Collaboration & Impact

With five Nobel Laureates and myriad other impressive accomplishments, our outstanding CU partners in the biological, physical, and social sciences are widely recognized as world-leading researchers.

Eleven world-class research institutes across the CU-Boulder campus provide collaborative environments for tackling large, interdisciplinary research projects. Our faculty are actively engaged in:

• JILA (with NIST)
• Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (with NOAA)
• Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (supported by NASA)
• Institute of Arctic & Alpine Research
• Alliance for Technology, Learning, and Society (ATLAS)
• Renewable and Sustainable Energy Institute (with NREL)
• Biofrontiers Institute

Partnerships with the outstanding University of Colorado School of Medicine anchor cutting-edge research programs in biomedical engineering and biotechnology.

Federal research laboratories in the Boulder area provide fantastic opportunities for collaboration, sharing of facilities, and support of graduate student projects and subsequent employment opportunities. These include:

• National Institute of Standards and Technologies (NIST)
• National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)
• National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR)
• National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
• National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA)
• United States Geological Survey (USGS)

Entrepreneurship and Commercialization         

We enjoy a rich history and culture of encouraging and supporting commercialization of faculty and student research breakthroughs. We partner with the CU Technology Transfer Office, which pursues, protects, packages, and licenses to business the intellectual property generated by college researchers.

In the last five years, college faculty have:

• generated 326 invention disclosures;
• filed 221 patents; and
• assisted with the formation of 17 start-up companies.

Boulder and Colorado's Front Range are a hub for high-tech startups with the University of Colorado and nearby national research labs attracting talent and funding. Recent examples of our intellectual property impacts include:

• OPX Biotechnologies is developing microbial strains for biorefining and next-generation biofuels through the directed evolution of genomes.
• ALD NanoSolutions employs novel chemistries and proprietary atomic layer deposition processing technology to deposit functional nanometer thick coatings on particles.
• Sundrop Fuels is developing the concentrated solar-thermal chemical reactor created by Professor Alan Weimer for large-scale, solar-driven hydrogen production and biomass gasification.
• MedShape Solutions is developing next-generation “shape memory” polymers for use in orthopedic fixation and other applications that are capable of controlled shape change or strain recovery in response to external stimuli.

The National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics reported in April 2010 that the Boulder area had the second highest level of science and engineering employment per capita, surpassed only by the Silicon Valley. The state of Colorado ranked fourth in the nation for federal Small Business Innovation Research, Phase I funding in 2010.