Great Ormond Street Hospital to Build New Research Facility

Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children (GOSH; London, United Kingdom) and University College London (UCL; United Kingdom) are constructing a new, state-of-the-art research center.

The Zayed Centre for Research into Rare Diseases in Children will be built adjacent to GOSH and the UCL Institute of Child Health, and will provide cutting-edge technology, equipment, and office space for up to 400 world-leading scientists and clinicians. The center will contain a variety of research laboratories to study rare diseases and develop treatments. A good manufacturing practice (GMP) facility on the fourth floor will aid laboratories to manufacture specialist products for new therapies, clinical trials, and patient treatments.

The six-story building will have a total floor space of more than 13,000m², with equipment rooms and workspaces to develop diagnostic procedures, manufacture gene and cell therapies, and to create personalized medical devices. Additional features will include a cardiology suite; a flow cytometry suite for the counting, storing, and analysis of cells with laser technology; a new outpatient clinic; and research write-up areas, meeting rooms, and spaces to allow scientists and medical teams to collaborate and progress with their work. Two large laboratories will be located on the lower ground floor.

“The really exciting thing about the new building is the possibility of creating a working environment that brings everyone together. As a clinician, I need to explore my options for treating a patient with experts who can help me develop them,” said Professor Andrew Taylor, MD, of GOSH and UCL. “A variety of different professionals under one roof will allow us to turn innovative thinking into practical solutions. The centre will also give us a manufacturing capacity to develop these solutions at scale so we can help more and more patients.”

The new research center, named in the honor of Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, the Emir of Abu Dhabi and first president of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), will operate as a partnership between Great Ormond Street Hospital, UCL, and the Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity (London, United Kingdom). Construction is scheduled to begin in January 2017 and is expected to be completed by 2018.

Related Links:
Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children
University College London
Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity