UTSW Research Building Phase 5

This $100 M project includes a cluster of academic research buildings including a 12-story, 400,000 sq. ft. biomedical research tower and thermal energy plant. Our design focused on creating a structural solution capable of operating at the highest level to support sensitive medical research activities. The design also needed to accommodate present and future floor and ceiling penetrations for services to the wet labs. With this thought in mind, we adopted a policy to straddle the layout of the laboratory benches with the structural beams. This would allow any future penetrations to be located under the benches without penetrating main concrete beams. Reinforced concrete structural systems respond to the need for vibration mitigation because of greater internal damping compared with steel systems. Damping reduces a floor system’s vibration response and the vibration velocity, as well as the length of time the floor system vibrates following a footfall.