It comes after last year’s approval by the state Legislature of classified research at University of Wisconsin System labs.
The 1,300-square-foot facility cost about $500,000 and was paid for by a variety of funders, the largest chunk coming from a federal Economic Development Agency grant.
The new lab sits in an office building owned by the Wisconsin Security Research Consortium, a mix of public and private entities dedicated to improving the state’s climate for national cybersecurity research. Other tenants in the building include the Wisconsin Technology Council and the UW-Madison office of corporate relations.
Tom Still, president of the technology council, said in an email Friday that construction is done on the cybersecurity space but more work awaits before it can be operational.
Also unknown is what if any contracts the center will win and what researchers will work there. Some may not be affiliated with the university.
“It’s still very early,” he said.
Most contracts would flow through the Wisconsin Security Research Consortium, and classified research done there would be owned by the federal government, Still said.
Marsha Mailick, interim vice chancellor of research at UW-Madison, was not available for comment on Friday.
The UW System won legislative approval last year to embark on more classified research after nearly 45 years out of the game.
It had abandoned classified research since the 1970s, when sentiment against the Vietnam War made “secret military research” a dirty phrase.
In subsequent years, it became apparent that classified research included far more than research on weapons and violence.
Projects in medicine, engineering, environmental science and more could all be classified for security reasons.
Then, after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the Bush administration took $2 billion in non-classified research spending and classified it, chiefly because of the war on terrorism.
“We’re basically updating a policy that’s 40 years out of date,” said Steve Lyons in arguing for the change.
He’s president of Wisconsin Growth Capital Coalition, a pro-business group composed of companies, organizations and angel networks and venture funds.
Lyons said then he believed opening the door to classified research could bring tens of millions of dollars into the economy yearly, following the example of other states such as Virginia and Colorado that allow classified research on campus.
He said that in addition to cybersecurity and aerospace research, UW-Madison could bring in significant classified contracts in foreign languages, an area of particular strength.
As of last spring, 14 universities nationally hosted a University Affiliated Research Center sponsored by the federal Department of Defense. Among Big Ten schools, Penn State and Nebraska were the only ones with a research center.
©2015 The Wisconsin State Journal (Madison, Wis.)
