Daily Staff Writer

The W.M. Keck Foundation, based in Los Angeles, has awarded a $1.2 million grant to Iowa State to fund a new micro-miniaturization lab on campus, the university announced Wednesday.

The laboratory will be “devoted to making scientific instruments incredibly small,” according to a News Service press release.

Faculty from several different ISU departments will work at the lab, which will be directed by chemistry professor Marc Porter as part of ISU’s Microanalytical Instrumentation Center (MIC), the press release said. Also contributing to the lab’s research will be Ames Lab scientists.

“We are extremely delighted to have the backing of the Keck Foundation for the new micro-miniaturization lab,” said ISU President Martin Jischke. “The Keck Foundation has chosen to support one of the most advanced scientific groups at Iowa State.”

The lab will allow researchers to transform present analytical instruments, such as table-top-sized chromatographs, into much smaller devices, the university said. This high-tech miniaturization will enable researchers to investigate environments normally inaccessible to scientists.

“Reflecting W.M. Keck’s life as a pioneer, innovator and risk taker, the Keck Foundation seeks out research [at ISU] … because it is opening new directions in science,” said Maria Pellegrini, Keck program director. “The foundation is happy to participate in these efforts.”

One MIC group is currently developing a micropump that could conceivably be no thicker than a human hair, Porter said.

This new gadget would be a boon to long-term space flight because it would help shrink the space shuttle’s chromatograph system from the size of a microwave oven to that of a silver dollar, he said.

The system aids the recycling of water from cabin humidity and bodily wastes, which is essential for any long-term journey in outer space.

Possible projects at the new lab include research on inter-cellular communication and an atomic-force microscope, which would be able to detect disease by using only a single pair of molecules, Porter said.