A notable team of Michigan leaders has been assembled to lobby the federal government for MSU’s bid to bring a significant scientific tool to campus. University officials should be applauded for their efforts to better the higher-education community of Michigan.
The establishment of the U.S. Department of Energy’s proposed Rare Isotope Accelerator on campus could be one of the most momentous occasions in the university’s history.
The newly formed 34-member Rare Isotope Accelerator Advisory Committee - composed of influential state leaders that include former President Gerald R. Ford and Lansing Mayor David Hollister - has been charged to actively work to win the project for MSU.
The $900 million federal project should come to MSU, and the only obstacle standing in the university’s way of getting the Department of Energy project is competition from the department’s own Argonne National Laboratory at the University of Chicago.
But with many influential political, business and academic leaders lobbying for a Michigan home, the possibility of the accelerator finding a home on our 5,000-acre campus could be a reality. U.S. Sen. Carl Levin told The State News on Monday that MSU’s chances for landing the RIA are better than they’ve ever been.
Scientists say the accelerator could help answer several questions about the origin of elements, the limits of nuclear existence and properties of nuclei with extreme ratios of neutrons to protons. Such questions can help advance science and medicine.
Gov. John Engler made it clear that snagging the facility for Michigan is a key goal. He pledged $2 million for the accelerator in the state’s 2002-03 budget.
The university’s reputation as an outstanding institution for scientific research and advancement has proven the prime selling point to generate support for the project.
MSU’s National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory helped the university become one of the foremost nuclear physics institutions in the nation. In 1999, U.S. News & World Report ranked MSU’s nuclear physics program No. 2 in the nation.
The half-mile long piece Rare Isotope Accelerator is expected to be about 10,000 times more powerful than MSU’s two linked cyclotrons, which are used to study the properties of nuclear material.
With MSU at the center of the state’s Life Science Corridor, which links the scientific efforts of Wayne State University, the University of Michigan, MSU and the Van Andel Institute in Grand Rapids, the benefits that would come to the state and to the health of the nation by receiving the accelerator are enormous.
MSU would be able to further its land-grant tradition by reaching out to the community, the nation and the world by furthering significant scientific advances.
MSU’s reputation and scientific know-how gives the 35-member advisory committee all the ammunition it needs to make the case for MSU. Now let’s hope the federal government gets the message.
