Event Schedule

Registration for the Fundamentals Course attendees.

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This meeting is intended for presenters only, and is a critical part of the Tradeline program. Your group will be given last minute information on the audience and their special questions as well as project information relative to this topic. Also covered will be conference protocol and audio-visual equipment for presenters, as well as details on the conference schedule. Speakers will receive a full set of conference materials at this time.

Advanced RSVP Required

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Many research institutions face the gap between laboratory discovery and commercial-scale adoption in advanced manufacturing, energy storage, and polymers. Bret Cummock draws on NLR's Energy Materials and Processing at Scale (EMAPS) facility —a 127,000-square-foot, $224 million flagship building now under construction—to share design evolutions and infrastructure decisions behind a next-generation scale-up research environment. He describes the flexible configurations supporting rapid reconfiguration and industry collaboration, how pilot-scale processing bridges bench research to commercial production, and how electrification and reclaimed water systems advance decarbonization targets. He highlights a range of best-in-class features to inform emerging science capital initiatives at any scale.

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As universities push to grow engineering capacity and attract top talent, new facilities must serve specialized research while enabling cross-disciplinary collaboration. Brent Stringfellow demonstrates how evolving institutional priorities shaped key planning and design decisions in a new 210,000-square-foot engineering research and teaching facility housing two departments. He illustrates how the seven-story research tower and student-centered pavilion were configured to serve distinct programmatic goals while connecting faculty, graduate researchers, and undergraduates, and how advanced research can overlap with and enrich the undergraduate experience. He describes rationales behind advanced lab features, flexible configurations, multi-program integration, and targeted outcomes, and explains how this project completed an engineering district plan redefining how research is conducted in the Cockrell School of Engineering. He delivers key lessons learned on distinguishing characteristics and strategies instructive to other institutions planning and programming multi-department engineering research facilities.

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Don’t let your campus strategy treat location as a constraint — in today’s research landscape, breakthroughs don’t just come from funding or talent, they come from ecosystems. This session presents a candid, execution-focused look at how NYU Tandon School of Engineering has turned New York City’s density, proximity, and transit access into measurable drivers of research growth. Drawing on real-world capital projects in a high-intensity urban environment, Maey Khaled and Michael O'Neill deliver a data-driven framework for integrating location intelligence into capital project prioritization, vertical planning, adaptive reuse, and shared infrastructure. They outline a replicable playbook to assess campus positioning, align facilities investments with research ROI, and convert location from a fixed constraint into a competitive advantage. 

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Modern research buildings can deliver everything they promise on opening day and still constrain science through invisible operational pressures. Barbara Manley-Smith profiles Augusta University's post-occupancy study of a newly built, light-filled research facility, drawing on survey responses from faculty, staff, postdocs, graduate students, and undergraduates. She details what the modern environment achieved in collaboration, visibility, and shared-resource use, and pinpoints recurring constraints around lab storage, bench and wall space, equipment support, lab-office adjacency, environmental comfort, odors, and maintenance reliability. She maps how post-occupancy findings directly shape planning, infrastructure, and operations decisions for next-generation research facilities.

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Artificial intelligence and data science are driving a fundamental rethinking of academic research facilities, shifting from individual PI labs toward collaborative research neighborhoods optimized for fluid team structures and shared computational infrastructure. This session examines next-generation facility models and lab typologies through Amy Gutmann Hall at the University of Pennsylvania, an interdisciplinary hub for AI and data science programs, alongside peer benchmark comparisons. Presenters explore how open lab environments, transparent collaboration zones, shared computational infrastructure, and material systems including mass timber support both collective exchange and focused individual work. They deliver post-occupancy insights that translate directly into actionable planning guidance for future projects.

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As quantum information science emerges as a defining research frontier, universities are reimagining engineering facilities to support both established and emerging disciplines within unified, flexible environments. This session presents Cornell University’s Duffield Hall Expansion, which transforms two existing buildings into a cohesive complex housing the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, a state-of-the-art Quantum Information Science Technology (QIST) research facility, and strong programmatic connections to Cornell’s NanoScale Facility and Bowers College of Computing and Information Science. Presenters explore design strategies for flexible shared quantum labs, adaptable instructional spaces, and spatial connections that reinforce interdisciplinary collaboration across one of the nation’s leading engineering programs. 

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As computing and engineering curricula converge, universities face mounting pressure to create facilities that seamlessly integrate software development, robotics, data science, embedded systems, and advanced manufacturing, often within a single building or floor plate. This session presents a curriculum-driven, metrics-based planning framework for designing academic environments that unite computing-centered spaces with hardware-intensive labs. Stantec planners draw on quantitative and qualitative metrics covering space allocation, adjacencies, infrastructure capacity, utilization, and flexibility to translate academic requirements into actionable facility decisions. Through project case studies, they evaluate and contrast renovation-versus-new-construction tradeoffs, risk management strategies, and design approaches that future-proof computing and engineering education facilities.

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To attract high-caliber talent, institutions are reimagining the campus experience to bridge the gap between recruitment and enhanced learning outcomes. Critical to these efforts are cross-discipline convergence, student-centered experiential learning, and enabling collaboration. In this session, RFD presents trends, planning solutions and benchmarking studies for next generation science and engineering facilities, including design considerations for biophilic laboratory spaces. They outline key decisions to best leverage complex systems inherent to laboratory focused facilities, and review valuable “lessons learned.” They will also detail examples from recently completed and ‘on-the-boards’ projects from across the United States, and highlight design strategies for planning successful laboratory facilities that provide active and collaborative environments for learning and discovery.

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Quantum computing and artificial intelligence are rapidly transforming higher education research and the facilities that support it. Quantum systems demand specialized infrastructure including cryogenic environments and electromagnetic shielding, while AI research drives demand for flexible computational hubs and high-performance data infrastructure. This session examines how leading R1 institutions are designing convergence facilities that bridge the digital and physical domains. Using Michigan State University’s Leinweber Center for Engineering and Digital Innovation as a primary case study, presenters explore how cleanrooms, flexible laboratories, digital learning environments, and industry partnership spaces can be integrated to support quantum computing, AI, and advanced materials research within a single adaptive facility.

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Funding agencies mandate interdisciplinary collaboration, institutional commitments require aggressive decarbonization, and researchers demand adaptable spaces that keep pace with rapidly evolving science. This session reveals how the Resnick Sustainability Center addresses all three imperatives through integrated design-build execution, mass timber innovation, and flexible lab typologies that dismantle disciplinary silos. Presenters map actionable strategies for achieving measurable embodied carbon reductions, designing adaptable research modules that respond to evolving science, and creating transparent, collaborative environments that accelerate discovery-to-impact timelines. They chart new metrics for space utilization and collaboration effectiveness, demonstrate how progressive sustainability targets drive operational excellence, and provide a replicable blueprint for institutions pursuing convergent research models. They distill lessons learned on aligning stakeholder vision with performance outcomes and illustrate how strategic facility investments generate campus-wide ripple effects—empowering attendees to champion next-generation research environments.

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What does it take to deliver a major research facility when funding gaps, a global pandemic, and institutional uncertainty stretch a project timeline over a decade? This session traces Florida State University’s Interdisciplinary Research and Commercialization Building from concept in 2013 to construction completion, examining the leadership and persistence required to maintain momentum. Perspectives from FSU’s project management team, HGA Architects, and Whiting-Turner reveal how the project accommodated evolving user needs including a late-added Quantum Sciences program, and how a complex, technically demanding research facility was successfully delivered in a smaller regional market with limited specialized trade resources. 

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As AI and robotics reshape academic programs, science and engineering facilities must evolve into high-performing strategic assets that attract talent, drive investment, and catalyze regional growth. This session profiles Grand Valley State University’s Blue Dot Lab, a multidisciplinary STEAM innovation hub that embeds an experiential infrastructure layer bridging architecture, technology, and storytelling. Presenters illustrate how adaptable collision spaces blend teaching, research, and industry production for long-term facility relevance; how high-tech environments drive recruitment and donor engagement; and how co-locating student entrepreneurship with computing hubs transforms a campus building into a powerful catalyst for real-world innovation and measurable economic investment.

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USC’s Ginsburg Human-Centered Computation Hall redefines what an AI and computing research facility can deliver functionally and programmatically, and this session draws out best practices to inform similar initiatives. Presenters examine the LEED Platinum Living Lab pairing purpose-built spaces and immersive environments across multiple disciplines — an indoor drone aviary, advanced robotics labs, and fabrication studios — with a passive-first, net-zero-ready envelope. They illustrate the use of a digital twin platform to transform building systems into active research and teaching instruments. They demonstrate how data-driven stakeholder programming unified the Department of Computer Science and the School of Advanced Computing, rounding out USC’s engineering district cluster in strategic interdisciplinary interactive spaces.

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Research institutions face mounting pressure to expand STEM research capacity as capital budgets shrink and deferred maintenance backlogs grow. Bruce Molino draws on experience leading facility planning at Syracuse University and in private practice to present the 80/20 lab renovation model, a proven framework that standardizes lab infrastructure decisions to shorten planning and delivery timelines. He shares how the process structures faculty engagement, minimizes custom design iterations, and maximizes adaptability within existing buildings. He describes implementation strategies and principles that balance institutional standards with research flexibility. He delivers key distinguishing characteristics and strategies for other institutions expanding research capacity through targeted renovation.

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See the full list of participating exhibitors and event hosts.

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Research facilities rank among the most energy-intensive building types, making them critical proving grounds for sustainable design innovation. This session presents the University of Michigan College of Pharmacy as a case study in integrating hybrid mass timber construction with advanced energy systems to achieve ambitious carbon and performance goals. Session leaders demonstrate how defining clear project drivers, including operational and embodied carbon reduction, user wellbeing, constructability, and cost, enabled systematic data-driven evaluation of every design decision. They examine results of a facility life-cycle assessment: A 40 percent reduction in embodied carbon through the timber structural strategy, while optimized facade design, heat recovery, chilled beams, and high-efficiency laboratory ventilation delivered substantial operational energy savings. 

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AEC firms accumulate decades of design data from science and engineering facility projects, yet much of this institutional knowledge remains locked in tribal expertise and disconnected files. This session explores how Affiliated Engineers (AEI) has formalized a data management program that unlocks nearly 50 years of project history to improve decision-making across the entire facility lifecycle, from programming through post-occupancy. Presenters demonstrate how AI and machine learning tools are being integrated into design, construction, and building automation workflows to reduce costs, optimize performance, improve resource utilization, and advance decarbonization goals for high-performance science, engineering, robotics, and applied research facilities.

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At many research universities, activities connecting faculty hiring, lab development, research operations, and equipment planning span multiple units yet lack integrated governance, creating gaps that delay projects, strain capital resources, and misalign facilities with institutional priorities. This interactive, facilitated session invites participants to map their coordination processes, surface common challenges, and collectively build a shared model for how research facilities are planned and delivered. Drawing on a proven workshop framework and an implemented institutional example, Bruce Molino guides attendees in identifying actionable opportunities to improve alignment, clarify governance structures, and make more effective use of capital resources in support of institutional research priorities. 

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Tariff volatility, shifting Federal Reserve policy, and turbulent construction materials markets are forcing facility owners to fundamentally rethink cost planning. This session delivers a rigorous, data-driven analysis of construction cost escalation drivers including trends in labor productivity, key commodities such as steel, copper, lumber, and oil, and macroeconomic indicators such as GDP, equity markets, and employment. The Vermeulens team presents its construction labor weather map to identify regional cost pressure zones and multi-scenario forecasts for the next two years. Attendees will leave with actionable frameworks for setting contingencies, calibrating escalation assumptions, and managing capital planning risk in an unpredictable economic environment.

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The University of Arkansas’ Multi-User Silicon Carbide Research and Fabrication Laboratory is a landmark achievement in national semiconductor strategy, the only openly accessible silicon carbide fabrication facility in the United States. This session presents the collaborative design process behind this 22,000 sq. ft. facility, exploring how the architect, engineer, and university team balanced industrial-grade cleanroom requirements with an academic campus context and a commitment to educational transparency. Presenters illustrate how 6,500 sq. ft. of cleanroom processing space was integrated alongside open-access prototyping areas, how safety and security requirements were reconciled with visibility, and how flexible design features accommodate diverse semiconductor fabrication workflows.

View session page

As computing and engineering curricula converge, universities face mounting pressure to create facilities that seamlessly integrate software development, robotics, data science, embedded systems, and advanced manufacturing, often within a single building or floor plate. This session presents a curriculum-driven, metrics-based planning framework for designing academic environments that unite computing-centered spaces with hardware-intensive labs. Stantec planners draw on quantitative and qualitative metrics covering space allocation, adjacencies, infrastructure capacity, utilization, and flexibility to translate academic requirements into actionable facility decisions. Through project case studies, they evaluate and contrast renovation-versus-new-construction tradeoffs, risk management strategies, and design approaches that future-proof computing and engineering education facilities.

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This session lays out the roadmap for modernizing legacy facilities to deliver competitive 21st-century learning environments and support high-growth programs. In this case study of a transformation of a 40-year-old STEM facility at Indiana State University, session leaders document achievements in improved accessibility and collaboration, and providing future-ready environments for data science, robotics, and engineering. They illustrate high-value investments in "learning on display" that foster transparency and interdisciplinary engagement, and reimagined lab environments to support modern teaching, research, and flexibility across multiple STEM programs in one building.

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To attract high-caliber talent, institutions are reimagining the campus experience to bridge the gap between recruitment and enhanced learning outcomes. Critical to these efforts are cross-discipline convergence, student-centered experiential learning, and enabling collaboration. In this session, RFD presents trends, planning solutions and benchmarking studies for next generation science and engineering facilities, including design considerations for biophilic laboratory spaces. They outline key decisions to best leverage complex systems inherent to laboratory focused facilities, and review valuable “lessons learned.” They will also detail examples from recently completed and ‘on-the-boards’ projects from across the United States, and highlight design strategies for planning successful laboratory facilities that provide active and collaborative environments for learning and discovery.

View session page

Artificial intelligence and data science are driving a fundamental rethinking of academic research facilities, shifting from individual PI labs toward collaborative research neighborhoods optimized for fluid team structures and shared computational infrastructure. This session examines next-generation facility models and lab typologies through Amy Gutmann Hall at the University of Pennsylvania, an interdisciplinary hub for AI and data science programs, alongside peer benchmark comparisons. Presenters explore how open lab environments, transparent collaboration zones, shared computational infrastructure, and material systems including mass timber support both collective exchange and focused individual work. They deliver post-occupancy insights that translate directly into actionable planning guidance for future projects.

View session page

Science and engineering facilities are increasingly expected to do more than house research—they must activate community engagement, accelerate interdisciplinary exchange, and make innovation visible to a broader community. Presenters draw on projects at UC Davis and Oregon State University to show how core labs can be repositioned from isolated service functions into visible, connective infrastructure that activates public space. They share design strategies for integrating public-facing ground floors, maker spaces, co-working labs, and shared cores, and describe how mass timber construction supports research performance and community identity. They deliver key distinguishing characteristics and strategies for other institutions building innovation cultures.

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Quantum computing and artificial intelligence are rapidly transforming higher education research and the facilities that support it. Quantum systems demand specialized infrastructure including cryogenic environments and electromagnetic shielding, while AI research drives demand for flexible computational hubs and high-performance data infrastructure. This session examines how leading R1 institutions are designing convergence facilities that bridge the digital and physical domains. Using Michigan State University’s Leinweber Center for Engineering and Digital Innovation as a primary case study, presenters explore how cleanrooms, flexible laboratories, digital learning environments, and industry partnership spaces can be integrated to support quantum computing, AI, and advanced materials research within a single adaptive facility.

View session page

USC’s Ginsburg Human-Centered Computation Hall redefines what an AI and computing research facility can deliver functionally and programmatically, and this session draws out best practices to inform similar initiatives. Presenters examine the LEED Platinum Living Lab pairing purpose-built spaces and immersive environments across multiple disciplines — an indoor drone aviary, advanced robotics labs, and fabrication studios — with a passive-first, net-zero-ready envelope. They illustrate the use of a digital twin platform to transform building systems into active research and teaching instruments. They demonstrate how data-driven stakeholder programming unified the Department of Computer Science and the School of Advanced Computing, rounding out USC’s engineering district cluster in strategic interdisciplinary interactive spaces.

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This end-of-day session is where key ideas, new developments, and findings that have been revealed over the course of the entire two-day conference (including sessions you may have missed) get clarified, expanded upon, and affirmed or debated. This is also the opportunity to get answers from industry leaders and the entire audience to specific questions on key and challenging issues.  

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Wednesday, October 7th
8:15AM - Participants check-in in hotel lobby, and load the bus including any luggage
8:30AM - Bus departs
8:45AM - Bus arrives at Vanderbilt University for a two hour tour
11:30AM - Bus departs Vanderbilt University to Nashville International Airport (BNA)
12:00PM - Bus drops passengers at Nashville International Airport 
12:30PM - Bus returns to Omni hotel

A $50 transportation fee will be added to the conference registration cost for this optional tour.

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