Industry News

The University of Wisconsin-Madison broke ground on the $150 million Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery in Madison on May 2, 2008. The 300,000-sf interdisciplinary biomedical research building will be comprised of four stories above ground and one below, and will house research offices, an atrium, and flexible dry, wet, and combination laboratories. The collaborative public-private research project will accommodate biotechnology, health science, nanotechnology, engineering, and stem cell research.

Genzyme Corp. is planning to construct a new 200,000-sf R&D center in the Zhongguancun Life Science Park in Beijing. The $90 million facility will accommodate research and development in areas including orthopedics, transplant and immune disease, oncology, endocrinology, and cardiovascular disease, as well as laboratory-scale operations for the MACI(R) (matrix-induced autologous chondrocyte implantation) cell therapy and polyclonal antibody operations.

The College of William and Mary is planning to construct a $4.3 million seawater research facility at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science’s Eastern Shore Laboratory in Wachapreague, Va.  The facility will house environmentally controlled laboratory space and will provide investigators with running seawater for research in marine ecology and aquaculture in the high-salinity environment of the coastal ocean.

James Madison University will initiate the planning phase for Centennial Hall in July of 2008. Sited on the university’s campus in Harrisonburg, Va., the biotechnology building will house life sciences instruction and research. The facility will be operated in partnership with SRI International and other Virginian educational institutions. Completion is expected in 2011.

Elmhurst Memorial Healthcare is planning to construct a $450 million, 259-bed replacement hospital on the campus of its outpatient center in Elmhurst, Ill. Completion is slated for 2011.