On my first visit to Bristol’s Biological Sciences School
back in 2011, I was marched across campus to stare at a giant empty crater on
the corner of Tyndall Avenue, which I was assured would soon become the most
impressive building the university has ever attempted to construct. Now, some
three years later, the end result of the £54 million project is staggering –
and who better to welcome in the new build than Biology’s biggest living
legend, Sir David Attenborough.
At just gone 11am on Monday, I waited excitedly with an
assortment of 200 distinguished guests, including senior lecturers and the
city’s Mayor, for the esteemed naturalist and wildlife broadcaster to arrive
and officially open Bristol’s new world-class Life Sciences Building. The
university’s Vice-chancellor Professor Sir Eric Thomas
welcomed us all before the now retired Vice-chancellor Professor David Clarke, who oversaw the building’s
construction, regaled us with stories of some of the project’s difficulties –
including the discovery of ancient gun powder under the old physics workroom
that occupied the site.
Soon
after, Sir David took to the microphone to deliver a compelling and
personal speech, centralised around the importance of understanding the Natural
Sciences to tackle the world’s most pressing problems. He stressed:
“The only way we will deal with the problems on this planet
of ours that we have created is to understand what goes on… nothing, nothing
could be more important in the area of scholarship than this.”
“Unless we understand the very systems on which we live, the
food we eat, the air we breathe, unless we understand how our world affects us,
we’ll be in real trouble.”
What’s more, he highlighted the importance of bridging the
gap between science and the wider community, to make them realise “how
important it is for us to do something”.
In addition to this passionate message, he also spoke of
“the joy, resonance and delight” that can be conjured from the natural world,
adding “understanding the natural sciences will give you joy for the rest of
your lives, it brought great joy to me.”
To finish, he professed: “I’m proud to be a freeman of this
great city and also to hold an honorary degree from this very, very
distinguished university”, before unveiling the building’s new plaque and
declaring the building officially open.After Sir David’s awe-inspiring speech, guests were given tours around the building to see some of the breath-taking features – including a 20 metre living wall, which houses 11 different species of plant as well as roosting spots for birds and bats. Also, guests visited the GroDome, a state-of-the-art tropical greenhouse that resides on top of the 13,500 square metre building.
For me, the most impressive aspect of the building is the
five-storey glass laboratory wing, which supports ground breaking research from
a multitude of different disciplines – from bat bioacoustics studies to
virtual-led palaeontology.
The new Genomics Facility is set to transform the
university’s world class study into understanding the evolution and mapping of
entire genomes. Professor Keith Edwards, a cereal genomics expert from the
School of Biological Sciences, says:
"From
the outset the new building was designed to have a state of the art genomics
facility; including two next generation
sequencers and a range of genotyping and robotic platforms. The new laboratories have been designed to minimise sample
to sample contamination via the use of
controlled air flow between rooms
operating at different pressures.”
Image Credit: Nick Smith | University of Bristol
Image Credit: Nick Smith | University of Bristol