Michigan Tech News

Last Modified 3:42 PM on Mon Jul 20, 2009

October 3, 2005—

At a time when most government R&D funding has been stagnant or shrinking, Michigan Tech research has been attracting more and more dollars.

The university's federal contract and grant awards for last fiscal year jumped 13.7 percent over the previous year to a record $25.1 million, Provost and Vice President for Research David Reed told the Board of Control Sept. 29. Overall contract and grant awards were up 15.2 percent, to $33.1 million.

"Federal R&D spending is not up, and in many areas, it's down," Reed said. "What's happening here is not due to a federal funding increase."

The burgeoning research program is not due to any one star's success, Reed said. "There's a whole mix of things going on at the same time," he said. A number of six- and seven-figure grants have come through in widely different areas, from nanotechnology to fuel cell research and from forestry to mathematics.

"It's really all due to the activities of the faculty, staff and students," he added. "It's not because of something we're doing centrally, other than trying to facilitate their efforts."

The university is seeing a shift in where its research funding is coming from. "Last year, our funding from the Department of Energy passed the National Science Foundation for the first time," Reed said. "And NIH [National Institutes of Health] is becoming more important." Currently, most NIH funding at the university is directed toward the mathematical sciences department to support statistical genetics research. But other areas have growth potential. NIH spends almost six times as much money on mechanical engineering research as the NSF, Reed said.

The increase in health-related research is manifested in other ways. The university is collaborating with a number of different hospitals in both teaching and research programs.

The graduate program is expanding along with research. Graduate enrollment this semester is 897, an increase of 8.2 percent over last year. Of the total, 417, or 46.5 percent, are PhD students, which is placing the university in a position to graduate 50 or more doctoral candidates annually. That could push Michigan Tech up in the Carnegie classifications to research intensive, the highest level.

The university's research program has also proven its worth in a time of tight state appropriations. "Under the State House of Representatives' funding formula, about a quarter of Michigan Tech's appropriation is calculated from our research and graduate programs," Reed said. "That's $12 million a year in state money."

Michigan Technological University (www.mtu.edu) is a leading public research university developing new technologies and preparing students to create the future for a prosperous and sustainable world. Michigan Tech offers more than 130 undergraduate and graduate degree programs in engineering; forest resources; computing; technology; business; economics; natural, physical and environmental sciences; arts; humanities; and social sciences.