Skirball Administration
The Skirball Institute, directed by Dr. Ruth Lehmann represents NYU's most ambitious development project. This has culminated in the completion of a $200 million 23 story building on 1st Avenue housing the four floors of the Skirball Institute, as well as several floors for physicians' offices and fifteen stories of residential space.
Typical laboratory floors are organized with investigator labs lining the east and west sides of the building with the central region being used for common services. Administrative offices, conference rooms, etc. are located in the annex at the north-east corner of the building. There are 68 modules of approximately 700 square feet each plus 40 offices for new investigators to be recruited to NYU Langone Medical Center.
Unlike current research space in the Medical Center, which is allocated on a departmental basis, the Skirball Institute space is assigned to researchers working in four interdisciplinary programs: Developmental Genetics, Molecular Neurobiology, Molecular Pathogenesis, and Structural Biology. In addition to its Director, Dr. Ruth Lehmann, each of these units has a senior scientist who acts as a coordinator. Faculty have have primary appointments in an existing department and secondary appointments at the Skirball Institute to facilitate communication.
Within the Medical School the creation of the Skirball Institute is a commitment to the importance and contribution of basic research for control of cancer through genetic means, prevention of AIDS and malaria, a firmer understanding and treatment of Alzheimer's disease, and a cure for many other serious illnesses. The new institute provides greatly expanded state-of-the-art laboratories in which researchers from various diciplines are able to lead medicine into the twenty-first century. Future research will involve the crossing of traditional academic lines as scientists from a multiplicity of specialites and departments work together to translate the growing body of biomolecular knowledge into medical breakthroughs.The Skirball Institute has a Steering Committee which oversees the operation of the Institute.
