Laboratory: Dry And Wet

The University of Oxford opened the Life and Mind Building (LaMB) in October of 2025 in the United Kingdom. Designed by NBBJ, the £200 million ($268 million) facility houses the departments of Experimental Psychology and Biology, the latter including the departments of Plant Sciences and Zoology. The 270,000-sf structure provides high-performance wet and dry labs for learning and research, lecture theaters, classrooms, and conference and seminar rooms, with a teaching center on the ground floor.

More and more universities are building their scientific research centers around cores of huge, heavy, yet surprisingly delicate equipment. Building a core laboratory facility forces architects and campus planners to think about logistics, timing, and backup systems to a level of detail probably more familiar to NASA engineers than institutional architects. As the team behind Emory University’s new Health Sciences Research Building II (HSRB-II) learned, a huge range of factors—in their case, everything from the amount of rebar in the flooring to the width of the corridors to shipping velocity on the Suez Canal—must be reckoned with before such a facility is completed.

The University of Arkansas opened the Institute for Integrative & Innovative Research (I³R) in August of 2025 on its Fayetteville campus. Designed by HGA and Hufft, the $137.6 million facility will accelerate cross-disciplinary research to foster convergence across the public and private sectors and address pressing problems in domains such as medicine, food systems, and cyber technologies. The 144,000-sf building accommodates five wings.

Brown University is constructing the William A. and Ami Kuan Danoff Laboratories in Providence’s Jewelry District to support integrated life sciences research. The 300,000-sf facility was designed by TenBerke and Ballinger to catalyze innovation and the commercialization of impactful scientific and medical breakthroughs. The seven-story building will provide six levels of wet and dry laboratories and research cores for programs in biology, medicine, neuroscience, bioengineering, and public health.

Construction was completed in August of 2025 on the first phase of the redevelopment of Sydney Children's Hospital in Australia. Created in partnership with Sydney Children’s Hospitals Network, the Children’s Cancer Institute (CCI), the federal government, and the government of New South Wales, the AUD 658 million ($429.9 million) project includes the construction of Minderoo Children’s Comprehensive Cancer Centre to accelerate the translation of discoveries into clinical practice and improved patient outcomes. 

Folsom Lake College opened Oak Hall Science Building in August of 2025 to expand program offerings and foster educational excellence for the next generation of STEM professionals. Designed by HMC Architects with Research Facilities Design (RFD) as laboratory consultant, the $86 million facility houses classrooms and lecture halls alongside a 4,000-sf science center at the main entrance.

The University of California, San Diego opened the $152 million Viterbi Family Vision Research Center in June of 2025 at the Shiley Eye Institute in La Jolla, Calif. The 100,000-sf facility was designed by NBBJ to foster interdisciplinary collaboration with wet and dry laboratories, clinical trial suites, educational facilities, and a vivarium. Supporting leading-edge research, the five-story structure will drive advances in the treatment of ophthalmologic diseases and prepare the next generation of clinician-scientists for the workforce.

The University of California, Berkeley is planning to begin construction in spring of 2026 on a seven-story facility for the Innovative Genomics Institute and Bakar Labs. Designed by DGA and Weiss/Manfredi, the development will expand research capabilities in genomics engineering with CRISPR technologies and provide critical infrastructure for life science companies scaling their operations. 

The University of Kansas Cancer Center broke ground in May of 2025 on a visionary complex that will collocate groundbreaking biomedical research with world-class patient care in Kansas City. Designed by HDR and Hoefer Welker, the $450 million facility will deliver a comprehensive array of services in a single integrated location, as well as providing direct access to leading-edge clinical trials.

Pennsylvania State University opened the $128 million Susan Welch Liberal Arts Building in May of 2025. Designed by Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, the 144,350-sf project enables a forward-thinking model of social science teaching, research, and outreach that unites previously dispersed disciplines.

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.

The University of California, Davis celebrated the opening of a $1.1 billion destination for collaborative discovery in May of 2025 in Sacramento. Spanning 767,000 sf, the first phase of Aggie Square was designed by ZGF Architects as the flagship for a new model of innovation district that strategically collocates academic, industry, and community partners not only in the same building, but in many cases on the same floor.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison broke ground on the Phillip A. Levy Engineering Center in April of 2025. Designed by SmithGroup, Continuum Architects + Planners, and Ring & DuChateau, the $420 million facility will enable the College of Engineering to accommodate 1,000 additional students each year to address growing demand. Standing seven stories above grade with one basement level, the 395,000-gsf structure will offer 211,000 asf of collaborative teaching and research space.

The College of William & Mary opened a $76 million expansion of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) in April of 2025 in Gloucester Point, Va. Designed by Baskervill, Chesapeake Bay Hall provides a new home for the Institute's four academic departments: Aquatic Health Sciences, Biological Sciences, Fisheries Science, and Physical Sciences.

Designing higher education labs is sometimes as much about managing the chemicals that inhabit the space as it is about the scientists and their work in the lab. How hazardous are the chemicals? How are they stored, and what are the allowable quantities? How do you protect the researchers and occupants in adjacent spaces, both during normal lab operations and in an emergency? Is it possible to craft a code-compliant chemical management strategy that aligns with the current shift toward large open labs that foster interdisciplinary collaboration?