The University of Michigan in Ann Arbor has been producing top scientists for a long time. One notable alum, who went on to found the research science company SAIC, has recently donated $15 million to his alma mater, ensuring that Michigan will continue to train and support future generations of innovative engineers. In honor of this generous gift, the University will name its new engineering building on the North Campus after the donor and his wife, hence the Bob and Betty Beyster Building for Computer Science and Engineering. This isn't Robert Beyster's first gift to UM Ann Arbor either. In recent years, he has contributed toward research in biofuels, cloud computing and security, and gene therapeutics. He has also funded a class on employee ownership though the Center for Entrepreneurship. Michigan has one of the top engineering programs in the country.
Tags: University of Michigan, Midwest, New research facilities, 2012, Ann Arbor, Engineering, BioResearch Product Faire Event, Funding, MI, UMich, charitable giving
Imagine how much more territory you could explore if so much of your budget didn't have to go for gas. That's the thinking behind both the Better Buildings Challenge issued by the DOE and the University of California Irvine's new and retrofitted Smart Labs, which are getting a lot of attention nationwide for their success at cutting building inefficiencies and expenses by upwards of 50%. So what makes a Smart Lab so smart? What did building system engineers find when they put their bio research facilities and equipment under the microscope?
Tags: CA, Bioresearch, New research facilities, Southwest, 2012, BioResearch Product Faire Event, laboratory, Irvine, green life science research, Laboratory Equipment Supplier, laboratory sales, green design, UCI, UC Irvine
The perfect laboratory probably only exists in theory. The most meticulously-designed lab space, outfitted without sparing expense, will be ideal only until needs change, focus shifts, or growth is required. That's why lab planners are abandoning perfection for flexibility, and the form that flexibility takes is often modular. Modular labs can be whole buildings or rooms fabricated off-site and installed to spec, or they can be labs within a solid structure that have been designed with modular concepts to allow for future reconfiguration.
Tags: New research facilities, new science wet labs, San Diego, laboratory, San Diego Biotechnology
Acquiring the 28-building, 2.1 million sf former Pfizer complex on the north side of its Ann Arbor campus, renamed the North Campus Research Complex (NCRC), was a coup for the University of Michigan in 2009. (Read our earlier blog on the NCRC.) While some labs were filled quickly, planning, retrofitting, and moving into that much space doesn't happen overnight, so administrators developed a master plan for occupancy. That timeline has the complex reaching capacity by the end of this year, 2012, and they are ahead of schedule.
Tags: University of Michigan, Midwest, New research facilities, new science wet labs, 2012, Ann Arbor, BioResearch Product Faire Event, MI, UMich
The first overhaul to the University of Wisconsin, Madison's biochemistry facilities was completed in 1998, with the opening of a 200,000sf modern Biochem Addition building. But that was only Phase I. In a game of musical labs, the addition allowed biochemists to abandon their older buildings, which were taken over temporarily by the Microbiology Department until their new building was completed in 2008. Then Biochem Phase II began. Phase II included renovating the stately original 1912 biochemistry building and its 1937 wing, plus adding a six-story tower next door to house 20 research labs, auditoriums, a vivarium for research rodents, and instructional labs. The $112M Biochem Phase II complex is now complete and researchers are moving into their spacious new and renovated quarters on the Henry Mall.
Tags: Midwest, Biomedical expansion, New research facilities, 2012, WI, University of Wisconsin, UWisc, BioResearch Product Faire Event, Madison, scientific sales
On the UCSD Scripps Institute of Oceanography (SIO) campus, an eco-modern 125,000sf science lab building is nearing completion and will have its grand opening in March 2012. The Southwest Fisheries Science Center (SFSC) building project is also referred to as the La Jolla Laboratory Replacement Project because the previous building became unstable on the rocky coast several years ago during heavy storms and had to be closed down. The $56M new building project is being managed and financed by the federal National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and will be home to 250-300 researchers. In concert with a second $26M science lab building across the street that just broke ground (read below), SIO is strongly positioned to remain one of the world’s elite marine institutions and a major federal research outpost.
Tags: University of California San Diego, New research facilities, Southwest, California, University of California, Scripps, San Diego, UCSD science, UCSD research, UCSD, UC San Diego, La Jolla, new construction
We’ve been writing a lot lately about real estate and the complexities of urban life science expansion. In terms of ingenuity and multi-agency collaboration, Portland’s expansion into the South Waterfront area in order to expand Oregon Health & Science University’s capacity and facilitate collaboration with other Oregon universities is uniquely impressive. Recognizing long ago that OHSU’s location offered limited growth opportunity in terms of surrounding real estate, officials looked down the hill to Portland’s South Waterfront district, and at a derelict salvage yard in particular. There was space there, between two bridges, but would it be a valuable expansion if researchers and students couldn’t get between the two campuses easily? How to convince the principal players that the locale would work?
Tags: Oregon State University, Oregon Health Sciences University, Northwest, New research facilities, Oregon, Portland
1) Genome Institute awarded $114 million for research
Tags: Midwest, Washington University, Missouri, New research facilities, 2011 Research Funding, Funding, new construction
Mayor Bloomberg recently outlined formal plans to capitalize on New York research and create a science and technology campus that will mirror what Stanford University is to the Silicon Valley. Seventeen universities and institutions from around the world submitted proposals for the project. Contenders included Stanford University, Columbia, and the University of Chicago, but Bloomberg announced on December 18th that Cornell University and Technion-Israel institute of Science and Technology would be partnering to develop the New York research hub.
Tags: Northeast, Cornell University, New research facilities, New York, New York City, new construction, science buildings
The recent news out of New York regarding SUNY Stony Brook's future could not be better: a private donation to the Long Island university of $150 million will not only secure the future of its science programs but will allow Stony Brook to move up in order of magnitude into the ranks of top life science research institutions nationwide. The gift was made by the Simons Foundation, with the agreement by New York State that it will institute a new tuition structure for wealthier students and commit to a $35 million capital construction plan. The gift will go towards insuring research excellence in the School of Medicine, hiring top research faculty, and recruiting the best graduate students.
Tags: Northeast, New research facilities, New York, Stony Brook University, Funding, Biomedical Research Funding, science research funding