The Forest Research Laboratory (FRL) is Oregon’s original research agency designed to help solve problems, create opportunities, and develop new understanding and innovation about forest ecosystems, forest management and forest-derived renewable materials; its director is the dean of Oregon State University’s College of Forestry. Established by the Oregon Legislature in 1941, the program is supported by state and federal appropriations and by research grants from public and private sources (see Oregon Revised Statute 526.225).

In November 2023, the college launched the Center for the Future of Forests and Society to focus FRL research programs on efforts that bring together an inclusive array of minds, strategies and knowledge to collaboratively address complex issues we cannot solve in isolation. The CFFS will promote interdisciplinary science, interwoven with Traditional Ecological Knowledge and other ways of knowing, to holistically address the challenges we are facing both in Oregon and across the globe.

In addition to research in campus laboratories and university forests, studies are conducted cooperatively in public and private forests and in laboratories and manufacturing facilities throughout Oregon and the world.

Faculty, staff, and students from the College of Forestry’s Departments of Forest Engineering, Resources, and Management; Forest Ecosystems and Society; and Wood Science and Engineering contribute to a diverse portfolio of fundamental and applied research and outreach activities. Activities benefit from collaboration with many other departments and colleges at Oregon State and elsewhere. Communication of results to science peers, land managers, policy makers, and the public is a high priority.

The FRL, the Corvallis Forestry Sciences Laboratory of the U.S. Forest Service, the Corvallis-based Forest and Rangelands Ecosystem Science Center of the U.S. Geological Service, and related research conducted elsewhere on campus combine to form the largest concentration of forest sciences research in North America.