ORONO – According to a recent national economic study, Maine ranks second in the nation for the number of businesses that grow out of university spending on research and development, indicating a vibrant economic potential within the state’s R&D sector.

Yet, according to Robert Kennedy, president of the University of Maine’s flagship campus in Orono, this potential goes largely untapped, since the state has for several years ranked dead last in the nation for its per capita investment of taxpayer dollars in university research and development.

The time is right, Kennedy told an attentive audience at a breakfast meeting of the Bangor Region Chamber of Commerce on Tuesday morning, for Maine to follow the lead of other states and ramp up its investment. Kennedy’s presentation to the Chamber marked the recent formal authorization by the UMaine board of trustees of the new Graduate School of Biomedical Science, a project that’s been in the making for several years now.

“This is not just another academic program,” Kennedy promised Chamber members. Rather, he said, it’s a milestone that “has the potential to help transform the Maine economy.”

The new graduate school will further the collaboration already under way between Maine’s private research institutions and some instate educational facilities. More particularly, Kennedy said, it will advance Gov. John Baldacci’s vision for a biomedical “research triangle” in the Bangor area, a collaboration between the university, the Jackson Laboratory in Bar Harbor and the Maine Institute for Human Genetics and Health, an affiliate of Brewer-based Eastern Maine Healthcare Systems.

Kennedy emphasized that the new graduate school will attract high-caliber students and top-ranked research faculty to the university, both by offering opportunities to partner with the off-campus research facilities and by providing a competitive annual stipend for students admitted into the four-year program.

UMaine’s average grad student stipend is about $12,000 a year, Kennedy said, compared to the national average of $18,000 to $20,000. Students in the new biomedical program will receive an annual stipend of about $23,000 in each of the first two years, he said, thanks to the state’s willingness to dedicate a portion of the profits from Bangor’s new gambling facility to the biomedical school.

After their second year, students are expected to have partnered up with faculty mentors who will support their stipends through grant writing, Kennedy said.

In addition to making the University of Maine a more attractive option for grad students and faculty, the partnership with Jackson Lab and EMHS will also benefit those private institutions’ recruiting efforts by increasing access to capable students and an energized academic environment, Kennedy said.

Since 1998, the University of Maine System has received approximately $10 million a year from the Maine Economic Impact Fund; UMaine gets about 80 percent of that to spend on science and technology research. Graduate students and faculty use the state dollars to attract federal and private funds, averaging a $5 to $6 dollar match for each state dollar invested.

“That’s not a bad return,” Kennedy said Tuesday.

More economic activity around R&D will support related “spin-off” businesses that can offer good employment and career opportunities for Maine residents, Kennedy said. He referenced the 2006 Development Report Card for the States, recently published by the Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit Corporation for Enterprise Development. That study, available online at www.cfed.org, shows that Maine would generate 25.63 businesses for every $1 billion in university R&D, based on averaged data reported in 2000-2002. That standing places Maine second in the nation in research-driven business development, trailing only Wyoming.

Overall, the report states, “Maine’s ability to develop … its economy is hampered by its relative lack of investment in innovative research and physical infrastructure.” A CFED representative could not be reached Tuesday afternoon for further interpretation of the study.

UMaine spokesman Joe Carr said state, federal and private research spending at the university since 2000 has spawned about 20 new businesses that are still in operation. “We don’t count them until they become incorporated and have outside investment funding,” Carr said.

MEIF funding should be increased by $10 million each year for the next five years, Kennedy said, in order to allow Maine to catch up with other states that have been more aggressive in pursuing the R&D sector.

In addition, Kennedy said a 6-year, $150 million fundraising campaign currently under way at UMaine will be used in part to support the new biomedical school. One million dollars approved in last November’s bond referendum is being used to renovate Camden Hall on the University College of Bangor campus, where the new school will be housed.

State Rep. Sean Faircloth, D-Bangor, is a strong advocate of increasing R&D spending in Maine and serves on the Economic Growth Council, which allocates the Maine Economic Impact Fund. In an interview after Tuesday’s meeting, Faircloth said it’s impossible to overestimate the importance of supporting research funding in Maine.

“If you look across the nation, all states are being very competitive [in R&D],” Faircloth said. “We need to triple our efforts through both direct appropriations and bonds.”