The Secretary of Transportation was in Orono today and it was bridges that brought him. Secretary Ray Lahood was invited by Congressman Mike Michaud to tour one of the research facilities at the University of Maine.

Lahood was able to see some of the students' cutting edge research projects first hand. Governor Baldacci was also there.

Lahood seemed impressed with what he saw, and thinks the projects being done at the University of Maine will go well with the new green direction the country is leaning to. "I'm going to take this information back, I'm going to offer an opportunity for them to come to Washington," said Lahood, "and make some presentations, there is definitely a role for our government in what is going on here in this innovative incubator is what I would call it."

Researchers with the University of Maine Advanced Structures and Composites Center have designed something called "bridge in a backpack".

It features a carbon fiber fabric that's unfolded, inflated and coated with a resin at the job site, then filled with concrete.

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