If only I could have taken you with me on my tour through North Dakota State University’s research park in Fargo last month.  It was the first time I had ever seen a Clean Room.

No, my housekeeping isn’t quite that bad, although at my house, a clean room is one with no laundry on the floor and no dirty dishes in it. 

The Clean Rooms at NDSU’s research park went far beyond that.  Huge filters kept particles in the air to about 10,000 per cubic foot in one lab (a class 10,000 clean room).  Next door was a class 100 clean room with only 100 particles per cubic foot.  (A normal home, I learned, has around 3 million particles per cubic foot.) 

The particle count in the Clean Rooms had to be low because the scientists working in those labs were making very tiny, detailed microchips.  Dr. Philip Boudjouk, NDSU’s vice president for research, creative activites and technology transfer said even one dust particle on the microchip would be like a road block on a major highway.  

We weren’t allowed in the clean rooms.  We watched through windows as two scientist-students worked.  Besides their white lab coats, they had protective covers on their feet, caps over their hair, goggles, and filter masks over their noses and mouths.  In the lab with the smallest particle count, workers dressed in white suits that almost completely covered them.  They looked a little like astronauts.

Interesting.  And that was just one part of NDSU’s research center.  More about that later.