Biology

Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences opened the Harold Alfond Center for Ocean Education and Innovation in June of 2025. Designed by Harriman, the $31 million project represents a 40 percent increase in the footprint of the nonprofit institution's campus in East Boothbay, Maine. The 25,000-sf expansion offers advanced laboratories for discovery and development where investigators will translate early-stage ideas into novel products and solutions.

Cornell University celebrated the opening of Atkinson Hall in April of 2025 in Ithaca, N.Y. Designed by Lake|Flato and SWBR as a nexus for impact-driven research across disciplinary boundaries, the $54 million facility addresses the diverse needs of four unique programs, all of which are university-wide in scope.

Denver University is planning to construct the STEM Horizons building to expand and accelerate vital research in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Designed by Anderson Mason Dale with Research Facilities Design (RFD) as laboratory design consultant, the six-story structure will provide 87,000 sf of new and renovated space for hands-on learning, research, business incubation, and community partnerships.

An evolution of the equipment and technology researchers need is transforming ordinary labs into facilities that deserve to be called next-generation or future-ready. Significant changes in space utilization and lab planning and design are driven by increased automation and robotics, the incorporation of manufacturing, enhanced information technology with an emphasis on data collection, ever-evolving technologies, developer core/shell fit-outs, hybrid work patterns, and different approaches to project delivery and construction. 

Construction began in November of 2024 on the Atlantic Science Enterprise Centre (ASEC) in Moncton, New Brunswick. Designed by Diamond Schmitt Architects in association with EXP, the adaptive reuse project will transform the existing Gulf Fisheries Centre into a four-story complex equipped with leading-edge laboratories and technologies.

The vision of biomedical research as a collective effort is resoundingly clear in the $237.5 million Pelotonia Research Center, the first building to be completed in the 350-plus-acre Carmenton district on the campus of The Ohio State University (Ohio State) in Columbus. Opened in May 2023, the center integrates almost 100,000 sf of wet labs, 25,000 sf of computational labs, and 20,000 sf of core labs in a single facility designed to host interdisciplinary collaborations and public-private initiatives that focus on solving some of the most critical health challenges. With life science as the backbone of the research endeavor, current projects range from modeling cancer progressions to 3D printing of patient-specific anatomic models. 

Michigan State University broke ground in October of 2024 on the $200 million Plant and Environmental Sciences Building in East Lansing. Designed by HED and CannonDesign, the 200,000-sf facility will accelerate the discovery and development of global solutions for food security. Approximately 40 principal investigators and their teams will occupy the structure, which will feature leading-edge wet labs, growth chambers, and instrumentation suites.

Lehigh University's new Health, Science & Technology Building is designed to break down silos between academic departments, to enhance faculty research and better prepare students for tomorrow’s transdisciplinary world. Three different lab modules—with no walls between them—facilitate easy transitions from one use to another, as well as expansion and contraction as needs change. And collaboration spaces are strategically located between labs throughout the building.