Pushing a broom gave Kent Murphy time to think. After graduating from high school, Murphy spent parts of 11 years as a janitor with ITT Electro-Optical Products Division in Roanoke. Inclined toward science, he would pick the brains of researchers developing a little-known technology called fiber optics. In a twist right out of the movie "Good Will Hunting," ITT encouraged Murphy to attend college and, once he graduated, hired him as a lab researcher.

Kent Murphy, CEO of Luna Innovations Photo by Doug Miller

Murphy more than rewarded the company's faith in him. Before long, he developed a new type of fiber optic sensor that he discovered one day by accident while switching off his computer. It was the first of six fiber optic technologies he invented for ITT, netting the company huge profits. At a company he heads now, Murphy has helped invent sensors that protect Fresco paintings at the Sistine Chapel and enable airplane wings to change shape according to flying conditions. "Everything I've ever discovered," says Murphy, 42, "has been totally by accident."

Modest words for a man who 20 years after joining ITT now presides as CEO over Luna Innovations, a growing research and development company headquartered in Blacksburg. During the past three years, Luna Innovations has come into its own, pioneering new research, filing more than two dozen patents and spinning out three independent companies that aim to convert scientific research into commercial products. Luna's client list spans 10 countries and reads like a "who's who" of elite R&D organizations and Fortune 500 companies. The company's development of fiber optic sensors and advanced materials is being applied in industries as diverse as biosciences, industrial maintenance and telecommunications.

The company is "one of our region's growing success stories," says Gary Atkinson, director of the Roanoke office of Virginia's Center for Innovative Technology. Murphy founded the company with a partner in 1990 while a graduate student at Virginia Tech. The company, known then as Fiber and Sensor Technologies, began by making a special fiber optic sensor called a strain gauge, which measures microscopic changes in material and structures. These sensors have been used in test aircraft for detecting corrosion, structural fatigue and predictive maintenance.

Northrop Grumman was Luna's first customer back in 1990. Presently, the aircraft maker is working with Luna to embed the special sensors in newly designed wings that can change shape to match a plane's flight conditions.

Luna's sensors also have been used in the Vatican’s Sistine Chapel to protect priceless Fresco paintings, which can be sensitive to the slightest changes in temperature and humidity. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, a nuclear facility in Tennessee, tapped Luna to plant sensors inside its reactors to detect cracks and other structural compromises, making it the first company to conduct such a measurement.

Despite being 10 years old, the company has come into its own during the last three years. That's when Murphy took a leave of absence from his faculty job as a professor of electrical engineering at Virginia Tech to concentrate on growing the company. The Oak Ridge opportunity was among a series of incidents that spurred Murphy to focus the company more on research and development, with an eye toward eventual commercialization of products. "That's when we started seeing this vision of being more of an R&D company, so we changed the name and brought on an entrepreneurial board of directors to help us build the company."

Gradually, the company began to evolve, forming three spin-off companies that specialize in different disciplines of research and development. Luna Technologies develops instrumentation and fiber-optic measurement devices, which could be used to speed up testing during production of components used in telecommunication networks. Luna Analytics is trying to capitalize on the emerging field of proteomics by designing "bioanalysis" devices that could aid pharmaceutical companies in the discovery of new therapeutic drugs. And finally Luna nanoMaterials, the newest subsidiary, has patented a "new form of carbon" that improves the quality of magnetic resonance imaging machines used to detect tumors and other ailments.

By year's end, Murphy says Luna expects to spin off three additional companies."We are focusing on developing products that have great commercial appeal." Luna Innovations has raised about $20 million in "non-government funding," including grants and some private investment. Thus far, Luna Technologies is the only subsidiary to receive venture capital when it secured funding from a consortium of investors, including Gryphon Capital Partners in Roanoke.

New investment will be needed to help Luna spin off additional companies and expand its research staff of more than 100. Murphy says Luna Innovations expects to employ about 200 people by year's end. The company recently opened a research office in Charlottesville to cultivate relationships with professors at the University of Virginia. A sales and marketing office opened in Crystal City, near Washington, D.C., and plans call for eventually expanding to Research Triangle Park in Raleigh, N.C.

Luna's focus on penetrating highly lucrative markets should generate plenty of investor interest. "Everything Luna does has a high level of intellectual property behind it," says Leigh Huff, managing partner with Gryphon Capital. "It's cutting-edge technology that requires years of R&D, but from an investment standpoint, a high level of intellectual property is attractive. That's because it's going to be worth lots of money." Should all go according to plan, Murphy says Luna could be the target of a merger and acquisition, or may head to the public markets eventually. Either way, it would appear the company is poised to sweep up a windfall of profits.