PORTLAND (AP) - Oregon scientists may have made an important early development in Oregon's quest to become a national player in the embryonic but burgeoning field of nanotechnology.

For years, computer chip industry researchers have faced a vexing problem. As chips shrank to fit ever-smaller computerized products, the layers of the silicon sandwich - now thin enough to be measured in individual atoms - often were polluted by a silicon-based stubble.

"This kind of effect was a nuisance for a long time," said Raj Solanki, a professor of electrical engineering at Oregon Health & Science University's OGI School of Science and Engineering. "We used to call it whisker growth."

Today, however, those whiskers have a new and fashionable name: nanowires. As it turns out, they might be the key to a new generation of computer chips, flat panel displays and biological sensors.

In scientific circles, "nano" is all the rage. It refers to a nanometer - one-billionth of a meter. And nanotechnology is defined as anything working at the scale of less than 100 nanometers. A human hair is about 50,000 nanometers thick.

In practical terms, nanotech refers to scientists' ability to manipulate atoms to create new materials, drugs and machines. The capability is a recent phenomenon, and its possibilities appear limitless. Hence the hype.

Researchers say technologies under development in Oregon could one day show up in a variety of everyday applications, including lightweight power sources capable of running laptops for days, instead of hours; more fuel-efficient cars; better methods of delivering drugs; small in-room heat pumps that eliminate the need for duct work in homes; and microreactors capable of cleaning up toxic waste.

Researchers - in Oregon and elsewhere - are nowhere near realizing that potential yet. On Monday, though, a group of OGI researchers led by Solanki published findings in the Applied Physics Letter indicating that it had figured out how to grow nanowires in a precise location and in a specific direction - a critical first step in building a new generation of tiny electrical transistors for computer chips.

"This is still alchemy; it's not well understood," Solanki said. "Right now there is a lot of promise, but to actually make it work will take a lot of work - and a lot of funding."

Solanki says his lab, funded by local tech employers Intel, Sharp Laboratories and FEI, is the only one in the Northwest studying silicon nanowires. Now he and a team of investigators from OGI have teamed up with researchers at Portland State University and Linfield College to go after $7 million in federal grants. If successful, they would form another axis in Oregon's bid for prominence in the field.

"We've been collaborators and supporters," said David Evans, a research and development manager for Sharp Laboratories. Solanki "has been on the forefront of this kind of work. There's a lot of places interested in nanowires, but it's definitely a competitive effort."

Researchers at other institutions typically grow nanowires in a chamber separate from the silicon wafer, then combine them with a liquid that is poured over a silicon wafer patterned with electrodes. Using that process, some of the nanowires settle between the right electrodes, which can then be fabricated into electrical circuits.

In Solanki's lab, researchers grow the nanowires in the same chamber with the patterned wafer. By applying an electrical field between the electrodes, they found, they can get the nanowires to grow in a precise location.

Solanki says current technology will hold out for six more years, at which point nanowires might start showing up in mass-produced computer chips.

"That's my guess," he said. "This is still research. We have to make sure we can grow this well on a 12-inch wafer. At this point, we've just demonstrated the feasibility" of the technique.