Industry News

Surrey Satellite Technology is partnering with the University of Surrey Research Park to build a £10 million satellite R&D facility in Guildford in the United Kingdom. The 3,700-sm facility will house laboratories and cleanrooms for space engineering. Providing a single location for the assembly, testing, and integration of satellite platforms, the building will include a seismic test platform and two walk-in thermal chambers. Completion is expected in April of 2011.

The University of California, Los Angeles opened the renovated Terasaki Life Sciences Building in October of 2010. Located on the Westwood campus, the $48 million facility provides 33 open labs for collaborative research in genomics, neuroscience, biology, and regenerative medicine. The building features advanced HVAC filtration, plant growth chambers, and temperature controlled suites.

ConocoPhillips will begin construction in summer of 2011 on a 1.6 million-sf global technology center in Louisville, Colo. Designed by HOK, the facility will provide 500,000 sf of research space and 500,000 sf of administrative offices. Completion is expected by 2013.

Merck opened the €50 million Materials Research Center in Darmstadt in September of 2010. The 11,000-sm R&D complex will support research on liquid crystals, fine chemicals, organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs), and mobile energy storage. The sustainably designed facility includes two six-story buildings, a pilot plant, and cleanrooms.

The Department of Energy initiated the second phase of construction of the Superconducting Radio-Frequency (SRF) Accelerator Test Facility in September of 2010. Located at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Ill., the three-building project will include a 460-ft long test accelerator and cryomodules with cavities at a temperatures as low as -456 degrees Fahrenheit. The first phase of construction commenced in March of 2010 and involved the $2.8 million expansion of an existing building.