Construction of a new 300,000 square foot Biological Science Building is well under way at UM Ann Arbor. The $261 million project began in the spring of 2015 and is expected to be completed in the summer of 2018. University of Michigan Planner Sue Gott reported that, "The steel erections and concrete work are almost completed,” in an article for Michigan Live.
(Image courtesy of University of Michigan)
The new research facility will house research laboratories, associated support functions, offices and classrooms for two departments. The building will bring together the Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology, and the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. These are currently housed in Kraus Hall and the Ruthven Museums Building. The museums of Anthropology, Natural History, Paleontology and Zoology also will move into the new space.
This new building is designed so that visitors to the Museum of Natural History will be able to see and interact with exhibits representing university discoveries as well as learn about current and ongoing research efforts. Classrooms within the building will allow students easier access to interact with actual specimens and artifacts in the expansive museum collections while enabling faculty to use the latest ideas in teaching.
"I think the museum has the opportunity to be a centerpiece while also creating a draw for science to be on display," Gott said. "When you come into this building, we hope to encourage interest in science in those walking by."
The new research labs within the building are being constructed in an open plan to allow for greater collaboration, Gott said, increasing flexibility and better space utilization. When completed the Biological Science Building will connect to the Life Sciences Institute (LSI) Building, which sits adjacent to the new site. This will increase the utilization of its dock and vivarium functions. The LSI occupies the juncture of Central Campus and the Medical Center that is now called the Palmer Campus. This site also includes the Undergraduate Science Building and the Palmer Commons, a conference and meeting center that also houses the university's Bioinformatics Program.
A small renovation to LSI will be completed for vivarium and related support activities. The LSI Building is known for its large open labs, connected by shared equipment corridors and social interaction spaces, which catalyze and complement the collaborative mission of LSI. To improve human health through collaborative scientific discovery. The 230,000 sq. ft. building is packed with collaborative centers and sophisticated research tools. The Centers for Chemical Genomics and Structural Biology are located on the plaza-level 3rd floor along with core facilities in NMR, flow cytometry, and DNA sequencing. Researchers throughout the university collaborate with LSI scientists on projects in the core facilities and centers.
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