University of Illinois Integrated Bioprocessing Research Facility

Austin AECOM is currently designing a new $20 million research facility dedicated to interdisciplinary bioenergy research. This 35,000-sq-ft Integrated Bioprocessing Research Laboratory (IBRL) will house some 25 faculty researchers representing multiple disciplines. The facility is planned to be LEED Silver certified and complete in spring 2009.

The IBRL will be a translational facility for scale up and testing of bio fuels and other bio-products. It is a multi-disciplinary research facility with capabilities focused on the chemical, physical and biological conversion of renewal feedstocks to biofuels, such as cellulosic ethanol and other value-added products. Scientists working at the lab will employ multi-stage processes by which soybeans, corn and other grains, cellulosic crops such as Miscanthus giganteus and switch grass are converted to new and improved animal feeds, human foods, nutraceuticals (functional foods), energy sources, industrial feedstocks and chemicals.

It also will include an interdisciplinary educational component to train scientists and workers for tomorrow’s biotech industry as well as to educate consumers, producers and others.