ARC/Architectural Resources Cambridge and Suffolk Construction celebrate topping-off of 500,000 s/f Albert Sherman Center

State, city and local officials, students and faculty members from the University of Massachusetts, and representatives from ARC/Architectural Resources Cambridge and Suffolk Construction Co. held a topping off ceremony to commemorate completion of the structural steel frame for the Albert Sherman Center, a nine-story, 500,000 s/f medical research facility at the university's medical school campus. The celebration included a speaking program and the signing of the highest structural beam by staff and faculty. Upon its completion, the new facility will doubling the medical school's research capacity and expanding its educational space. Featuring a new wet lab research building, with educational and academic spaces, this building will be the latest addition to the university's Worcester campus, which has grown over the past seven years since the construction of the Aaron Lazare Medical Research Building (LRB). The Albert Sherman Center is located at the intersection of North and First Rds. and will be linked to the original Medical School building. ARC is overseeing all aspects of the project from design services, including programming, through construction, commissioning and closeout. The project is scheduled for completion in late 2012. The building will be energy-efficient and environmentally sustainable to meet the U.S. Green Building Council's LEED (Leadership in Engineering and Environmental Design) Silver standards, as well as all local, state and building energy performance standards and building codes. In addition to wet lab space, the new addition will include clean rooms, administrative space, a 300-seat auditorium, library, conference center, cafeteria and campus support spaces. A 1441 space garage will be built in the adjacent biotechnology research park. "The Topping Off is a great milestone for this project, and marks the mid-construction point," said Arthur Cohen, a principal at ARC/Architectural Resources Cambridge and Principal-in-Charge of the project. "Our design incorporates the campus master plan principles and is architecturally compatible with the surrounding and existing structures and buildings." The Sherman Center will bring the Advanced Therapeutics Cluster (ATC), the Department of Quantitative Health Sciences, the RNA Therapeutics Institute and the Center for Experiential Learning and Simulation under one roof. It will be a state-of-the-art facility where some of the world's top researchers can focus on creating new therapies for many debilitating diseases as well as facilities to support the education of the next generation of physicians in Massachusetts.