MRI: Track 3: Acquisition of a Helium Recovery System to Reduce the Consumption of Helium of Montana State University's NMR Core Facility

An award is made to Montana State University (MSU) to acquire a helium recovery system to reduce the consumption of liquid helium used in MSU’s NMR Core Facility. The system will lower the facility’s operational costs and carbon footprint, making the NMR Core’s activities more sustainable and environmentally friendly. Liquid helium is required for the operation the state-of-the-art NMR spectrometers, and the helium recovery system is an essential enhancement to research infrastructure that supports researchers carrying out frontier research and educational activities. The NMR Core is critical to MSU’s land grant mission, which promotes research, teaching, and outreach throughout the state of Montana. The helium recovery system will enhance MSU’s contributions to high quality graduate and undergraduate student education and will expand the Core’s ability to promote hands-on training of students through workshops, teaching of courses, and tours and demonstrations promoting scientific education. NMR spectroscopy is one of the most powerful tools for the elucidation of the structure of molecules, to identify unknown substances, and to characterize the arrangements of atoms within molecules. The helium recovery system will benefit the research of numerous scientists, staff, students, and outside (academic and non-academic) users of MSU’s NMR Core Facility. The NMR Core serves as a resource for chemists, engineers, biochemists, and other scientists at MSU, the University of Montana, and Tribal Colleges, throughout Montana and the upper northwest region of the United States. In addition to its critical role for early career faculty, the NMR Core provides essential support for established researchers including biochemists, organic chemists, medicinal chemists, bioinorganic chemists, and other campus-wide faculty engaged in metabolomics, biofuels, animals and livestock, and biofilm research, which will all benefit from installation of a helium recovery system in MSU’s NMR Core Facility. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.