Research and Development

Planning for the new Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital (JHACH) Research and Education Building in St. Petersburg, Fla., took place before all the building users were identified, and used strategies like identifying the business and design drivers to support collaboration, innovation, and communication. “The vision was to create a state-of-the-art space for pediatric health research and education, in a building that would draw people out of their offices and into the collaborative areas, to teach, work, and communicate,” says Roberta Alessi, executive vice president and chief operating officer at JHACH.

Pennsylvania State University is planning to construct the $98.5 million Animal, Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences Building in University Park. Designed by HOK, the 105,000-sf facility will provide the College of Agricultural Sciences with research labs, a general-purpose classroom, faculty offices, seminar rooms, and a state-of-the-art vivarium.

California State University, Sacramento opened the $91 million Ernest E. Tschannen Science Complex in September of 2019. Designed by CO Architects to accommodate the departments of biology and chemistry, the five-story, 96,631-sf structure offers teaching and research labs, classrooms, a 120-seat planetarium, and a rooftop observatory. Learning studios, labs, and corridors utilize glass walls to put science on display, and student collaboration areas with full-height vertical wood fins provide semi-private spaces for interaction.

Northern State University opened the $25.2 million Jewett Regional Science Education Center in late August of 2019 in Aberdeen, S.D. Designed by TSP and SmithGroup, the 54,000-sf STEM facility features "classatories" for disciplines including biology, ecological sciences, chemistry, physics, and biomedical sciences. Comprising two wings, the building houses research labs, a tissue culture lab, an imaging suite, a computer classroom, an 80-student classroom, a flex classroom, and faculty offices.

Singapore Institute of Technology broke ground in September of 2019 on the Punggol Coast campus. Strategically sited on two plots of land in the JTC Punggol Digital District, the project will provide 240,000 gsf of education, research, and innovation space, and will eventually enable the university to consolidate its six existing locations.  Designed as a living laboratory for sustainability, the campus will be powered by a sophisticated microgrid, created in partnership with SP Group, that will supply gas, electricity, and thermal energy.

Nanotronics began construction in September of 2019 on a 25,000-sf facility at the Brooklyn Navy Yard in New York. Featuring leading-edge manufacturing systems, the $11 million project will accommodate the research, development, and production of advanced imaging systems that combine robotics, optical microscopy, artificial intelligence, and machine learning platforms.

The Milwaukee School of Engineering opened the $34 million Dwight and Dian Diercks Computational Science Hall in September of 2019. Designed by Uihlein/Wilson - Ramlow/Stein Architects to accommodate programs in artificial intelligence, cloud computing, cybersecurity, and robotics, the 65,536-sf facility offers flexible, technology-enhanced classrooms, teaching and research labs, and a 1,024-sf data center with a GPU-accelerated supercomputer.

The Children’s Research Institute (CRI), the research arm of Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, D.C., has seen its research programs expand, bringing the need to accommodate more staff and projects. A new innovation campus is in the works, but the move to the former Walter Reed Army Medical Center Campus will take four years to complete. The institute is therefore focusing on laboratory densification, both in the current space and the new campus.

Texas Tech University broke ground in September of 2019 on a $90 million complex for the School of Veterinary Medicine in Amarillo. Located at the Texas Tech Health Sciences Center, the project includes construction of a two-story, 185,000-sf facility providing classrooms, research labs, surgical suites, anatomy labs, and pathology studios. A second building located at Mariposa Station will offer large animal housing facilities and a clinical skills training center.

ABB began construction in September of 2019 on a $150 million robotics hub in the Kangqiao district of Shanghai. Featuring advanced technologies for automated and digital manufacturing, the highly flexible facility will include an integrated R&D center to accelerate innovation in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). Supporting direct collaboration with customers, the center will leverage sophisticated machine learning strategies to enable robots to construct automated and robotic systems tailored to specific client needs.

The University of Wyoming opened the $105 million Engineering Education and Research Building (EERB) in September of 2019 in Laramie. Designed by ZGF Architects to provide maximum flexibility, the 110,000-sf facility leverages drop-down utilities and services to create reconfigurable labs for collaborative teaching and research. The four-story project features the Student Innovation Center, a maker space with prototyping, fabrication, and 3D printing technologies.

The South Dakota Animal Disease Research and Diagnostic Laboratory (ADRDL) celebrated the opening of its expanded Brookings facility in September of 2019. The $58 million project included construction of an 81,000-sf addition offering 3,762 sf of biocontainment space which provides BSL-2E necropsy and BSL-3 facilities. A 4,000-sf chiller plant was also constructed. General contractor McCownGordon broke ground on the expansion in August of 2017. The lab's existing 55,000-sf facility will now undergo renovation and completion is expected in May of 2020.

Texas A&M University opened the $70 million headquarters of the Texas A&M Transportation Institute (TTI) in September of 2019 in Bryan. Located on the RELLIS campus, the 190,000-sf facility provides advanced engineering research facilities for the creation of new transportation technologies and strategies for the optimization of infrastructure, construction materials, driver safety, and automated vehicles.

Northwestern University is continually working to grow and improve the quality of its research space inventory. A 2017 renovation and expansion of the Seeley G. Mudd Science and Engineering Library—situated in a prime location on the Evanston, Ill., campus—transformed a non-science building into a focal point of the university’s science complex. A desire to maximize research space within the constrained site resulted in a unique solution that leveraged both horizontal and vertical expansion.

BioMed Realty and the University of California, San Diego opened the $92 million Center for Novel Therapeutics in September of 2019. Located on the Science Research Park campus in San Diego, the 137,500-sf translational research facility enables investigators from the UCSD Moores Cancer Center to collaborate with pharmaceutical partners on the creation of innovative cancer treatments. The center also houses the city's first academic-industry drug discovery incubator.