For This Nanotech Professor, Science Means Business Alain Kaloyeros pioneered nanotech research at the University at Albany. Now he oversees a program in which students are trained to be both scientists and entrepreneurs.
By Jason Daley •
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A new crop of grad school professors is moving beyond books and lectures and taking a hands-on approach to getting their students started in business.
Back in 1988, when Alain Kaloyeros was a newly minted Ph.D. in condensed matter physics, a friend working at IBM told him not to take a job at the University at Albany, State University of New York, saying it was a third-tier school. The friend had a point--at the time, Albany didn't even have an engineering program.
Kaloyeros took the job, however, and less than 20 years later, Albany is home to the College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering--the nation's premier nanotech research facility--which collaborates with the R&D departments of 250 high-tech companies. Not to mention the $8.5 billion the college has received in private and government investment.
