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WASHINGTON
STATE UNIVERSITY
Biotechnology/Life
Sciences (R&EC#2) Building
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FIRING UP STATE ECONOMIC
DEVELOPMENT
AND CREATING HOT CAREERS
IN BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES:
Construction
dollars for a four-story $57.1 million 117,210-square-foot building to bring
together biological science programs across academic disciplines in innovative
laboratory settings has been requested from the 2005 Legislature by Washington
State University for the Pullman campus. The building plan to meld programs
under one roof near Johnson Hall is designed to create a synergy that fires
up state economic development and produces students that will pursue hot,
new careers on the cutting edge of science in everything from agriculture,
to cancer, to birth defects research. The new facility will feature open
laboratories similar to Stanford’s Center for Clinical Sciences Research.
The building ranks high
on the four-year baccalaureate list for essential new building construction
supported by WSU and is the university’s highest priority for new construction
scheduled to begin in the upcoming biennium. It received $45 million in
Gov. Gary Locke’s capital construction budget, $12 million short of the
amount necessary to build the complete project. The building features a
flexible, open laboratory design, faculty and students will be assigned
modules of lab benches and share nearby equipment rooms.
The building will
immediately bring long-sought relief to the Pullman research university
campus that has less than half of the teaching laboratories required for
hands-on learning by undergraduate and graduate students. Many of these
over-utilized laboratories are antiquated. It will move laboratories out
of science buildings like Heald Hall that have been inadequate for many
years because of light laboratory floor load capacities and poor mechanical
and electrical systems. They will be involved in new laboratory settings
where 25 faculty scientists from different colleges and departments will
be assembled to work in teams conducting tens of millions of dollars in
research in a new multi-disciplinary facility. The building houses the School
of Molecular Biosciences, one of WSU’s leading units in securing federal
funding.
The building will
allow federal research in the school to increase more than 120 percent to
about $8 million per year (direct costs). The SMB concentrates its research
on chromosome structure and function. This area of research is expected
to yield discoveries for the treatment of cancer, especially ovarian, breast
and pituitary. Research in reproductive genomics, focusing on treating issues
like infertility, is also a major effort of the center. A bacterial group
that will be working in the building is making discoveries that will improve
management of two major medical microbial problems: dysentery and tuberculosis.
It will also be the
headquarters for the Center for Integrated Biotechnology and some of the
core laboratories serving 170 faculty members in the WSU system.
The CIB
will focus upon basic and applied molecular/cellular biological research
in bioinformatics, genomics, proteomics, bioengineering and cellular and
molecular processes. Emphasis will be placed upon utilization and development
of new biotechnology techniques, therapies, devices, and research tools.
This Center and School
of Molecular Biosciences encourages interdisciplinary research, that engages
faculty and students from different academic departments and colleges to
work together to find solutions. Faculty will retain their academic appointments
but will mix their efforts into integrated research projects. This accelerates
the development of advanced technologies and intellectual property.
The concept
for this building grew out of WSU’s recently completed strategic planning
effort and seeks to continue WSU’s historic strength in the biological sciences.
The WSU strategic plan recognizes biotechnology as a priority for the state
and the university and stresses the importance of interdisciplinary efforts
to maximize return on resources. WSU prepared its capital construction
requests accordingly.
Fits into the
governor’s ten-year plan. The building, innovative in content,
is a modification to an earlier Life Sciences/Heald project originally scheduled
for design in 2003-2005 and construction in 2005-2007. This replaces that
project which also contained research and teaching laboratories and faculty
offices. Both projects specified construction of open space laboratories
for optimum use and flexibility of the workspace.
The earlier project
request predominately accommodated faculty in the College of Sciences.
This proposal puts the building in a complex that engages faculty in that
college, as well as centralized advanced technology core laboratories to
provide services to faculty in the College of Pharmacy, the College of Engineering
and Architecture, the College of Veterinary Medicine, and College of Agriculture,
Human and Natural Resource Sciences. More than half of the programs housed
in the building have participating scientists that are involved in agricultural
research.
The building
will contain the types of programs promoted in Gov. Christine Gregoire’s
Life Sciences Discovery Fund legislation, which WSU strongly endorses. It
is designed to stimulate the state economy through partnerships between
research institutions and other public and private sources in life science-related
fields.
Washington State
Economic Development. Over the last decade, Washington’s biotechnology
and medical technology companies and non-profit research organizations have
hired over 2,000 new employees per year and anticipate continued employment
growth. The field requires a highly educated and trained workforce. The
Center for Integrated Biotechnology will enhance biotechnology research
and industry interactions. Spin-out biotechnology companies and increased
industrial interactions will significantly enhance economic development
in the State in relation to the biotechnology industry. The new building
plays a critical role in this process and will have research, education
and industrial impacts.
Predesign work is
complete and design work is nearly complete. The building is ready for
construction. It will be the second building in the science complex known
as the WSU “Research & Education Center.”
For more information
call: Larry Ganders, Assistant to the President, 360-956-2165
2005-07
Request: $57,100,000 State
MACC = $35,233,000
= $301
Gross Sq
Ft. 117,210 NASF Sq Ft. 62,120
|
Project TOTAL $
2001-03 2003-05 |
2005-07 |
|
Biotechnology/Life Sciences (R&EC #2) |
$61,750,000
|
$150,000
|
$ 4,500,000
|
$57,100,000
|
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