Next-Gen Labs: The Impact of Automation, Manufacturing, and Technology

An evolution of the equipment and technology researchers need is transforming ordinary labs into facilities that deserve to be called next-generation or future-ready. Significant changes in space utilization and lab planning and design are driven by increased automation and robotics, the incorporation of manufacturing, enhanced information technology with an emphasis on data collection, ever-evolving technologies, developer core/shell fit-outs, hybrid work patterns, and different approaches to project delivery and construction. 

“The biggest challenge is to create a facility flexible enough to accommodate utilities that might be needed in the future without over-investing in something that might never be needed,” says Ellen Sisle, global director of science and research at Jacobs. “The best approach is to focus on not creating roadblocks to accommodating unknown future technology, but not providing for everything at move-in.”

Examples include allowing space in the shafts for future ductwork without necessarily providing the ductwork, or running utility mains along central corridors but not tapping off to specific locations until necessary.

The research industry has discussed labs of the future for nearly three decades, but little progress has been made to change the defining characteristics of these future-ready labs. Labs designed in the past few years have looked similar to those built 30 years ago, with their overhead services, mobile or fixed casework, large open spaces, and enhanced connections and visibility between spaces to foster collaboration. If not for updates to the aesthetic appearance with more modern finishes and furniture, it would be difficult to distinguish the older labs from the newer ones, though some were being dubbed “future-ready” many years ago.

The evolution of labs, which began decades ago, often includes larger expanses of spaces and different approaches to what is housed in labs and how programming is conducted. Twenty years ago, Jacobs designed what was supposed to be an interdisciplinary lab with biology and chemistry researchers on the same floor to enhance collaboration between the two disciplines in the shared hallways and common areas. However, a recent visit to the facility showed the biologists and chemists still just email each other from their respective areas.

Collaboration didn’t improve, “but there was still this continuing evolution of thinking about how the labs should be organized,” says Sisle. “Many of our clients started changing the floor plates so that instead of organizing by a particular discipline, they might organize by a particular disease or therapeutic research.”

Small noticeable changes that began to occur recently include more aesthetically pleasing casework, space metrics to make labs more efficient with operational changes, shared equipment, and less individualized ownership of resources. New external drivers, which will impact the research process and project delivery, inspire real design changes to accommodate new technologies.  

“The biggest issue is being flexible for the future without over-investing in the present,” says Sisle.

Understanding New External Drivers

Automation and Robotics

Research facilities must keep pace with the new equipment and technologies necessary in the labs and support spaces. Increased automation and utilization of robotics, independent of other equipment, can be programmed and reconfigured according to evolving research. Robots used in labs, offices, and remote locations offer efficiency, accuracy, and the capability to handle high-throughput testing and screening for various types of research.

“As technology, automation, and the ability to synthesize data improve, the cycle of discovery, experimentation, and potential failure becomes faster,” says Tejoon Jung, global design principal at Jacobs. “Having on-site pilot plants and manufacturing inevitably becomes part of that cycle as it both creates the need for and enables faster testing.”

Manufacturing

Manufacturing drives the design, layout, and organization of labs and overall research facilities, with many including on-site pilot plants and manufacturing capabilities to ensure more efficient and quicker research testing and potential production. With a greater synergy between research and manufacturing/pilot plants, many pharmaceutical companies have moved their overseas plants back to their own facilities in the United States. 

The inclusion of manufacturing in research facilities raises a major question: How do you block and stack a building so it still remains efficient, while maintaining a close connection between the manufacturing spaces, analytical and testing labs, and scientists working in different parts of the building?

“Critical adjacencies need to be discussed during planning with the users and created to support the workflow particular to the facility being designed,” says Jung. “Because certain physical attributes of manufacturing spaces and labs—such as environmental criteria and finishes—are different, collocating all manufacturing together and all lab space together is prudent.”

Locating manufacturing spaces on the ground floor can accommodate the greater loading criteria for slabs and the higher floor-to-floor height requirements of equipment. Speculative developer lab buildings designed for future tenants are being increasingly used to house manufacturing equipment and to test work being done in the lab, making it important to integrate the research being done in the labs with the work taking place in the spec buildings.

New Technologies, Enhanced IT, and Increased Data Collection 

The introduction of new technologies is occurring so rapidly that research facilities must constantly review their space availability, understand the requirements to house the technology, and know how to make adjustments in services and space when new technology is added. It is essential to test new technologies without interrupting the daily workflow of all building occupants.

As cloud-based artificial intelligence and computational research become more integral to science, more facilities are increasing the size of their data centers and central computing rooms to better facilitate research and to easily access cloud data centers. A robust data infrastructure throughout today’s facilities is necessary to accommodate ever increasing data usage.

Hybrid Work

Hybrid work patterns require spaces that enable more effective collaboration across multiple locations and among various stakeholders.

“What we saw during the pandemic was what researchers, or their facility leads, were always telling us while we were programming buildings: They are the ones coming to work every day,” says Sisle. “Before that, the trend was to make the workplace the same for the lab and non-lab employees, but the pandemic pointed out that the needs are quite different, and we will take a look at what this means as we plan new buildings.”

Developer Core/Shell Fit-Outs

Using core/shell spaces is not a new idea, but they are now being utilized more and in geographic areas where they previously were not. Developers who used to focus on commercial office buildings are turning their attention to research facilities. As a result, the developers are following the same robust design criteria used in research buildings versus what they are accustomed to when developing office buildings or other non-lab facilities. 

The developers are designing the research facilities with façades that epitomize the identity of the building’s occupants, and rethinking how they will operate the building when it is leased. These fit-outs were previously occupied by several small companies, but the newest trend is for one large pharmaceutical company to lease an entire building. 

New Approaches to Project Delivery and Construction

Prefabrication and modular construction are expediting the construction of research facilities, thereby reducing construction waste, enhancing sustainability, increasing safety of construction workers, minimizing impact from weather-related delays, and decreasing the number of necessary on-site construction workers. Main distribution ductwork complete with the risers is often brought to the site as a prefabricated system. Prefabricated shafts, some as high as 60 feet, can be brought to a site and dropped by crane into the roof of a building as a plug-and-play system. Large-scale mega panels and entire ceiling systems with lights can be delivered to the site and installed.

Impact on Lab Design: New Space and Building Typologies 

The new drivers affect how labs are organized, the types of spaces that are needed in these facilities, and the types of buildings that are constructed. Determining the size of a new building requires a fresh design approach where planners acquire as much information as possible about the type of equipment that will be used now and in the future.

“The most common spaces required to accommodate labs of the future are areas to test new technology, while not interrupting existing research; spaces where lab and non-lab workers can collaborate easily; spaces in the lab where virtual connection to other research locations is possible; and spaces that accommodate large automated platforms,” says Sisle.

Driving innovation in a data-driven environment requires reviewing the floorplate and blurring the boundaries between the labs, offices, and other areas, and creating visual and functional connectivity for increased collaboration. Computational lab scientists and other non-lab staff should be strategically located just outside the labs in a work environment with spaces to spur productivity. 

It is also important to rethink the appropriate metric for lab space planning, especially in robot-centric labs where the traditional 11-foot lab modules may not be the best choice. Building designs must include enough space to install, house, maintain, and remove large pieces of equipment. 

With larger equipment and fewer people working in many of today’s facilities, other aspects of commonly accepted lab metrics also may be questioned. For example, the “per researcher” space metric might require reconsideration based on the facility’s size, the type of research, size of the equipment, and the programming.

New spaces, such as innovation hubs, may create environments where people can collaborate, use new technologies, take a coffee break, and work alongside robots. The hub, strategically placed between labs and offices, contains a cluster of specialized areas to promote fluid connectivity between the two environments.

“The growing requirement to test and accommodate new technologies and discuss the findings in situ, with colleagues in various labs, drives the need to provide lab space that is different and more future-oriented than simply having a flexible lab,” says Sisle.

Innovation hubs can include a vestibule with a handwashing area, space to remove personal protective equipment, and non-lab space for refreshments. Researchers can use the handwash sink and lab coat closet, conveniently located on the lab side, to enjoy food and beverages brought in from the office side. It provides space for lab-based researchers to meet with computational scientists and other office-based research staff without leaving the lab environment.

It is critical to have sufficient space for robotics and other automated technologies within the innovation hub. 

“In a research lab, unlike a testing lab, people and robots work near each other, and the space has to work for both of them,” says Jung. “The design must provide spaces that allow both to function simultaneously, but there is no singular answer to incorporating robotics into research facilities because it differs.”

The hub also should include space for new experimental technology to be tested without interrupting other established research. Overhead services and utilities must be more robust than in a typical lab space to accommodate a wide range of future technology.

Future-ready facilities also benefit from providing the means for researchers to interface virtually with colleagues while still working in the lab environment. For example, computational scientists could collaborate with researchers in a lab by viewing a virtual projection of a molecular model being analyzed outside the lab, meaning neither would have to walk back and forth between computers and the lab bench.

The innovative drivers are creating new building types, where hybrid manufacturing and lab areas coincide with the new space typologies. 

“Blocking and stacking can be a challenge, but one approach is to assign the manufacturing and pilot plant to the ground floor, where there is slab on grade, high performance, good vibration criteria, ready access to the loading dock and warehouse, and vertical adjacencies to analytical and other labs that work together with the manufacturing portion,” says Jung. “The drawback to this type of layout is that now you have the entire floor plate that is 22 to 24 feet high, and unless manufacturing can take up the entire floor, there is wasted space.”

Labs and offices can be located on the upper floors, keeping entry to these areas separate from the manufacturing environment. In buildings where the manufacturing and pilot plant do not require an entire ground floor, a sensible approach could be to build a wing for these activities to the side of a lab building, thereby preserving proximity to labs, support spaces, and utilities. 

“We have been talking about the lab of the future for quite a long time, but now all of these drivers are actually having an impact on what the lab of the future will be,” says Sisle. 

By Tracy Carbasho