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CORVALLIS - Electro Scientific Industries, a Portland, Ore., high technology equipment firm, has helped the College of Engineering at Oregon State University obtain a new laser machining system for a fraction of what it would normally cost.

The custom-built ESI Model 4420 micromachining system will be essential to research in OSU's MECS program, or Microtechnology-based Energy, Chemical and Biological Systems.

The MECS program is dependent on using high-precision micromachining and bonding technologies to develop human hair-sized microchannels into metals, ceramics and other materials. MECS research has the potential to reduce the size of heat pumps and fuel reformers for automotive applications, issue almost-instant visual warnings when various chemical or biological toxins are detected, or eliminate the transport of toxic waste by converting it into inert constituents on-site.

The market value of the new equipment is about $350,000, but ESI sold it to OSU at the manufacturer's cost.

"Over the last several years, ESI has been a very good friend to the OSU College of Engineering," said OSU industrial and manufacturing engineering professor Brian Paul

. The new machine will be critical to sustaining millions of dollars of MECS research funding that could be important to future economic development of the state, Paul said. Industry support of this type will allow the Pacific Northwest to continue leading initiatives in this area, he said.

Last month, OSU and Pacific Northwest National Laboratories jointly announced establishment of the Microproducts Breakthrough Institute, a research and development facility to be located in Corvallis and used to transform MECS research into new products and companies.

"We have been long-time advocates of OSU and their engineering research and teaching efforts," said Ed Swenson, an OSU engineering alumnus and ESI's senior vice president of research and development. "We believe that collaboration between the local business community and OSU ultimately benefits everyone, and we look forward to supporting them in the future."