Industry News

Lawrence Livermore Laboratory has received approval from the federal government to build a laboratory for the study of potential biological weapons in Livermore, Calif. Rated Biosafety Level 3 (BSL-3), the lab will enable research in the detection of potential threats including anthrax, botulism, and other diseases. In planning the facility, the National Nuclear Security Administration reviewed 92 public comments and, as a result, incorporated 33 changes to the planned facility.

The City of Poway broke ground on a 5,900-sf council chamber building and a two-story 50,400-sf City Hall office building in October 2002. The $14.6-million project was designed by McGraw/Baldwin Architects. Douglas E. Barnhart Inc. is providing construction management services.

The University of California San Francisco (UCSF) is planning the Mission Bay Cancer Research Center. The research facility, expected to reach completion in 2006, will cost over $100-million. UCSF plans to develop a total of 2.65 million sf of biomedical laboratory and instructional space at its Mission Bay campus, for a construction cost of more than $2-billion.

San Antonio-based Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) has completed a 5,000-sf fuel contamination research and testing laboratory. The facility houses over 4,200-sf of lab space and 12 automated test cells, one dedicated to hybrid fuel cell testing, two to diesel, and nine to gasoline, enabling a greater flexibility in the number of systems and components that can be tested at one time.

The South Texas Blood & Tissue Center (STBTC) will soon complete a 44,000-sf expansion that will include a nucleic acid testing laboratory enabling earlier detection of Hepatitis C and HIV. The testing process will provide over 80 hospitals and clinics with the highest quality of blood available. The $10-million expansion will increase STBTC's headquarters to 125,000-sf and will include expanded facilities for umbilical blood storage.