Ground Broken for ILSB

(from University Relations news release, Tuesday, May 30, 2006)

Calling it "the largest undertaking in the history of our university," Texas A&M University President Robert M. Gates and other officials broke ground Friday (May 26) on the $95 million Interdisciplinary Life Sciences Building.

The new facility, scheduled to be completed in summer of 2008, will help Texas A&M in both research and teaching, Gates said, and it will help attract high-quality faculty, top students and important research grants.

The 220,000-square foot building, the largest construction project in the university's 130-year history, will be equipped with the most modern classrooms and laboratories available, Gates said. It will be located at the corner of Old Main and Houston Street and north of Simpson Drill Field.

"This facility will surely be a major factor in helping Texas A&M fulfill its mission of teaching, research and service in an especially exciting and highly competitive field," Gates added.

"It will place us in a far better position to recruit outstanding faculty and provide them - as well as our existing faculty - with opportunities to obtain major research funding from both federal and foundation sources.  It will project to undergraduates, graduate students and the general public a positive image of Texas A&M's strengths in the ever-evolving life sciences, and it will certainly enhance our reputation among our colleagues throughout the scientific community."

"This new building will allow us to expand the life sciences in several areas," Richard Ewing, vice president for research, said.

"From chemistry to agriculture to engineering, it will facilitate the important connections in research. Offices will be next to classrooms and laboratories to emphasize the importance of teaching. A tremendous amount of time and planning have gone into this facility.  Just five years ago, none of us believed we would one day be breaking ground on such an impressive building."

Texas A&M Regent Chairman John White said the new facility will put the university "on the forefront of research and teaching.  It will be a vivid example of Texas A&M's commitment to the life sciences," White stressed.

The Interdisciplinary Life Sciences Building, along with the George P. and Cynthia W. Mitchell Institute for Fundamental Physics and Astronomy and the George P. Mitchell Physics Building, represent a series of construction projects that totals more than $300 million, one of the largest new facilities programs being undertaken on any campus in the country.

Other campus projects include an emerging technologies and economic development building, an expansion of the laboratory animal resources and research building and an addition to the veterinary medicine research tower.

The new facilities play a key role in supporting Texas A&M's faculty reinvestment program, which has a goal of hiring 447 faculty members over a five-year period. To date, 346 new faculty have been hired, Gates said, additions which will significantly improve the faculty-student ratio and enhance the teaching process.

Also at the groundbreaking were Peter Doyle, president and CEO of J.E. Dunn Southwest, the construction firm heading the project, and Ed Cordes of Perkins+Will, the design firm of the building.

Photo from the groundbreaking ceremony is here.