Penn State's annual research report for 2004 published online

Penn State's annual research report for 2004 published online

University Park, Pa. -- The Annual Report of Research Activity FY 2004 published by Penn State's Office of the Vice President for Research is available online at http://www.research.psu.edu/pu/annrep04.pdf

The report details the University's research and development (R&D) expenditures, which reached $606.5 million in fiscal year 2004, up 11 percent over fiscal year 2003. Included are charts detailing the sources of research funding and expenditures from federal agencies, for strategic research initiatives, by performing unit and by year from 1985 to 2004.

In addition, the report offers examples of research programs and reports on the technology transfer units of the Office of the Vice President for Research (OVPR), including the Intellectual Property Office, the Industrial Research Office, the Research Commercialization Office, PENNTAP, Ben Franklin Technology Center of Central and Northern Pennsylvania, the Small Business Development Center and Innovation Park at Penn State, the University's research park.

Eva J. Pell, vice president for research and dean of The Graduate School, writes, "Our strengths across complementary areas allow us to continue to explore new ways to fulfill our land-grant mission: creating new knowledge that directly benefits people's lives. That knowledge runs the gamut, from the creation of a microbial fuel cell that can generate electricity while treating ordinary wastewater to an innovative program for educating South African youth against the spread of AIDS to the promise of a new treatment for a particularly lethal form of cancer."

Among the research programs described in the report are the development of Seahorse by the Applied Research Laboratory and the U.S. Naval Oceanographic Office. Seahorse is an unmanned, underwater vehicle (UUV) used to collect high-quality data in seacoast regions of the world. The OVPR report notes that, unlike earlier UUVs, Seahorse is capable of pre-programmed, independent operations that allow it to maintain a constant depth, course and speed; navigate between various points; and conduct search and survey patterns.

Also described is a summer program developed by the Institute for the Arts and Humanities to help high school English and social studies teachers incorporate Shakespeare into their classes. Supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the program introduced the teachers to multimedia depictions of the Shakespearean era, including film clips, popular music and Web archives of visual images, as springboards for discussion.

Another program described in the report is a successful Phase I clinical study, sponsored by the National Institutes of Health at the Penn State College of Medicine. In the study, a growth factor, known to be involved in the suppression of pain and found by College of Medicine researchers to control the production of some cells, was administered to patients with advanced, inoperable pancreatic cancer. Preliminary results showed the treatment is very encouraging. The researchers currently are enrolling patients in a larger, Phase II study.

National Science Foundation data for fiscal year 2002, the most recent year available, shows Penn State ranks 12th among U.S universities in R&D expenditures. The University also had more top-10 rankings for individual fields of study than any school ranked above it. Only MIT, in 15th place, had as many programs rated in the top 20, the annual report notes.

An analysis, prepared by Tripp Umbach and Associates and released in November 2004, showed that Penn State is the single largest generator of economic impact in Pennsylvania, with an annual net impact valued at $6.14 billion. Of the $606.5 million in research expenditures generated by the University, more than $425 million remained in the state's economy, generating an additional $1.7 billion in economic expansion and more than $52.8 million in added annual revenue. Penn State research expenditures also support more than 16,000 jobs throughout the commonwealth.