Latest Reports

Regulatory requirements for using directional airflow as the primary method of containment in BSL-3 labs is a simple concept, however the engineering and controls required for today’s facilities present an array of challenges when it comes to conducting “failure scenario” tests during commissioning and shutdown, and startup procedures during normal operations. Maintaining collaboration between the occupants, an experienced architect, and an objective third-party commissioning partner while designing or redesigning a BSL-3 lab can prevent costly delays and complications.

The Baylor Research and Innovation Collaborative (BRIC) is a multidiscipline research and academic facility, housed inside a renovated 304,000-sf tire manufacturing plant, designed to break down or inhibit silos from forming, while being friendly to commercialization, industry, workforce development, and international collaboration.

The four-story Jackson Laboratory for Genomic Medicine (JAX GM), containing both biological and computational lab space arranged around a central atrium, houses 160 biomedical researchers, technicians, and support staff from five different temporary spaces on the University of Connecticut Health Center campus. The number of occupants is expected to grow to 300 within three years, and the labs are flexible enough to accommodate the expected trend away from the wet bench toward more computational research.

Aiming to exit two leased facilities, backfill an owned building, and reunite departmental groups, Wells Fargo Bank successfully completed a two-year restack, consisting of approximately 40 projects that moved about 5,000 employees and touched roughly 1.1 million sf in seven Charlotte, N.C., facilities. A time-based migration planning process allowed Lori Ferguson, Wells Fargo senior properties project manager, and her team to keep the gargantuan task on track as it implemented the corporate strategy.

The Commonwealth Center for Advanced Manufacturing (CCAM) is a research collaboration between the University of Virginia, Virginia Tech, Virginia State University, and manufacturing companies worldwide. The 63,000-sf state-of-the-art facility is designed for manufacturers to collaborate with faculty and students from Virginia’s top research and teaching institutions to perform advanced research in surface engineering and manufacturing systems.