Microproducts Breakthrough Institute

The Microproducts Breakthrough Institute is a unique collaboration between Oregon State University and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory focused on the development and commercialization of microchannel-based technologies for energy, medical, environmental and national security applications. Formed in 2003, the MBI model is to include academic, federal laboratory and industrial researchers in the same facility and to support the researchers with unique fabrication, modeling and testing capabilities tailored to the development of microchannel devices.

Our Mission

Through a public/private partnership, and through research supported by federal and corporate sponsors, the mission of the MBI is to develop and commercialize with industry micro/nano technology and processes in the energy and environmental areas. Core competencies are in microchannel heat and mass transfer processes, energy systems, microreactor technologies, nanoparticle synthesis, and fabrication of microchannel components.

Microchannel-based technology is the MBI's core focusmicrochannels

The technical focus of the MBI is microchannel-based technology where we use the short diffusion lengths available in microchannels to significantly improve heat and mass transfer for a wide range of energy, chemical and biological systems. The use of microchannels for diffusion-limited heat and mass transfer processes frequently result in a factor of five or ten reduction in the size of the device. Examples of microchannel components include:

Microchannel heat exchangers
Microchannel catalytic chemical reactors
Microchannel combustion systems
Microchannel reactors for the production of nanoparticles
Microchannel separations processes
Microchannel kidney dialysis systems
Compact power and heat actuated cooling systems
Compact hydrogen production systems for fuel cells
Microchannel desalination systems
Energy storage systems

Research at the MBI involves device development and the development of low cost and high volume manufacturing processes for microchannel devices.