Engaging Universities

From its founding, The Research Triangle Park has sought to engage the Triangle region’s universities—Duke University, North Carolina State University, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The Triangle Universities Center for Advanced Studies Inc. (TUCASI) was established to ensure the continued presence of the research institutions in the Park.

In the mid-1970s, the Park set aside a 120-acre campus to house organizations that could bring together faculty from the three universities and Park scientists. The Park entrusted TUCASI as the body that proposes how its assets are distributed to the universities and projects of their choice.  

One example of TUCASI’s effect on the state is the maturation of the North Carolina Networking Initiative (NCNI). With early funding from TUCASI, NCNI was established in 1998 as a collaborative effort between the region’s three Research I universities, along with high-technology industries to deploy leading-edge networking technologies and facilitate network- enabled research. The existence of NCNI and the ability of local partners to easily connect to the Abilene national research network and National Lambda Rail has led to significant local participation in supporting Internet technologies and has raised the visibility of the Research Triangle Region in the national and global networking world.