A12
NEWS
Blue Mountain Eagle
Wednesday, October 26, 2022
OSU to build supercomputing center
By COURTNEY VAUGHN
Oregon Capital Bureau
CORVALLIS — Oregon
State University says a new
150,000-square-foot super-
computing research center in
the works could pave the way
for breakthrough research in
artifi cial intelligence, robotics
and materials science, while
bolstering Oregon’s semicon-
ductor industry.
OSU offi cials announced
Friday, Oct. 14, that a $50 mil-
lion donation from NVIDIA
founder and CEO Jen-Hsun
Huang and his wife Lori
Huang was among $100 mil-
lion in gifts received by the
university to create a new,
three-story, $200 million Col-
laborative Innovation Com-
plex at the university’s cam-
pus in Corvallis. The Huangs
are both OSU alumni. Once
completed sometime in 2025,
the new center will be named
after them.
OSU President Jayathi Mur-
thy said the addition of a super-
computer opens the door for
advanced research in climate
science and global environmen-
tal issues, among other things.
During a virtual meeting Fri-
day with members of the media,
Murthy said the university is
“very excited about all the pos-
sibilities of this new develop-
ment” and the philanthropy that
led to it.
“It’s a very ambitious and
modern platform on which to
build future research,” Mur-
thy said, noting the focus will
be on “all things climate and
sustainability.”
NVIDIA, the computer
chip manufacturing company
Jen-Hsun Huang co-founded,
is already a pioneer in artifi -
cial intelligence technology
and innovation.
“We discovered our love
for computer science and
engineering at OSU,” Jen-
Hsun and Lori Huang said in
Submitted image/Lara Janzen
Aerial rendering of the future Collaborative Innovation Com-
plex, center, at Oregon State University in Corvallis.
a news release about the proj-
ect. “We hope this gift will
help inspire future generations
of students also to fall in love
with technology and its capac-
ity to change the world.”
The Huangs called AI “the
most transformative technol-
ogy of our time.”
“To harness this force,
engineering students need
access to a supercomputer,
a time machine, to acceler-
ate their research,” the cou-
ple said.
OSU offi cials said the new
facility would create new
areas for graduate study at the
university and could lead to an
expansion of the current degree
off erings in the technology and
semiconductor fi elds.
“The Jen-Hsun and Lori
Huang Collaborative Innova-
tion Complex at Oregon State
University will be much more
Along with the Collab-
orative Innovation Com-
plex, OSU also announced
that a 49,000-square-foot arts
and education center will be
named the Patricia Valian
Reser Center for the Creative
Arts.
Known for her philan-
thropy, Reser previously
donated $25 million anon-
ymously for the arts cen-
ter, which is slated to open in
spring 2024.
Construction on a diff er-
ent project — Reser Stadium
— remains under way, thanks
to $96.1 million donated to the
university. OSU has a fund-
raising goal of $160.5 million.
The OSU Foundation has
an active $1.75 billion cam-
paign that aims to provide stu-
dent support, scholarships,
fellowships and learning
funds while paying for fac-
ulty positions, academic pro-
grams, research and commu-
nity engagement.
than a building. It will serve
as a university-wide prom-
ise and as a hub for advanc-
ing groundbreaking solutions
for the betterment of human-
ity, the environment and the
economy,” Murthy said in a
news release announcing the
new project. “The center will
be a dynamic place where cre-
ative, driven faculty, students
and partners from business
and other universities come
together to solve critical chal-
lenges facing the state, nation
and world.”
Artifi cial intelligence and
robotics are already showing
promise in helping fi ght wild
fi res, said Steve Clark, vice
president of university rela-
tions and marketing at OSU.
“There’s work being done
within the College of Engi-
neering to understand how the
robots can actually, in some
respects, be fi rst responders,”
Clark said, noting a bi-pedal
robot being used in research.
Harvesting sunlight on the farm
By GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
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AURORA — Growing crops
and harnessing solar energy need
not be mutually exclusive.
That’s the idea behind a $1.5
million project at Oregon State
University’s North Willamette
Research and Extension Center,
putting the concept of agrivolta-
ics to the test.
Agrivoltaics, or dual-use
solar, is exactly what its name
implies — using areas of land
simultaneously for farming and
solar power generation, which
has the potential to not only add
another revenue stream for pro-
ducers selling electricity, but
also better manage sunlight for
plants.
Chad Higgins, an associate
professor of biology and eco-
logical engineering for OSU,
has studied agrivoltaics since
2015. During that time, he con-
ceived of a research farm where
he could experiment with how
to maximize the benefi ts of solar
panels on farmland.
Seven years later, construc-
tion is underway on the OSU
Solar Harvest facility, with a
320-kilowatt solar array being
installed on 5 acres at NWREC.
A groundbreaking ceremony
was held Oct. 11 at the research
station, about 20 miles south of
Portland.
“To have it all come together,
fi nally, after all the intermediate
gins in 2015 analyzed the eff ect
of solar panels on sheep pasture
near the main OSU campus in
Corvallis. Findings showed that
grass grown underneath solar
panels used water 300% more
effi ciently and grew 90% more
forage.
Once completed, Higgins
said he will fi rst use the Solar
Harvest array to further study
alfalfa and grass as “reference
crops.”
“How much water can you
save and how much stress can
you relieve because of the agri-
voltaics? If I can understand that
on a reference crop, then I can
translate that to other crops,” he
explained.
Unlike other agrivoltaic
demonstrations, Higgins said the
Solar Harvest array is diff erent
in its design. Rather than lifting
the panels high off the ground,
they are fi tted on hinges that run
north to south and can tilt nearly
vertical.
In other words, Higgins said
that instead of trying to pass
equipment underneath panels,
this array will allow the panels to
move as needed to make room
for farming.
“This is highly important,
because the cost of steel plays
so big in the economics of the
design,” he said. “Absent any
additional subsidies from the
government, it’s hard to make
highly raised panels work
economically.”
struggles along the way, is amaz-
ing,” Higgins said. “I can’t wait
to get started.”
Finding funding for the proj-
ect was one such struggle, Hig-
gins said. Because the project
will produce and sell electricity,
that ruled out any state or federal
grants.
Instead, Higgins partnered
with the Oregon Clean Power
Cooperative, a nonprofi t dedi-
cated to helping build commu-
nity solar projects, to make his
dream a reality. Co-op mem-
bers are helping to fi nance con-
struction, and in turn will receive
power from the array.
The Roundhouse Founda-
tion, based in Sisters, also pro-
vided an $800,000 grant for agri-
voltaics research through the
OSU Foundation.
“There are obvious pushes
toward electrifi cation of our
entire economy,” Higgins said.
“When you think through
the consequences of that, the
push of solar into agricultural
areas is inevitable. That can be
thought of as a detriment, or an
opportunity.”
According to Higgins’
research, widespread installa-
tion of solar arrays on farms
could provide 20% of all elec-
tricity generated nationwide.
To reach that benchmark would
take a land base roughly the size
of Maryland, or about 1% of cur-
rent U.S. farmland.
A diff erent study led by Hig-
Coffee Break!
Puzzle solutions can be found in today’s classifieds
CLUES ACROSS
1. Unhappy
4. Clairvoyance
7. One who works under you
12. What happens there
stays there
15. Not ingested
16. Got the picture
18. One thousandth of a
gram
19. Breakfast item
20. About
21. Tall deciduous trees
24. Safe keeping receipt
27. Cowardly
30. Pueblo people of New
Mexico
31. Herring-like fish
33. A very large body of
water
34. Angle (abbr.)
35. Spiritual leader of a
Jewish congregation
37. White clergical vestment
39. Cool!
41. Matchstick games
42. Thick piece of something
44. A state that precedes
vomiting
47. Burned item residue
48. Jaguarundi
49. Anno Domini (in the year
of Our Lord)
50. The home of “60 Minutes”
52. Dorm official
53. Give cards incorrectly
56. One who is learning
the job
61. Popular R.L. Stevenson
novel
63. Attentively
64. CNN’s founder
65. Criticize
CLUES DOWN
1. Fijian capital
2. Assist
3. Elected lord in Venice
4. The capacity of a physical
system to do work
5. People of the wild
6. Parent-teacher groups
7. Midway between south
and southeast
8. Moved quickly on foot
9. Handheld Nintendo
console
10. “Top of the Stairs”
playwright
11. Electronic data pro-
cessing
12. “Dog Day Afternoon”
director
13. Leaned
14. About aviation
17. Mountain is a popular
type
22. Lake along Zambia and
Congo border
23. Heroic tales
24. Soviet Socialist Republic
25. “Star Trek” villain
26. Hand gesture popular on
social media
28. Renters have one
29. Tubular steel column
32. Database management
system
36. Similar
38. Providing no shelter or
sustenance
40. Death
43. What a sheep did
44. Midcentury Asian
battleground
45. Horizontal passage into
a mine
46. Mortified
51. Improper word
54. No seats available
55. Financial obligation
56. It can be hot or iced
57. Tough outer skin of a fruit
58. __ Spumante (Italian
wine)
59. Misfortunes
60. Negative
62. Camper
WORDS
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ARTICHOKE
ASPARAGUS
BEETS
BRUSSELS
SPROUTS
CABBAGE
CARROTS
CAULIFLOWER
CELERY
CHARD
CORN
EGGPLANT
GARLIC
LEEKS
LETTUCE
ONIONS
PARSNIPS
PEAS
PEPPERS
POTATOES
PUMPKIN
SHALLOTS
SQUASH
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TURNIPS
ZUCCHINI