Wayne State University will open a $93 million research facility on Wednesday dedicated to studying health disparities that plague Detroit residents — such as diabetes and hypertension — in Detroit’s Midtown district. The facility is expected to create both temporary and permanent jobs for more than 400 individuals.
“The Integrative Biosciences Center embodies what it means to be a public, urban research university — creating and sharing knowledge that contributes immensely to improving the quality of life for its surrounding community,” says M. Roy Wilson, president of Wayne State. “Research conducted in this center will also have important applications in other urban communities around the world.”
Wilson says the 200,000-square-foot building, located at 6135 Woodward Ave. on the north side of the university’s campus, will offer laboratory space for the study of metabolic disorders such as diabetes and obesity, hypertension (America’s leading cause of death which affects African-Americans at a higher rate than other groups), and cardiovascular disease. Henry Ford Health System will also occupy a portion of the first floor.
Wayne State faculty members in environmental science, behavioral health, and systems engineering departments will work at the research center. Additionally, Wilson says the university has plans to recruit 30 new faculty members to work at the center.
“The building was designed to foster collaboration among researchers,” Wilson says. “Being very open is a key feature of science today. We want our researchers talking to each other about what they are working on.”
He says IBio includes 127,000 square feet of renovated and repurposed space from the former Dalgleish Cadillac dealership building, designed by architect Albert Khan.