Industry News

Rush University Medical Center is constructing a 300-bed, $575 million hospital in Chicago. Designed by Perkins+Will, the facility began construction in fall of 2008 and is slated for occupancy in 2012. LEED Gold certification for sustainable design will be sought for the new teaching hospital, which will feature energy efficient building systems and a green roof. The 14-story building will have a butterfly shape that expands outward at higher stories from a smaller rectangular base.

Harvard Medical School Dubai Center (HMSDC) will open the Medical Simulation Center in Dubai in the first quarter of 2009. The 20,461-sf facility will provide a simulation environment for healthcare training in a facility housing an auditorium, teaching spaces, and a library. Including simulation operating rooms, intensive care units, emergency rooms, and ward rooms, the center will feature 6,000-sf for emergency medicine training.

centrotherm photovoltaics is constructing a thin-film R&D center in Blaubeuren, Germany. Slated for completion by year-end 2008, the project will include a thin-film laboratory with leading edge analysis tools and pilot fabrication for CIGS lines. The facility will employ 20 staff members. Construction on the facility began in January of 2008.

Marquette University is planning to construct the $100 million Discovery Learning Complex in Milwaukee. Housing the College of Engineering, the facility will be structured around 15 pods housing conjoined classrooms, faculty offices, and research labs in each grouping. The project will feature multidisciplinary labs for materials and structural testing, complex systems, mechatronics, visualization, neuromechanics, and biomedical imaging. A specialized energy workshop lab will focus on development of alternative energy resources.

Hendrick Medical Center will break ground in late fall of 2008 on an $80 million expansion of its healthcare campus in Abilene, Texas. Dubbed “Project 2010”, the project will include a four-story patient tower with surgical and birthing suites and a separate physician office building. The new Hendrick Children's Hospital, featuring visual themes from the Berenstain Bears, will house larger patient rooms, pediatric ICU, and chemotherapy. Project 2010 will consist of 200,000-sf of new construction and 38,000-sf of renovation. Completion is slated for fall of 2010.