Inventing the Lab of the Future

Scientists want more space, predictable environments and autonomy. Research managers, on the other hand, believe they will have to do more with less. And research facility designers will have to cope with conflicting pressures, both from within the scientific community and, increasingly, from society at large to design flexible, broadly responsive and cost-effective facilities. These were the general conclusions of a conference at the New York Academy of Sciences in June, which brought a diverse group of scientists, research managers, research facility planners, and designers together to discuss the forces that will shape the lab of the future, and the forms it might take. Nathaniel Heintz of Rockefeller University and Samuel Williamson, NYU, made it clear that scientists expect to be more entrepreneurial, more mobile, and will conduct science in a variety of settings, such as small scale research centers where they will have their own firms to maintain control over their research. The lab will continue to be the heart of the scientific workplace, requiring more adaptability, more user autonomy, and tighter control over the environment to match the growing sensitivity of the equipment. More change can be expected in the support space environment than within the lab proper. Because labs are where scientists live as much as where they work, there are higher expectations for the quality of design. More user friendliness (light, security, interior stairways for quick access) will be demanded, along with fewer physical barriers between disciplines. Amenity, communication, and interaction are considered as important as the technical aspects of labs. Steven Cohn, Yale University Medical Center, stressed that universities are constrained by capital and limited by the government in recouping their investment. Societal returns are high, but capital returns are low. The result will be smaller projects, mostly renovations, phased over longer periods of time. While the overall stock of academic research space is adequate, it is not reasonably distributed, nor are there sophisticated tools available to measure rates of return on physical capital or to define the capital costs attributable to a project. These tools must be developed if these investment decisions are to be made more accurately. Leon Lewis, Hoffman LaRoche, saw competition, market, and governmental pressure leading to lower R&D investment by pharmaceutical companies affecting corporate, academic and philanthropically sponsored research. The pressures on future facilities will be toward higher population densities and lower occupancy and construction costs, while maintaining flexibility, functional effectiveness, attractiveness to younger scientists, and more control over operating costs. In discussing how the design community is currently designing the future into research facilities, Robert McGhee, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, stressed that lab building utilization must be examined in terms of 5 to 10 years after initial occupancy. The biggest source of change has been the increasing sophistication and quantity of equipment, which demands more service in labs and more specialized support space for equipment accommodation. Leevi Kiil, of Haines Lundberg Waehler, architects, engineers and planners, emphasized facility endurance via flexible building mechanical system distribution pathways which allow modification and change: central vertical shafts, utility corridors, interstitial floors. …