All this when in 1892, industrialist John D Rockefeller underwrote the construction of a Gothic outpost in the US Mid-West to pursue higher knowledge in the manner of leading European universities. And the University of Chicago had soon justified its benefactor's vision, becoming an intellectual cauldron pioneering research in Sociology, Education, Free Market Economics and Nuclear Physics.

Now, Rockefeller's institution is evolving, hoping to participate in the economyof the new century. Banking on its research in Life Sciences, the institute is hoping to cash in on the medical and biotechnological developments.

It's even hiring stars from rival universities and industry labs to seek out opportunities to commercialise its discoveries. An in-house venture capital operation called ARCH Development Corp., set up to back professors' entrepreneurial efforts, has lined up its highest number of start-ups and technology-transfer deals.

It's a quest for relevance--a search that drives dozens of major research universities across the nation. These schools, most of them enormous operations with billion-dollar budgets, are re-examining their traditional missions. They're trying to adapt to an era of technological change.But there's some good news in all this. Dozens of universities have the resources to act as research machines. A generation ago, there were perhaps 10.

To regain its influence of old, Chicago hopes to reap the commercial fruit from its revived combined divisionof Biological Sciences and Pritzker School of Medicine. Three years ago, Glenn D Steele Jr, then a cancer surgery professor at Harvard Medical School, was recruited to head the operation.

And Steele wants Chicago back among the top 10 science schools within five years. He talks of a new ethic, one that requires measuring progress in commercialisation and boosting collaboration with the drug and biotech industries. The feeling is that there is a lot to be gained from interaction with the industry, and students are looking for a different kind of a high that entrepreneurship can provide.

Back at the helm

Pardon the pun, but Mo Siegel, the 47-year-old founder and CEO of Celestial Seasonings Inc., the herbal tea company based in Denver, has always been an idea percolator. In 1968, he got the notion to market herb teas, foreseeing the natural-foods obsession that Americans have had in more recent years.Within 16 years he built the company to $28 million in revenues and then sold it to Kraft Foods.Seven years later, after a management buy-out was engineered by a group of investors, he returned as the company's chief executive officer.

Fortune magazine asked Siegel (now chairman): When does it make sense for an entrepreneur to make a comeback?

This is indeed a difficult decision, because when you give birth to a company, it's always in your blood, and you care about the enterprise. But it all depends on how the business has evolved since you left. If it has grown or changed in a way in which your skills could add a lot of economic value, then it may make sense. It worked for me because the company needed the expertise that I had to offer in both product development and marketing.

It needed a guy to reduce debt, to reinvent the product line, and to boost sagging sales. Since my return, Celestial Seasonings has spun out 100 new products, ranging from cough drops to nutritional supplements, and sales have increased a startling 63 per cent -- to $80 million.

In addition, I had the support ofthe employees and the board of directors, and that's critical. In fact, the board approached me with the offer. Keep in mind, though, that any entrepreneur who makes a comeback must seek equity to make this worth his or her while. I got back 25 per cent for a $3 million investment, plus stock options and profit sharing. Despite the huge challenge, for me it has been very energising and rewarding.