news-record.com

There might have been a louder celebration at N.C. A&T when the Aggie football team broke a long losing streak last week, but the university's biggest win came a few days later.

A&T was named an Engineering Research Center by the National Science Foundation Thursday. In football terms, it's like going to a bowl game.

The center poses a triple-threat: education, research and industrial application. It promises to score big benefits for the university and Greensboro.

National Science Foundation funding -- at least $18 million over the next five years -- is just the beginning. It provides leverage to apply for other grants, N. Radhakrishnan, A&T's vice chancellor for research, said Friday. Business investment could follow. A&T also will have to commit money of its own, but the payoff can be immense. The field of bioengineering is very lucrative, Radhakrishnan said: "That is where the action is."

A&T will establish a department of bioengineering as part of the center, admitting its first undergraduate students next fall, master's degree students the following year and doctoral and postdoctoral students in 2011. Radhakrishnan predicts it will become the largest department in A&T's School of Engineering, with about 250 students.

Work will focus on the development of metallic biomaterials used in implants, cranial reconstruction and other revolutionary advances in medical technology. A&T's primary partners in the project, the Universities of Pittsburgh and Cincinnati, have schools of medicine and engineering and can provide expertise that A&T currently lacks. But A&T plans to catch up quickly. Its designation as a lead ERC will make it a "mecca for engineers," Radhakrishnan said. A&T's ability to lure top researchers and teachers also will be enhanced by its policy of splitting licensing fees from patented discoveries 50-50 with the faculty members responsible, a more generous arrangement than most universities offer. And, "absolutely there will be patents," Radhakrishnan said.

Several companies already plan to work with the center on real-world applications for new technologies. With the federal funding comes an expectation that the program will become financially successful.

"They think we'll have enough momentum to stand on our own. ... We are responsible to the NSF to deliver the goods," Radhakrishnan said.

For A&T and Greensboro, the goods include an exciting program that draws bright students and creative faculty, the potential for highly skilled jobs and a national name for cutting-edge research.

That should inspire the football team to keep winning as well.