UM Advanced Wood Composites Center boasts success

ORONO – There is no shortage of work for the staff and students at the University of Maine’s Advanced Engineered Wood Composites Center.

Research contracts from the federal government and private businesses stream in steadily and have created 140 jobs at the center since it opened in 1996, according to its director, Habib Dagher, and Jake Ward, assistant vice president of research, economic development and governmental relations at UM.

Dagher and Ward spoke at a Bangor Region Chamber of Commerce breakfast on Tuesday morning about the ways in which UM acts as an economic engine by developing new technology in the center.

“When you see the work Habib is doing or when you grab one of the students, you see the excitement, you see the energy and you see the future of the state,” Ward said to the audience of about 65 Chamber members.

The center uses wood composites – or fibers and other wood particles bound with adhesives – to create strong, durable and sometimes shock-absorbent products. For example, last year the center collaborated with Hodgdon Yachts of Boothbay Harbor to construct an all-composite version of the aluminum Mark V patrol boat used by Navy SEALs. Unlike the aluminum model, the composite version reduces the wear and tear on boat operators and SEALs by absorbing the impact as the vessel crashes through the waves.

The collaboration could lead to a $200 million contract between the Navy and Hodgdon Yachts, Dagher said.

“We’re a Maine [research and development] company that helps other companies grow,” Dagher said.

In the past year, the center also has completed and presented wood-composite armored tents to a Maine National Guard unit stationed in Afghanistan and blast-resistant buildings to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Since 2001, the center has received more than $34 million in research funding from more than 276 industrial contracts and government agencies, including the Federal Highway Administration, the National Science Foundation and the Maine Technology Institute. The center has published work in more than 199 peer publications, and at least 600 undergraduate and graduate students from 15 academic departments have been paid to work in the lab. The center also has obtained nine patents and numerous national awards, according to Dagher.

Current research projects include investigating ways to use wood composites to create nanotechnology, offshore wind energy, armored tents, bridges, piers, pilings and high-speed ferries.