TARDISS Mission

TARDISS will lead fundamental research supporting the creation of a Silicon Valley of Domestic Rubber Production, working closely with all stakeholders. Our U.S. Sunlight to Material vision harnesses the power of nature, creating bridges between engineering, biology, and agriculture, to revolutionize alternative natural rubber (NR) production from domestic crops: guayule, rubber dandelion and mountain gum. This will directly contribute toward enhancing national security and support American manufacturing.

What is TARDISS?

The TARDISS ERC plays a leadership role in research and accelerates current U.S. federal (e.g., Department of Defense (DoD), Department of Agriculture (USDA)), and industrial (e.g., Goodyear, Bridgestone) efforts towards a domestic NR supply, through fundamental research into plant biology and rubber technology obstacles that have impeded cultivation and processing of potential domestic crops. The broad transdisciplinary team of experts from five core universities (The Ohio State University (OSU), North Carolina State University (NCSU), California Institute of Technology (Caltech), Texas Tech University (TTU), and University of California Merced (UCM)) and two other affiliated universities (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) and Case Western Reserve University (CWRU)), will also address Engineering Workforce Development, merging education in rubber engineering with “smart” agricultural practices, aimed at the current aging workforce in industry and the workforce for the new millennium.

Get Involved

The TARDISS Innovation Ecosystem (IE) is centered in the energetic entrepreneurial ecosystem of Northeast Ohio, but actively converges the expertise of the geographically distributed and internationally recognized research team, complemented by small to large companies, national and federal laboratories, and the students and communities it serves. The overall success of TARDISS IE will be a continual evolution of buy-in from our industrial colleagues and other stakeholders.

EWD - ARA

The primary goal of EWD is to equip a workforce comprised of informed, diverse workers for the growing NR economy, fostered through the creation of the American Rubber Academy (ARA). The ARA will educate as well as train the current and future US workforce at all levels including K-12 students, teachers, farmers/manufacturers, undergraduate and graduate students, and post-doctoral researchers. Through ARA, an emerging workforce will acquire skills needed, embedded in fundamental knowledge. New minors, graduate courses, certificates, and possibly degrees, will be developed for the growing NR industry to produce scientists, engineers, biological and agricultural specialists, and other experts.