Engineering thinks 'small'

The School of Engineering and Applied Science is entering the last stage of its plan for expansion, and the focus can be summed up in one word -- nanotechnology.

As the technology responsible for stain-repellent Dockers khakis and potentially life-saving drugs, nanotechnology is the future of engineering, says Engineering Dean Eduardo Glandt.

With the third and final part of the plan under way, Glandt wants to make sure that Penn is a "destination school" for scholars in this innovative field, which combines medical research and engineering.

In 2004, Glandt placed the improvement of Penn's nanotechnology program -- which involves delicate atomic-scale work -- on the agenda of his strategic plan, which was initiated in 1999.

Since then, Glandt has also worked to revamp the Computer Science and Bioengineering departments, the other two components of his program.

Grants from the federal government for nanotechnology at Penn will help his goals become a reality.

On Nov. 10, the Engineering School celebrated the founding of the Penn Center for Molecular Discovery, which was made possible by a $9.5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health. The center is the second nanotechnology research hub established at Penn in the past two years.

Faculty at the center will study interactions between different molecules -- research with potentially life-saving results.

Their findings could help drug companies develop new medicines with fewer side effects.

Last September, Penn was awarded a grant by the National Science Foundation to create the Nano/Bio Interface Center, one of six new Nanoscale Science and Engineering centers around the country. Penn will receive a renewable grant of $11.4 million over five years.

With its establishment in 2004, this research program -- with almost $30 million dedicated to applying nanotechnology to medicine -- will help Glandt successfully complete the third phase of the strategic plan.

The center, currently housed in the Laboratory for Research on the Structure of Matter, will be moved to a new building, which will be built on what is currently a parking lot next to LRSM at 33rd and Walnut streets. No move-in date has been set.

Still in the planning stages, the new building has no budget, but Glandt said it will be the most expensive of three buildings that were added in the past two years as a part of the strategic plan -- $20 million Levine Hall and $42.2 million Skirkanich Hall.

Glandt said that the new building's hefty price tag is in part due to the fact that nanotechnology research requires both computer labs and wet labs with running water and ventilation systems.

Center Director Dawn Bonnell said that because nanotechnology has the potential to improve so many different technologies, its effects often go unnoticed.

"It is definitely true that nanotechnology will revolutionalize society," Bonnell said. "The changes that nanotechnology makes are not so exciting just because you see it every day."

Glandt said the schools of Engineering, Medicine and Arts and Sciences will all contribute to fundraising -- currently in its beginning stages -- for the new building.

Bioengineering Department Chairman Daniel Hammer called the additions "a huge positive" and added that the new nanotechnology centers will benefit his department.

"The growth in nanotechnology is very good for bioengineering," Hammer said. "The lines are very blurred between these areas."

Bonnell said that the new building and the nanotechnology research that will come out of it will help Penn achieve its goals of interdisciplinary study.

"The center, as it goes further, will continue to make connections," she said. "It will serve as a model for cross-University initiatives."

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