Ivy League booms with biomed labs

Both Yale School of Medicine and Harvard Medical School (HMS) are beefing up their biomedical research departments with new developments: a $176 million, 440,000-sq.-ft. building at Yale, and a $250 million, 430,000-sq.-ft. facility for Harvard.

Yale's new biomed building is part of a 10-year, $500 million plan to expand the school's medical facilities. Designed by architectural firms Payette Associates of Boston and Venturi Scott Brown of Philadelphia, the facility will hold six floors of laboratories for disease-based research, genomics and magnetic-resonance imaging. Baltimore-based Whiting-Turner is construction manager.

HMS's largest expansion in nearly a century, its L-shaped building will consist of a five-story structure, a 10-story tower and a 560-car below-grade parking garage. Predominantly clad with glass, the facility was designed by Architectural Resources Cambridge (ARC). Danvers, Mass.-based William A. Berry & Sons Inc. will oversee construction.

ARC also recently designed a biomedical building at Tufts University School of Medicine, near Boston, which is currently in the construction phase.