Wolfgang Bauer has been a busy man this week.
The chairman of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, along with countless other faculty and staff, have been preparing for today’s opening of the new Biomedical and Physical Sciences Building.
Workers were in the $93 million facility Thursday making final preparations for the dedication ceremony, to be held at 3:30 p.m. today. Construction on the project began in February, 1999.
It’s been the formula for a few sleepless nights for Bauer.
“I won’t be able to take a vacation until the semester is over, but I think next week will be a lot easier for me,” he said. “I may be able to see my wife and kids again.”
But the wait is worth it, Bauer said.
“It’s one of these historic days in the life of the university,” he said. “It will just elevate us to a totally different level.”
Huge paintings now hang on once-barren walls. Couches and desks have been moved in. A stage sits in the center of the four-story atrium between the office and lab towers of the new building.
With hundreds of donors, faculty, staff and community members invited to the ceremony, it promises to be a big day for the university, MSU President M. Peter McPherson said.
“This will be very important for science, education and research on this campus,” he said. “There’s no question that this will be exciting.”
The facility is welcome news to Phillip Lamoureux, who spent last week moving into his third-floor laboratory in the west tower of the building.
Lamoureux, who spent the past 15 years working as a research assistant in Giltner Hall, said the new building offers many improvements, including a cleaner work environment.
“We used to joke with the graduate students that they didn’t get their Ph.D.s until they got their case of allergies,” he said. “At 98 years of age or so, it was kind of decrepit.”
The new building will incorporate the departments of Physics and Astronomy, Physiology, Microbiology and Molecular Genetics.
The combination of so many science disciplines is what makes the building so cutting-edge, said George Leroi, dean of the College of Natural Science.
Leroi said faculty won’t be grouped by department in the building, but by program. Faculty members from different departments working on the same research will have side-by-side labs, he said.
“It was a great idea to put these together,” Leroi said. “Science is becoming multidisciplinary and the building was designed to synergize that - to bring people together.”
