MIT lures Texas nanotech team to Northeast

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Posted 7:53AM on Monday, March 25, 2002

AUSTIN - A group of University of Texas researchers who performed cutting-edge research on nanotechnology, helping to expand the school's impact in the new field, has been lured to Cambridge. Angela Belcher, a professor and a member of UT's new Center for Nano and Molecular Science and Technology, will join Massachusetts Institute of Technology's new NanoMechanical Technology Laboratory as an associate professor in the fall. In developing microscopic parts for supercomputers of the future, Belcher's research team was the first to bind a virus to semiconductor base material. The virus deposited a protein that could be used to build up a structure inside a microchip. "Losing her is a setback for us," UT President Larry Faulkner told the Austin American-Statesman in Monday's editions. "I hate to lose Angela Belcher. She's as innovative a young scientist as I've ever seen." Belcher, 34, said most of the 15 or so Ph.D. and postdoctorate students in Belcher's lab will go with her. Faulkner is among several Austin leaders who has been promoting nanotechnology and its research in assembling molecule-size devices. But atom-by-atom construction of such devices as sensors and switches is just part of nanotech, also designed to make ultraminute changes to existing substances. Belcher's departure is "a tremendous loss for the state," said Conrad Masterson, founder of the Texas Nanotechnology Research Initiative and a board member of the Texas Nanotechnology Initiative. The two groups were recently formed for promoting nanotech investment and growth. Earlier this month, a TNI conference on nanotech commercialization was billed as drawing more participants more than 400 than any other in the U.S. so far. Belcher, in her three years at UT, pulled in hefty grants and published research on the super-tiny construction of semiconductors in the journal Nature. Central Texas economists point to nanotech as a growth area for Austin technology. "I've actually seen a lot more industry interest in the last year," said Belcher, a seventh-generation Texan from San Antonio. The TNI estimates that Texas could see $1 billion in investment for nanotech research in the next five years. Southwest Texas State University in San Marcos is trying to raise money for a nanotech center for applied research. Belcher said she is receiving a "really good package" from MIT and DuPont Co., which has supported her team's work.