Michael Ceballos couldn't believe there wasn't a national Native research institute somewhere in the United States, so he set out to create one.

On Tuesday, Ceballos placed his first order for laboratory chemicals and science equipment as he and University of Montana students begin working in, arguably, the country's first university research lab created for Native graduate and undergraduate students.

“The idea behind the Native American research labs is to provide hands-on research experiences, both laboratory and field experiences, for Native students who have come from economically disadvantaged communities or from tribal colleges where you often don't have access to instrumentation and expertise,” said Ceballos, a research assistant professor at UM.

Four students - recipients of a MILES grant, part of the Howard Hughes medical program - are now at work in three new laboratories on the University of Montana campus, combining a hands-on and cross-disciplinary setting with state-of-the-art research instrumentation.

“Science is data, it's documentation, it's everything that's necessary for tribal development to occur,” said Madonna Peltier-Yawakie, president of Turtle Island Communications, a telecommunications and engineering company in Brooklyn Park, Minn. “If there are going to be Native Americans who are skilled in those areas, they have to have access to those kinds of facilities.”

Too often, the opportunities for Natives to learn hard science slip away in high school, said Aaron Bird Bear, American Indian student services coordinator at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

“The preparation level of students coming from rural schools that are predominately American Indian enrollment - they're always coming with a huge hurdle of math to catch up with,” said Bird Bear. “It usually impedes them from enrolling in foundational course work like chemistry. You see these kinds of barriers that keep American Indians from participating in the sciences.”

He said of the 193 self-identified undergraduate Native students at UW-Madison, 43 are majoring in science or engineering.

Brian Hall, a UM doctoral student in pharmacology and a former Blackfeet Reservation high school student, said he wasn't prepared for molecular biology when he got to college.

“It was an eye-opening experience,” Hall said. “My biology class was really very simple and macro. What did we do? We studied the Linnaean classification system. There was nothing molecular.”

Flo Gardipee, also a UM doctoral student, earned an undergraduate degree in wildlife biology. She is looking forward to working with Native undergraduates in the new research labs.

“It's going to provide a place where we can take on some projects and have some independence and work in a comfortable environment,” she said. “I'm proud of Michael for getting this started. This is awesome.”

Ceballos, an Alfred P. Sloan Scholar, is completing a doctoral degree in integrative microbiology and biochemistry. He brings two active research awards to UM, including grants from the National Science Foundation and NASA.

“The university has made it a priority to assist Native Americans to enter careers in science,” UM President George Dennison said. “The establishment of the laboratory will help immensely because it will provide a safe place for experimentation and guided learning.”

Across the nation, about 400 Native students complete university degrees in science and engineering each year, said Don Motanic, a trustee for the American Indian Science and Engineering Society Foundation.