Biomedical

Doctors Hospital at Renaissance is partnering with the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley to create a $34 million medical research facility in McAllen. The 83,000-sf building will be developed as a public-private partnership and will be leased back to the University at an annual cost of $2.5 million. The project will provide 16 research labs, core facilities, and clinical space for the study of diseases affecting the Rio Grande Valley.

Texas Tech University is initiating an $86 million expansion of its Health Sciences Center in Lubbock. Designed by Hill International, the 183,000-sf project includes the 56,000-sf Education, Research & Technology Building and the 17,000-sf West Expansion Building. A third facility adjoining an existing library will create an additional 110,000 sf of teaching and research space, and will feature a 240-seat flipped classroom and a sophisticated gross anatomy lab.

UMass Medical School opened the $20 million Massachusetts Facility for High-Resolution Cryo-Electron Microscopy in October of 2016 in Worcester. Featuring a 2,000-sf microscopy suite housing two cryo-EM systems, the $5 million Titan Krios and the $4 million Talos-Arctica, the 4,100-sf laboratory will provide academic investigators and industry partners with advanced imaging capabilities for biomedical and pharmaceutical research.

The University of North Texas broke ground in October of 2016 on the Interdisciplinary Research and Education Building in Fort Worth. Supported by $80 million in state funding, the 173,000-sf facility will accommodate a progressive, team-based pedagogy for health sciences and interprofessional education. Designed by Treanor Architects, the building will house the College of Pharmacy, the North Texas Eye Research Institute, and the Institute for Molecular and Therapeutic Development.

Michigan State University opened the $70 million Bio Engineering Facility in East Lansing in October of 2016. Supporting interdisciplinary biomedical research, the 130,000-sf building provides modular open labs and offices for faculty from the colleges of Engineering, Human Medicine, and Natural Science. Promoting collaboration with many other departments, including veterinary medicine, nursing, and osteopathy, the sustainably designed project is physically connected to both the Clinical Center and Life Sciences buildings to promote the sharing of core resources.

The University of Nebraska Medical Center will construct the National Center for Health Security and Biopreparedness on its Omaha healthcare campus. Occupying the entire ground floor of the planned Global Center for Advanced Interprofessional Learning, the 30,000-sf facility will provide advanced simulation suites and inpatient quarantine areas for the management of infectious diseases such as Ebola. The biocontainment training center is supported by $19.8 million in funding from the U.S.

The State University of New York (SUNY) Upstate Medical University opened the final phase of its Biotech Accelerator in September of 2016. Located in Syracuse, N.Y., the 60,000-sf facility was designed by The S/L/A/M Collaborative and constructed by Murnane Building Contractors. Providing wet labs, dry labs, and core research space with shared equipment, the project houses the Medical Innovation and Novel Discovery (MIND) Center and the Molecular Pathology Next Generation Sequencing Lab.

The University of Texas at Arlington broke ground in October of 2016 on the $125 million Science and Engineering Innovation and Research Building. Designed by Page and ZGF Architects to support team-based learning and discovery, the six-story, 220,000-sf facility will provide two floors of instructional space, with research activities occupying four floors and a basement level.

Arizona State University broke ground in October of 2016 on the $120 million Biodesign Institute Building C in Tempe. Designed by ZGF (Zimmer Gunsul Frasca) and BWS Architects to promote interaction, the 188,000-gsf project will accommodate up to 80 principal investigators arranged in collaborative neighborhoods over five floors and a basement level. The multidisciplinary research building will house a compact X-ray laser facility, wet labs, high bay spaces, and offices.

The University of Kentucky dedicated the $112 million Jacobs Science Building in October of 2016. Designed by Payette and JRA Architects, the flexible 240,000-sf facility features technology-enabled active learning (TEAL) classrooms, collaborative teaching labs, advanced instrumentation suites, lecture halls, and outdoor classrooms. The sustainably designed project was built by Messer Construction. 

Research has begun at the £650 million Francis Crick Institute in London. Designed by HOK in partnership with PLP Architecture, the 10-story, 980,000-sf facility can accommodate 1,250 scientists and 250 support staff engaged in interdisciplinary biomedical research. The Crick Institute represents a partnership between University College London, Imperial College London, and King’s College London, working in collaboration with the UK Medical Research Council, the Wellcome Trust, and Cancer Research UK.

The College of William & Mary opened the third phase of the Integrated Science Center (ISC3) in September of 2016 in Williamsburg, Va. Accommodating programs in applied science, biology, chemistry, psychology, neuroscience, and computer modeling, the $74 million interdisciplinary facility features 13 chemistry research labs, four teaching labs, instrumentation suites, a computational lab, a biological sciences makerspace, a spectroscopy lab, and a complete machine shop.

Today’s scientific researchers are improving their productivity, research outcomes, and technological advances by using the knowledge of many disciplines. This emerging field of “convergence science” goes beyond traditional collaboration to the much larger intellectual intersection of engineering, physical sciences, life sciences, and other disciplines, plus big data. In this model, research includes funding from private sources or foundations that demand marketable results quickly.

Nova Southeastern University opened the $100 million Center for Collaborative Research in September of 2016 in Davie, Fla. Designed by ACAI Associates, the six-story, 215,000-sf facility features wet and dry laboratories, a high-performance computing environment, the AutoNation Institute for Breast and Solid Tumor Cancer Research, the NSU Cell Therapy Institute, and the Institute for Natural and Ocean Sciences Research.

The University of Texas at El Paso is planning to break ground in early 2017 on the $85 million Interdisciplinary Research Building. Designed by Perkins+Will, the 150,000-gsf project will feature collaborative research labs, a vivarium, imaging suites, core labs, a visualization suite, conference rooms, an atrium, an auditorium, and academic and administrative offices.