The Diamond Center is the world's largest private research laboratory devoted solely to AIDS research. The Center occupies two floors in the New York City's Bureau of Laboratories Building. The total of 44,000 square feet of laboratory space provides an efficient and comfortable environment for research with an anticipated complement of ~100 scientists. The centerpiece of the facility is the 5,000 square foot Irene Diamond Biosafety Level-3 (BL-3) Containment Laboratory, used by the investigators and visiting researchers for working safely with HIV. It is entered through double doors with airlocks and is always at negative pressure with respect to the outside space. Within the BL-3 are six independent modules for use by individual research teams.
There are nine laboratories for routine research, environmental rooms for work at defined temperatures and equipment rooms, all available for general use by the center's scientists. The Center is fully equipped with an extensive array of the latest state-of-the-art scientific equipment.
The Center's two conference rooms and library are a hub for seminars and lectures, bringing together scientists and clinicians from the Diamond Center, The Rockefeller University and many other institutions from across the city and the world.
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Working Lab
This is one of the nine labs of the center. Each of these labs has windows that allow natural light in, and there are also large windows that allow people to view the labs from the hallways. All of these architectural designs were chosen to give the lab an open feeling which encourages interaction between the scientists of the center.
This is the changing room leading into the BSL3 lab. In this room the scientists put on safety gear before passing through two more doors to enter into the common area of the BSL3.
There are 7 modulars within the BioSafety Level 3 laboratory. This is where the scientists work with live virus. A BSL3 lab is very costly to construct, and must be entirely self contained, meeting strict OSHA regulations for air and water handling. The lab has its own air handling unit that does extensive filtering to the air before it is allowed to be exhausted to the outside. In addition, the entire lab is kept at negative pressure with respect to the outside space to keep air from escaping. When people enter and exit the lab, all air is pulled into the lab where it is filtered before being released.
In addition to the 7 modules, there is 940 sq. ft. of common space in the BSL3 Lab. This space has work benches, modern equipment and storage for investigators shared use. This area is laid out following the theme of the rest of the center, keeping all of the scientists near one another, to encourage interaction.
The facility houses an applied precisions Deltavisionn restoration microscope, utilizing an Olympus ix-70 inverted microscope platform. This microscope system is contained in a BSL3 facility for work with infectious material.
This lab is equipped with state-of-the-art scientific equipment such as a Becton Dickinson LSR II, FACS Cailiber, Thermo Scientific NanoDrop 1000 and an Applied Biosystems Real Time PCR machine.
Within this lab a Cytomation MoFlo high-performance cell sorter is available, configured with 3 lasers and currently capable of acquiring 8 colors of fluorescence. This system is capable of routine cell sorting at cell throughput rates of 50,000 cells per second.
Officers are provided to the scientists so that they can quietly focus on reading and writing of scientific material.
The seminar meeting room is where the scientists meet weekly to share ideas with invited guest speakers. It is a free exchange of ideas with some of the most important people in the research community. The room features an LCD projector system used for multimedia presentations. This screen as well as the room's lights and sound system can be controlled by the presenter via a touch screen at the podium.
This is the boardroom, which is also a library housing archives of different medical journals and current writings. This conference room has a 60" plasma TV which is used for presentations and videoconferencing.
Upon entering the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center, the first thing our visitors see is the unique double helix carpet which was designed by Jack Owens, who died of AIDS in 1992. The architects' theme of wood paneling and the polished steel seen above is repeated throughout the center. The sculpture at the end of the hall is from Irene Diamond's personal collection and was donated to the center.
