The Norwegian Institute of Technology ( Norwegian: ''Norges tekniske høgskole'', NTH) was a science institute in

Trondheim Trondheim ( , , ; ), historically Kaupangen, Nidaros, and Trondhjem (), is a city and municipality in Trøndelag county, Norway. As of 2022, it had a population of 212,660. Trondheim is the third most populous municipality in Norway, and is ...

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

. It was established in 1910, and existed as an independent technical university for 58 years, after which it was merged into the

University of Trondheim The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU; ) is a public university, public research university in Norway and the largest in terms of enrollment. The university's headquarters is located in Trondheim (city), Trondheim, with region ...

as an independent college. In 1996 NTH ceased to exist as an organizational superstructure when the university was restructured and rebranded. The former NTH departments are now basic building blocks of the

Norwegian University of Science and Technology The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU; ) is a public university, public research university in Norway and the largest in terms of enrollment. The university's headquarters is located in Trondheim (city), Trondheim, with region ...

(NTNU). NTH was primarily a

polytechnic A polytechnic is an educational institution that primarily focuses on vocational education, applied sciences, and career pathways. They are sometimes referred to as ''institutes of technology'', ''vocational institutes'', or ''universities of app ...

institute, educating master level

engineer Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who Invention, invent, design, build, maintain and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials. They aim to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while ...

s as well as

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs, and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

s. In 1992 NTH had 7627 master and doctoral students and 1591 employees; it graduated 1262 chartered engineers (master level), 52 chartered architects, and 92 Dr.Ing. (PhD). The operating budget was equivalent to US$100 M, and the total premises amounted to around 260,000 m² (64

acre The acre ( ) is a Unit of measurement, unit of land area used in the Imperial units, British imperial and the United States customary units#Area, United States customary systems. It is traditionally defined as the area of one Chain (unit), ch ...

s). Since the merger, it forms a part of the university campus commonly known as

Gløshaugen Gløshaugen is a neighborhood in the city of Trondheim in Trøndelag county, Norway. It is located in the borough of Lerkendal, approximately southeast of Midtbyen in Trondheim Municipality, the downtown center of Trondheim. It is situated ea ...

, from the geographical area in which it is situated.

History

Seal of the Norwegian Institute of Technology

The decision to establish a Norwegian national college of technology was made by the Norwegian parliament, the

Storting The Storting ( ; ) is the supreme legislature of Norway, established in 1814 by the Constitution of Norway. It is located in Oslo. The Unicameralism, unicameral parliament has 169 members and is elected every four years based on party-list propo ...

, in 1900, after years of heated debate on where the institution should be located; many representatives felt that the capital

Kristiania Oslo ( or ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of 1,064,235 in 2022, an ...

(now Oslo) was self-evident as the place for this nationally important seat of learning. However, eventually ''Den Tekniske Høgskole'' was located in the geographically central city of

, based on an emerging policy of decentralisation as well as the city's existing and highly esteemed technical college, ''Trondhjems Tekniske Læreanstalt''. Hovedbygningen, the building of Norges tekniske høgskole was designed by architect

Bredo Greve Adolf Bredo Stabell Greve (28 June 1871 – 30 March 1931) was a Norwegian architect. Biography Greve was born at Hamar in Hedmark, Norway. He was a son of Mathias Sigwardt Greve (1832–1912) and Blanca Olivia Juell (1836–1918). He was a bro ...

. It was built of granite block construction in the

National Romantic style The National Romantic style was a Nordic architectural style that was part of the National Romantic movement during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It is often considered to be a form of Art Nouveau. The National Romantic style spread ...

of architecture. Five academical departments were originally present in the parliament's resolution of 31 May 1900: *

Architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and construction, constructi ...

and city planning *

Civil engineering Civil engineering is a regulation and licensure in engineering, professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including public works such as roads ...

Mechanical engineering Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines and mechanism (engineering), mechanisms that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and engineering mathematics, mathematics principl ...

(a. General and b. Naval, i.e. ship and ship engine construction) *

Electrical engineering Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems that use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...

Chemistry Chemistry is the scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a physical science within the natural sciences that studies the chemical elements that make up matter and chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules a ...

(a. General and b. Electro-chemistry)

Academic faculties

The academic structure of NTH during the last years before its inclusion in NTNU was as follows: *Faculty of Architecture, with 5 Departments: **Form and Colour Studies **Building Technology **Architectural History **Arch. Design **Town and Regional Planning *Faculty of Applied Earth Science and Metallurgy, with 3 Departments: **Metallurgy **Geology and Mineral Resources **Petroleum Technology and Applied Geophysics (see also Department of Petroleum Engineering and Applied Geophysics) *Faculty of Civil Engineering, with 8 Departments: **Building and Construction Engineering **Geotechnical Engineering **Road and Railway Engineering **Transportation Engineering **Hydraulic and Sanitary Engineering **Building Materials **Structural Engineering **Geodesy and Photogrammetry *Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, with 5 Departments: **Electrical Power Engineering **Telecommunications **Engineering Cybernetics **Physical Electronics **Computer Systems and Telematics *Faculty of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, with 7 Departments: **Inorganic Chemistry **Organic Chemistry **Physical Chemistry **Chemical Engineering **Industrial Chemistry **Industrial Biochemistry **Biotechnology *Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, with 6 Departments: **Thermal Energy and Hydropower **Machine Design and Materials Technology **Production and Quality Engineering **Applied Mechanics, Thermo- and Fluid Dynamics **Heating and Ventilation **Refrigeration Engineering *Faculty of Physics and Mathematics, with two Departments: **Mathematics Sciences **Physics *Faculty of Marine Technology, with 4 Departments: **Marine Systems Design **Marine Structures **Marine Hydrodynamics **Marine Engineering *Faculty of Economics and Industrial Management, with two Departments: **Economics **Organisation and Work Science (Norwegian abbreviation: ORAL) *Center for Management Education (Norw. abbrev.: ULA) *Technical University Library of Norway (Norw. abbrev.: NTUB) **The national resource library of technology and architecture **Locations: Technical Main Library as well as six Faculty Libraries on campus

Notable alumni

* Jens G. Balchen, electronics engr., professor, "father of Norwegian cybernetics",

IEEE The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is an American 501(c)(3) organization, 501(c)(3) public charity professional organization for electrical engineering, electronics engineering, and other related disciplines. The IEEE ...

fellow * Alf Egil Bogen, electronics engr., co-inventor of

Atmel AVR AVR is a family of microcontrollers developed since 1996 by Atmel, acquired by Microchip Technology in 2016. They are 8-bit RISC single-chip microcontrollers based on a modified Harvard architecture. AVR was one of the first microcontroller ...

μcontroller, co-founder of Atmel Norway *

Helmer Dahl Helmer Hartmann Dahl (17 June 1908 – 29 March 1999) was a Norwegian electrical engineer and director of research at the Chr. Michelsen Institute. Biography Dahl was born at Sarpsborg in Østfold, Norway. He was the son of Karl Theodor Dahl (186 ...

, electronics engr., World War II radar and

ASDIC Sonar (sound navigation and ranging or sonic navigation and ranging) is a technique that uses sound propagation (usually underwater, as in submarine navigation) to navigate, measure distances ( ranging), communicate with or detect objects o ...

pioneer, research and industry mentor, technology historian * David Lie Eide, engineer *

Johannes Falnes Johannes Falnes (1931–2024) was a Professor Emeritus of Experimental Physics at the Department of Physics of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology noted for his contributions to wave energy research. He was one of the pioneers of ...

, wave energy researcher *

Ivar Asbjørn Følling Ivar Asbjørn Følling (23 August 1888 – 24 January 1973) was a Norwegian physician and biochemist. He first described the disease commonly known as Følling's disease or phenylketonuria (PKU). Early life and education He was born on 23 August ...

- chemical engr., discovery of

Phenylketonuria Phenylketonuria (PKU) is an inborn error of metabolism that results in decreased metabolism of the amino acid phenylalanine. Untreated PKU can lead to intellectual disability, seizures, behavioral problems, and mental disorders. It may also r ...

, Jahreprisen 1960 *

Ivar Giaever Ivar Giaever (, ; born April 5, 1929) is a Norwegian-American solid-state and biophysicist who shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physics with Leo Esaki and Brian Josephson. One half of the prize was awarded jointly to Esaki and Giaever "for the ...

, mechanical engr., physicist, 1973

Nobel laureate The Nobel Prizes (, ) are awarded annually by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, the Swedish Academy, the Karolinska Institutet, and the Norwegian Nobel Committee to individuals and organizations who make outstanding contributions in th ...

* Bjarne Hurlen, mechanical engr., army officer, defence industry executive (

Kongsberg Våpenfabrikk Kongsberg Gruppen is a Norwegian multinational company, that supplies high-technology systems to customers in the merchant marine, defence, aerospace, offshore oil and gas industries, and renewable and utilities industries. In 2018, Kongsbe ...

1956–1975) *

Ralph Høibakk Ralph Høibakk (born 14 July 1937) is a Norwegian entrepreneur. He established the Tandberg Data company in 1978, which produced ergonomically designed laptops and keyboards. Høibakk left the company in 1986, and started Høibakk Invest, which p ...

, physicist, computer industry executive, mountaineer, adventurer (

Seven Summits The Seven Summits are the highest mountains on each of the seven traditional continents. On 30 April 1985, Richard Bass became the first climber to reach the summit of all seven. In January 2023, ''Climbing (magazine), Climbing'' said "Today, t ...

; South Pole) * Fred Kavli, physicist, innovator, business leader (sensor technology: Kavlico Corp.), and philanthropist *

Paal Kibsgaard Paal Kibsgaard (born April 1967) is a Norwegian petroleum engineer and businessman; the former chairman and CEO of Schlumberger, the world's largest oilfield services company. Early life He was born in Ålesund, Norway in April 1967. Educatio ...

, petroleum engineer, chairman and CEO of

Schlumberger Schlumberger (), doing business as SLB, is a global multinational oilfield services company. Founded in France in 1926, the company is now incorporated as Schlumberger NV in Willemstad, Curaçao, with principal executive offices in Houston ...

Arne Korsmo Arne Korsmo (14 August 1900 – 29 August 1968) was a leading architect in Norway and a propagator of the international architectural style. He taught at the Norwegian National Academy of Craft and Art Industry and he was a professor at the Depa ...

- architect, professor,

Norwegian National Academy of Craft and Art Industry The National College of Art and Design () was established in 1818. In 1996, the National College of Art and Design became part of Oslo National Academy of the Arts (''Kunsthøgskolen i Oslo'', KHiO), along with the Norwegian National Academy of ...

* Olav Landsverk, electronics engr., military weapon systems computer pioneer, professor * John M. Lervik, electronics engr., co-founder and CEO of

cXense Cxense ASA (pronounced si:sɛns was a technology company, founded by John Markus Lervik in Oslo, Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Eur ...

, co-founder and former CEO of Fast Search & Transfer (FAST) * Finn Lied, electronics engr., World War II resistance agent, defence research director, Minister of Industry * Terje Michalsen, electronics engr., venture capitalist * Lars Monrad Krohn, electronics engr., industrialist (mini- and microcomputers) * Ingvild Myhre, electronics engr., telecom industry executive (Alcatel Telecom Norway,

Telenor Telenor ASA ( or ) is a Norwegian majority state-owned multinational telecommunications company headquartered at Fornebu in Bærum, close to Oslo. It is one of the world's largest mobile telecommunications companies with operations worldwi ...

Mobil) *

Lars Onsager Lars Onsager (November 27, 1903 – October 5, 1976) was a Norwegian American physical chemist and theoretical physicist. He held the Gibbs Professorship of Theoretical Chemistry at Yale University. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemist ...

, chemical engr., 1968

* Venketa Parthasarathy, chemical engr., noted for work on

wood pulp Pulp is a fibrous Lignocellulosic biomass, lignocellulosic material prepared by chemically, semi-chemically, or mechanically isolating the cellulose fiber, cellulosic fibers of wood, fiber crops, Paper recycling, waste paper, or cotton paper, rag ...

and two-stage oxygen delignification * Erik Rolfsen, architect and city planner for

Oslo Oslo ( or ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of 1,064,235 in 2022 ...

* Edgar B. Schieldrop, mechanical engr.,

student society A student society, student association, university society, student club, university club, or student organization is a society or an organization, operated by students at a university, college, or other educational institution, whose membership t ...

co-founder, popular science & technology author *

Rolf Skår Rolf Skår (13 May 1941 – 24 May 2023) was a Norwegian engineer and entrepreneur. He was a co-founder of the computer manufacturing company Norsk Data in 1967, and took over as chief executive officer (CEO) of the company from 1978 to 1989. He ...

, cybernetics engr., industrialist (minicomputers), Norwegian Space Centre director * Einar Aasen Skogsholm, PhD Electrical Engr., VP of MECO * Øystein Stray Spetalen, petroleum engr., Norwegian investor *

Berit Svendsen Berit Svendsen (born 7 April 1963) is a Norwegian engineer and business executive. As of September 2015, she is a vice president of the Telenor Group and head of Telenor Norway. 4 September 2018 she resigned from both positions after longer intern ...

, telecom. engr., MTM, CTO of

2000–. *

Anders Talleraas Anders Talleraas (born 4 February 1946 in Brattvær Municipality) is a Norwegian politician for the Conservative Party. He was elected to the Norwegian Parliament from Møre og Romsdal in 1977, and was re-elected on four occasions. Talleraas w ...

, mechanical engr., MP for 20 years, former Conservative party parliamentary leader *

Vebjørn Tandberg Vebjørn Tandberg (16 September 1904–30 August 1978) was a Norwegian electronics engineer. Tandberg was born at Bodø in Nordland, Norway. He attended the Norwegian Institute of Technology in Trondheim (1930). He founded '' Tandbergs Rad ...

, electronics engr., industrialist (radio, tape recording, television) *

Theodore Theodorsen Theodore Theodorsen (January 8, 1897 – November 5, 1978) was a Norwegian-American theoretical aerodynamicist noted for his work at NACA (the forerunner of NASA) and for his contributions to the study of turbulence. Early ye ...

Norwegian-American Norwegian Americans () are Americans with ancestral roots in Norway. Norwegian immigrants went to the United States primarily in the latter half of the 19th century and the first few decades of the 20th century. There are more than 4.5 milli ...

aerodynamicist Aerodynamics () is the study of the motion of air, particularly when affected by a solid object, such as an airplane wing. It involves topics covered in the field of fluid dynamics and its subfield of gas dynamics, and is an important domain of ...

Leif Tronstad Leif Hans Larsen Tronstad (27 March 1903 – 11 March 1945) was a Norwegian inorganic chemist, intelligence officer and military organizer. He graduated from the Norwegian Institute of Technology in 1927 and was a prolific researcher and wri ...

O.B.E. The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

, chemist, nuclear chemistry scientist, planner and organiser of World War II's ''

Operation Gunnerside The Norwegian heavy water sabotage (; ) was a series of Allied-led efforts to halt German heavy water (deuterium) production via hydroelectric plants in Norway in World War II, Nazi Germany-occupied Norway during World War II, involving both Nor ...

'' * Tor Olav Trøim, marine engr., shipping and energy industry executive (Frontline, Seadrill) *

John Ugelstad John Ugelstad (31 March 1921 – 3 April 1997) was a Norwegian chemical engineer and inventor, known for discovering a process to manufacture monodisperse micropellets or microbeads and dynabeads. He was a professor at the Norwegian Institu ...

, chemical engr., known for his pioneering work on monodisperse polymer beads * Tore M. Undeland, electrical engr., professor, international textbook author (Wiley),

fellow * Gjert Wilhelmsen, marine engr., co-founder of Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines * Bror With, mechanical engr., inventor of the ''

Rottefella Rottefella is a Norwegian manufacturing company of winter sports equipment, more specifically ski bindings. The name "Rottefella" refers to the three-pin binding invented by Bror With in 1927, inspired on a couple of rat traps he had seen in ...

'' ski binding and Dromedille dinghy; World War II resistance agent * Vegard Wollan, electronics engr., co-inventor of

μcontroller, co-founder of Atmel Norway

Commercial impact

The following companies, or divisions of international companies, have been created directly or partly from NTH research and influence, including its contract research arm

SINTEF SINTEF (, "The Foundation for Industrial and Technical Research"), headquartered in Trondheim, Norway, is an independent research organization founded in 1950 that conducts contract research and development projects. SINTEF has 2000 employees fr ...

with spin-offs: *3d-Radar AS (advanced ground penetrating radar technology for shallow subsurface mapping in 3D

* Atmel AVR, Atmel Norway (inventors and designers of the

RISC microcontroller family, incl HW/SW tools)

*Ceetron AS (3D visualization and technical computing for oil & gas, plus aerospace, automotive, and consumer electronics

* Cybernetica (Norwegian company) advanced process control, specializing in nonlinear

model predictive control Model predictive control (MPC) is an advanced method of process control that is used to control a process while satisfying a set of constraints. It has been in use in the process industries in chemical plants and oil refineries since the 1980s. I ...

* CorrOcean (industrial/off-shore Corrosion Monitoring

*ErgoRunit AS (

outsourcing Outsourcing is a business practice in which companies use external providers to carry out business processes that would otherwise be handled internally. Outsourcing sometimes involves transferring employees and assets from one firm to another ...

services in IT system planning/

administration Administration may refer to: Management of organizations * Management, the act of directing people towards accomplishing a goal: the process of dealing with or controlling things or people. ** Administrative assistant, traditionally known as a se ...

and accounting

(N) * Fast Search & Transfer (FAST) (inter/intranet

search engine A search engine is a software system that provides hyperlinks to web pages, and other relevant information on World Wide Web, the Web in response to a user's web query, query. The user enters a query in a web browser or a mobile app, and the sea ...

s; developers of alltheweb.com

*GE Vingmed Ultrasound, formerly Vingmed Sound (

ultrasound Ultrasound is sound with frequency, frequencies greater than 20 Hertz, kilohertz. This frequency is the approximate upper audible hearing range, limit of human hearing in healthy young adults. The physical principles of acoustic waves apply ...

-based imaging in medical diagnosis and surgery support systems

(N) *Marine Cybernetics, specialising in the testing and verification of ship and offshore structure control system

(N) *MARINTEK, The Norwegian Marine Technology Research Institute,A majority share is owned by the SINTEF, SINTEF Group including MARINTEK (USA), Inc

* Nordic Semiconductor, Nordic Semiconductor ASA (

ASIC An application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC ) is an integrated circuit (IC) chip customized for a particular use, rather than intended for general-purpose use, such as a chip designed to run in a digital voice recorder or a high-efficien ...

design, SoCs, RF/mixed-signal hybrid IC's

*Oceanor (oceanographic measurements and real-time environmental monitoring in oceans, freshwater, and soil

*Powel ASA (IT products/services for energy production companies

*Q-Free ASA; formerly Micro Design AS (radio systems for tolling, traffic information, parking, ticketing, access control, logistics

*Schlumberger Information Solutions Trondheim, formerly VoxelVision AS (3D visualization, mostly for oil & gas applications

*SINTEF, The Foundation for Scientific and Industrial Research at NTH (contract research corp, 1700 employees

*SINTEF Energy Research, SINTEF Petroleum Research, and SINTEF Fisheries and Aquaculture ² *Sinvent Ltd., SINTEFs development and investment company *Sun Microsystems Trondheim; formerly ClustRa Systems (high-availability, real-time

database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data or a type of data store based on the use of a database management system (DBMS), the software that interacts with end users, applications, and the database itself to capture and a ...

technology

*Kongsberg Oil & Gas Technologies AS; acquired Systems in Motion AS (3D visualization software

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Norwegian Institute of Technology Defunct universities and colleges in Norway Technical universities and colleges Buildings and structures in Trondheim Education in Trondheim Universities and colleges established in 1910 * 1910 establishments in Norway National Romantic architecture in Norway Art Nouveau educational buildings