VanderHart scores high with insulation research

Micah VanderHart presents his research — Photo by Jessica Armstrong
Master’s student Micah VanderHart gives a presentation on his research on vacuum insulated panels at a regional competition in Denver, Colorado, in March 2025.

April 9, 2025
By Yuri Bult-Ito

A �ֻ�ֱ�� engineering student who is researching highly efficient insulation placed among the top nine at a recent regional thesis competition.

Micah VanderHart, who won first place in UAF’s Three Minute Thesis competition in February, went on to a regional competition in Denver, Colorado, in March.

3MT participants present their theses in three minutes with only one PowerPoint slide.

VanderHart, a master’s student under Tom Marsik at the UAF �ֻ�ֱ�� Center for Energy and Power, presented his research related to vacuum insulated panels, or VIPs. The building insulation is up to 10 times more effective than traditional options.

However, VIP adoption in the building industry has been slow, due to some shortfalls. VanderHart is part of a research team developing an active vacuum insulation system to address those. He is developing a control system for the active vacuum insulation.

His system uses a vacuum pump to periodically remove air from the panels and regularly checks for panel punctures. The automated system can be permanently connected to all the panels in a building. VanderHart’s system also allows panels to be built on site to custom dimensions.

. The active vacuum insulation system will help meet increasing demand for advanced building insulations that can reduce energy consumption.

“My goal is to make this system affordable so it can be commercialized and available to homeowners,” VanderHart said.

VanderHart said he enjoyed the wide variety of presentations by other competitors at the Denver event.

“It would have been hard for me to pick winners, if I had been a judge,” he said. “And I enjoyed listening to them all and learning about their work.”

in 2008, 3MT is an annual competition held in more than 200 universities worldwide. Participants share their research with a broad audience with no background in the research subject areas.

VanderHart’s research is supported by the �ֻ�ֱ�� Regional Collaboration for Technology Innovation and Commercialization program, an initiative of the Department of the Navy’s Office of Naval Research.