A $1.7 million Maximizing Investigator’s Research Award from the National Institutes of Health to Roland Hatzenpichler, assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry in the College of Letters and Science, to support research into developing new single-cell resolving tools to better understand the human gut microbiome.
• A $750,000 NASA EPSCoR grant to fund a study of albedo, the proportion of energy reflected from surfaces on the earth. An MSU professor and students will fly drones over wintry landscapes in Montana and Finland to collect data, which will be compared with nearly simultaneous satellite measurements from the same locations. The results will help calibrate satellite instruments to better collect precise data from all over the globe and make it available to scientists. The work is a priority of the National Academies of Sciences because albedo is one of the primary factors influencing snowmelt, and snowmelt is a primary source of water for one-sixth of the world's population.
• An award from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Pathway to Independence to Artem Nemudryi, a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Microbiology and Cell Biology in the College of Agriculture. The award provides up to two years of mentored support followed by two years of support if the scientist secures an independent research position. It is worth $750,000. Nemudryi was the second researcher in 2022 from Blake Wiedenheft's lab to receive an NIH Pathway to Independence Award. Andrew Santiago-Frangos received the NIH Maximizing Opportunities for Scientific and Academic Independent Careers, or MOSAIC, award.

In addition to such newly funded research, several ongoing projects and researchers at MSU have received significant recognition recently, including:

• A national award to MSU engineering researchers who developed a specialized concrete and helped use it for the first time in an innovative bridge replacement project in partnership with the Montana Department of Transportation. The award, one of 11 given by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, highlighted the use of the ultra-strong concrete, designed and tested by MSU researchers, in the replacement of two bridges on Highway 43 near Wisdom. The project was described as a "daunting challenge" and highlighted MDT's ongoing research partnership with MSU.
• The development of a Rubik’s Cube-sized computer, RadPC, that will travel to the moon aboard a NASA lunar lander in 2024. RadPC uses ordinary computer processors with complex MSU-developed software to protect computers that control satellites and spacecraft from damaging radiation in outer space. More than 62 MSU undergraduates, 17 graduate students and nearly a dozen faculty have worked on the project for the past decade; two graduate students recently delivered the finished project to NASA.
• Sreekala Bajwa, dean of MSU’s College of Agriculture and director of the Montana Agricultural Experiment Station, received the 2022 Cyrus Hall McCromick Jerome Increase Case Gold Medal from the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers. The award honors exceptional and meritorious engineering achievement in agriculture that has resulted in new concepts, products, processes and methods that advanced the development of agriculture. Bajwa was recognized for her outstanding contributions to the industrial adoption of precision agriculture technologies, agricultural byproduct utilization and ensuing contributions to foundational technologies.
• Work by scientists in MSU’s Center for Biofilm Engineering, who are developing a tool for replicating microbial mosaics that can be used in the study of innovative treatments of problems caused by biofilms resistant to traditional treatments. MSU researchers presented their work to researchers and industry partners from around the world during the annual Montana Biofilm Meeting in Bozeman in July.

Nicole Motzer at nicole.motzer@montana.edu or 406-994-6879

Original source can be found here.