BOZEMAN – Montana State University has set a record for spending on research, officials said.
Officials say the school spent $112.3 million in the past year, an increase of $10 million from the year before.
“This is not a small feat,” MSU President Waded Cruzado told the Bozeman Daily Chronicle. “It happens when there are less federal dollars available. It means we’ve increased our competitiveness. These are not earmarked dollars.”
Researchers at the school study such things as fuel cells, brucellosis vaccines for bison, human infectious diseases and crop pests.
“The quality of ideas of our faculty and students are garnering more and more attention,” Cruzado said. “I could not be any prouder or happier.”
The previous year for the fiscal year that ended June 30, the Bozeman campus spent $102.7 million.
Officials at the school said the leading research departments are environmental sciences, physics, immunology, chemistry and biochemistry and transportation.
Officials said the research money, besides helping scientists, also helps graduate students and undergraduates. The money also supports hundreds of jobs in Bozeman and in other parts of Montana.
Tracy Ellig, MSU news director, said $11.6 million of this year’s total was federal stimulus money. Ellig said it was used as part of the $17 million renovation of Cooley Lab, MSU’s biomedical research center.
“Money is so tight,” Ellig said. “Maintaining in the range of $100 million, we believe is sustainable. We don’t forecast, given the situation in Washington, large-scale growth on a continuous basis.”