Minutes of the Regular Meeting, September 9 ... - Digital Collections

September 9-10, 2008 31365RELOCATION OF A RESEARCH LAB – NCThe University has identified strategic areas of research strength and growthopportunity that will lead to national leadership, and has committed resources to effect thisgrowth. The Integrated Life Sciences Initiative is an outgrowth of the University’s researchexcellence in genomics and biosciences. Dr. Xiaoming Xiao, a renowned leader in theapplication of geospatial technologies to the study of ecologic processes and human health, is thelatest faculty hire to this Initiative. He will join the Department of Botany/Microbiology and theCenter for Spatial Analysis. Dr. Xiao will bring with him his research group, including postdoctoralresearchers and graduate students, and significant ongoing research funding.Dr. Xiao’s group will be located in the Stephenson Research and Technology Center(SRTC) on the University’s Research Campus. This agenda item will enable the University topurchase the remote sensing and GIS equipment to support Dr. Xiao’s research and teaching, andprepare the lab and office space in SRTC for his group.Dr. Xiao’s research is typical of an emerging trend in research that involves massivedata sets to analyze complex problems. While the University has an excellent facility for largescalecomputation in its Oklahoma Center for SuperComputing Education and Research(OSCER), which can handle large datasets and computation, Dr. Xiao’s research represents anew thrust in truly massive datasets, in the order of hundreds of thousands of Gigabytes. As partof the startup support for his laboratory, therefore, the University is establishing a new Petascale(one Petabyte is a million gigabytes, roughly ten thousand times the storage on a personalcomputer) Data Storage (PDS) facility in the High Performance Computing Lab in SRTC. Thisfacility is critical to Dr. Xiao’s research and will also serve the campus needs for massiveresearch data projects. This agenda item will purchase the initial data storage drives for the PDS.III. AND IV. MASTER LEASE-PURCHASE PROGRAMThe Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education (OSRHE) implemented theMaster Lease-Purchase program to facilitate for Oklahoma colleges and universities acquisitionsof long-lived assets using the lease-purchase method. OSRHE submits funding requirementsperiodically through the State of Oklahoma Council of Bond Oversight and the OklahomaDevelopment Finance Authority, the conduit financing agency. Institutions fund the resultingdebt service using current operating funds. The consolidation of multiple funding requests into asingle debt issuance by the OSRHE greatly reduces the time and effort that would otherwise berequired for an institution to finance the acquisition of a major capital asset. A ReimbursementResolution by the Board is required in the event-because of timing-University funds must beused for the original acquisition, and reimbursement is needed from the lease proceeds. ThisResolution constitutes a declaration of official intent as is required by the reimbursementregulations set forth in Regulation Section 1.150-2 of the Internal Revenue Code.Funding has been identified, is available and budgeted within the Vice President forResearch accounts.President Boren recommended the Board of Regents:I. Authorize the President or his designee to negotiate and execute, subject to legalcounsel review, the documents and agreements necessary to effect the relocationof Dr. Xiaoming Xiao’s research program and laboratory from New Hampshire tothe Stephenson Research and Technology Center on the University’s ResearchCampus, as part of the Integrated Life Sciences Initiative;II. Authorize the President or his designee to compete, negotiate, and awardcontracts and purchase orders, in an overall amount not-to-exceed $740,000, tosuppliers as necessary, to configure and equip the above referenced lab for remotesensing and GIS research and teaching, and to establish a Petascale Data Storage