Memorial Sloane Kettering Cancer Center opened the 558,000-sf Mortimer B. Zuckerman Research Center in New York in September of 2006. The 23-story, 400-ft high facility was designed by Skidmore Owings & Merrill and Zimmer Gunsul Frasca Partnership. Housing 16 floors of laboratories with 18 wet lab modules each, the research center is built with parallel lab and equipment rooms where mechanical components are located in easily accessible rooms next to the laboratories, significantly reducing noise and heat in the research spaces. Designed to foster interaction and collaboration, the building includes "interaction staircases" entirely enclosed in glass as well as alcoves providing shared space for work being conducted by multiple laboratories. Offices and conference rooms line the center's entire east side, with windows running floor to ceiling as is the case throughout the building.
The laboratory side of the facility features exterior sunshades over a glass curtainwall with baked-in ceramic frit patterns to control the amount of light entering and exiting the space, thus reducing HVAC costs. Research will focus on immunology, cancer biology, genetics, and molecular pharmacology and chemistry. Turner Construction began building the center in 2002 with initial occupancy occurring in May of 2006. The Zuckerman facility is the first of a two-building, $503-million project; the second 135,000-sf, seven-story structure will be built on an adjacent site currently occupied by the 40-year-old Kettering laboratory. Construction has already begun on the second building, which will connect to Zuckerman and include a 350-seat auditorium, dry labs, and academic offices. Completion is slated for early 2009.
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ZGF Architects LLP
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