Industry News

The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas recently broke ground on a 24,000-sf renovation of laboratory and office space for the University's biochemistry department. Architect for the project is Omniplan; the contractor is McCarthy. The project includes the demolition and renovation of a portion of the third floor in Building K, a five-story research facility on the UT Southwestern campus. The labs on this floor, used for research in cell biology, were originally constructed in the mid-1970s.

San Jose State University (SJSU) will open the doors of the new $177.5-million Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Library on August 1, 2003. The 475,000-sf facility, the first public/private partnership in the nation between a university and a city, will feature a browsing library serving hot and cold meals, an Internet cafe, a large story-telling room, a rooftop terrace available for rental, and four multipurpose suites with videoconferencing equipment available for meetings.

The Air Force Office of Scientific Research has recently contracted the Korth Cos. of the District of Columbia to renovate the 58,000-sf interior of the Office of Scientific Research and the Defense Office of Hearings & Appeals in Arlington, Va.

Bay Area BioScience Center (BABC) is expanding from 880 sf to 1,550 sf with a move from downtown San Francisco to a new South San Francisco location. With 450 Northern California members, BABC is also planning to open a second East Bay office in or near Berkeley this summer. Long-term plans include a Mission Bay office location as other biotechs move into that development.

Delta Search Labs is building a $300-million supercomputer lab in 50,000-sf of leased space at 700 Technology Square at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Expanding its 15,000-sf Kendall Square supercomputer operations, the new facility will enable researchers to visualize their data.