Industry News

The University of Edinburgh began building the National Avian Research Facility in early 2013. The $22 million research laboratory represents a partnership of the Roslin Institute of the Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies and The Pirbright Institute. The facility will include specific-pathogen-free (SPF) areas for research with genetically modified poultry. Completion is expected in late 2014.

Pfizer broke ground on a pharmaceutical manufacturing facility near Thuwal in Saudi Arabia in March of 2013. Located in King Abdullah Economic City (KAEC), the 347,000-sf plant will produce 18 million packs per year. The facility will become fully operational in 2015.

India's National Institute of Virology has completed the Maximum Containment Laboratory in Pune. Established by the Indian Council of Medical Research, the BSL-4 facility is located in the existing Maximum Containment Facility and meets the biocontainment guidelines of the Centers for Disease Control and the World Health Organization. The Maximum Containment Laboratory is comprised of two suites, each providing a main lab and two animal labs. The secure facility includes a gamma radiation lab for sample processing and a training area.

Diamond Light Source, the United Kingdom's national synchrotron facility, opened the Crystal biocontainment imaging laboratory in February of 2013 in Oxford. The containment level three (CL3) facility supports the analysis of viruses and infectious diseases at the atomic and molecular level using synchrotron light.

Dordt College is planning to build an interdisciplinary science complex in Sioux Center, Iowa. The first $11 million phase includes an engineering wing with high bay space and labs for materials science, thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, electronics, and solar energy research. A new medical skills lab and a two-story addition providing technology-rich classrooms, faculty offices, computer labs, and informal learning spaces will also be constructed.