From the Atmosphere to Zebrafish,
Researchers Uncovering Secrets to Life, the Universe and (Almost) Everything!
OU’s Research Campus
By Jerri Culpepper
Using an interdisciplinary approach, University of Oklahoma
researchers in an array of scientific fields including meteorology, the life
sciences and supercomputing, are making impressive forays into frontiers not
long ago explored only by mathematicians, philosophers and writers of science
fiction.
Cutting-edge research into life science fields ranging from
robotics to genomic studies is now taking place in the new Stephenson Research
and Technology Center on OU’s 271-acre Research Campus. In spring 2006, the
National Weather Center – which will house OU’s academic and research programs
in meteorology alongside research, training and operational elements of the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration – will open. The two buildings
anchor OU’s growing research environment on Norman’s south side, which also
includes One Partners Place – housing such private companies as Weathernews
Americas Inc. and Vieux and Associates as well as several university operations
– and will soon add Two Partners Place and a new facility for the Department of
Chemistry and Biochemistry.
“The Research Campus and its buildings will enable and support a
true ‘community of ideas’ that reflects the core mission and values of a
university, but with a decidedly modern approach that includes academia,
government and the private sector,” said Lee Williams, vice president of research
and dean of the Graduate College.”
Kelvin Droegemeier, associate vice president for research and
director of the Center for Analysis and Prediction of Storms and the Sasaki
Institute, says the new Research Campus has been dubbed by researchers and
students as “connecting the dots,” referring to the campus environment in which
government (.gov), academia (.edu) and industry (.com) can develop creative
synergies for mutual benefit. As
collaborations grow, other groups are expected to be added to the mix to
represent participation from the military (.mil) and nonprofit and
not-for-profit organizations (.org) as well as other as yet unknown “dots.”
Calling the Research Campus “the portal to 21st-century
academia,” Droegemeier explains that the university is creating something
unique – different from most research parks associated with other
universities. “It is an unparalleled
research and learning environment as well as a dynamic framework for
stimulating business innovation and growth,” he noted.
What does that mean? For
one thing, he says, the Research Campus features numerous laboratories and work
spaces that allow students from the freshman to graduate level to get involved
in real-world research to complement their classroom experiences. Additionally,
Weathernews (and later other private companies as they move to the Research
Campus) provide valuable internships and other real-world experience, thus
improving students’ marketability upon graduation. Finally, “the Research Campus provides fully redundant, 24/7
power, environmental control, networking and personnel support – capabilities
that are essential for private industries of the type we are creating and with
which we are developing relationships,” Droegemeier noted.
Through this new environment that promotes creative synergy among
organizations having vastly different cultures, the university is meeting OU
President David Boren’s vision of a global multicultural campus in its fullest
sense, bringing together people and organizations that reflect a diversity of
nationalities, ethnicities, organizational and institutional cultures. This
positions the campus and its students to move more readily into the areas of
technology transfer and economic development.
Another component of the Research Campus is its economic
development impact on the city and state.
As businesses locate here, not only are more jobs created, but they in
turn form spin-off companies. As new technologies are developed, they are quickly
commercialized and marketed.
And then, of course, there are the benefits to society, or
“science in service to society.” (See
accompanying overview.)
“In
one place, you have all this intellectual property, access to faculty talent
and student thinking,” Droegemeier says. Smiling, he added, “Basically what
we’re doing is, we’re connecting the dots.”
“ In one place, you have all this
intellectual property, access to faculty talent and student thinking,”
Droegemeier says. Smiling, he added,” Basically what we’re doing is, we’re
connecting the dots.”
5 Han Wang
discusses the ramifications of his zebrafish research.
5 REAL Director Dean Hougen with one of the lab’s mobile robot
frames.
The Stephenson Research and Technology Center is a multi-phase project to support interdisciplinary programs in biosciences, bioengineering and the Supercomputing Center. In addition to the other facilities mentioned, a chilled water/emergency generation plant has been constructed.
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The first phase of the
Research and Technology Complex
is the 94,600-square-foot Stephenson Research and Technology Center. (A second
phase will add 100,000 square feet of laboratory and office space and will
provide growth space for the university’s chemistry and biochemistry research
programs.) In addition to OSCER, the SRTC houses the following:
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Robotics, Evolution,
Adaptation and Learning Laboratory (REAL), directed by Dean Hougen — Research concentration is the
intelligent connection of sensing to action, the essence of modern robotics.
Applications include space exploration, military endeavors, and medical and
assistive applications.
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OU Microarray and
Bioinformatics Core Facilities,
directed by Tyrrell Conway — This facility offers the powerful tools of the
highly complex technology of functional genomics to OU researchers.
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Advanced Center for Genome
Technology, directed by Bruce Roe — A
unit of OU’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, the center has been
designated as a Genome Center by the National Institutes of Health, National
Human Genome Research Institute, since 1990. One of the first three labs
involved in the worldwide Human Genome Project, OU researchers have since
sequenced the first completed human chromosome, discovering the genes involved
in several forms of mental retardation, brain cancer, leukemia and
schizophrenia.
q
OU Bioengineering Center, directed by Ed O’Rear, David Schmidtke, Peter McFetridge and Uli
Nollert — Research includes projects essential to tissue engineering and
medical imaging, which impacts the diagnosis of diseases and the monitoring of
the various therapies’ effectiveness.
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The Neuroendocrine
Developmental Genetics Lab, directed
by Randy Hewes — Research focuses on the mechanisms by which cells acquire,
maintain and regulate neuropeptides and how changes in neuropeptide signally
control animal behavior.
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Zebrafish Development,
Genetics and Genomics Lab, directed
by Han Wang — Using zebrafish because of their genetic similarity to humans,
rapid life cycle and transparent embryos (which make viewing development
easier), Wang studies molecular genetics and genomics of circadian rhythmicity
(which determines sleep and wake cycles, among other things), embryogenesis,
retinal and blood development as well as human diseases.
q
Institute for Environmental
Genomics, directed by Jizhong Zhou —
A distinguished R&D staff scientist in microbial genomics and ecology, Zhou
just came to OU from Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee to head this
institute. With the arrival of Zhou and his research staff, the SRTC is now 100
percent occupied.
5 The 244,000-square-foot National Weather Center is scheduled to
open in spring 2006.
The 244,000-square-foot
National Weather Center, which is
scheduled to open in spring 2006, will house OU’s academic and research
programs in meteorology and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration’s Norman-based weather, research and operations programs. The
university programs that are moving to the NWC are the School of Meteorology,
the Center for Analysis and Prediction of Storms, Center for Spatial Analysis,
Cooperative Institute for Mesoscale Meteorological Studies, Oklahoma
Climatological Survey, and the International Center for Natural Hazards and
Disaster Research. The NOAA organizations include the National Severe Storms
Laboratory, National Weather Service Forecast Office, NEXRAD Radar Operations
Center, Storm Prediction Center, and the Warning Decision Training Branch. The
College of Atmospheric and Geographic Sciences will administer the facility.
The first classes will be offered in the NWC in August 2006.
The 50,000-square-foot One
Partners Place is anchored by the
privately held Weathernews Americas Inc. and also houses the following
university entities: the Office of Technology Development, Integrated Radar
Data Services (IRaDs), the Sasaki Institute, the Vice President for Technology
Development, and the Center for Wealth Creation.
Sasaki Institute,
directed by Kelvin Droegemeier — works in the shared interest of the science
and engineering enterprise, “connecting the dots” on the Research Campus to
meet individual needs, visions and cultures, with local economic development a
key focus.
OSCER
Where Students, Researchers Turn to Get Work
Done FAST
When researchers and students need to mine,
simulate or visualize phenomena or vast amounts of data, whether it’s for
weather forecasting, bioinformatics, high-energy physics, earthquake modeling,
molecular modeling, bioengineering, aerospace design, or a plethora of other
needs, they turn to OU’s Supercomputing Center for Education and Research, or
OSCER.
OSCER, a multidisciplinary center within OU Information Technology, provides supercomputing education, expertise and resources to undergraduate and graduate students, staff and faculty. OSCER serves more than 250 students, staff and faculty in 25 departments in the colleges of Arts and Sciences, Business, Engineering, Geosciences and Medicine. And, notes OSCER director Henry Neeman, some of the most active users are students. In fact, he says, OSCER is the only supercomputing center in the world that focuses on teaching supercomputing to scientists and engineers – from high school students to professors – who don’t have a lot of computing experience.
OU researchers have access to Topdawg – OSCER’s
newest supercomputer. When Topdawg debuted at OU last April, it was the
54th-fastest supercomputer in the world. In the fast-moving world of computers,
that place will be usurped soon, but it remains the fastest supercomputer in
the Big 12 and in Oklahoma history.
Topdawg, a Dell product, runs at a peak speed of
6.5 trillion calculations per second and has 2,000 times as much RAM as a
typical PC. Cool? Try using it to simulate physical phenomena, such as
tornadoes, earthquakes, galaxies, or atoms. Or to sequence genes. Or to turn a
vast sea of data into easy-to-understand pictures. Definitely cool.
Want more information on OU’s Research Campus? Look at photos of
the National Weather Center as it is being built? View the labs in the
Stephenson Research and Technology Center? Visit http://www.rccc.ou.edu/