Groundbreaking set for new Barshop Institute

An artist's rendering of the new Barshop Institute.

A new era of research and discoveries in aging will begin Oct. 17 when UT Health San Antonio will break ground on a new and expanded Barshop Institute for Longevity & Aging Studies.

The three-story, 108,000 gross-square-foot building will be located at the corner of Floyd Curl and Charles Katz drives, adjacent to UT Health’s Medical Arts & Research Center and across the street from UT Health’s Greehey campus. The total project cost $70.2 million.

Scheduled guests at the ceremony include William H. McRaven, chancellor of the University of Texas System, UT System Regent Rad Weaver, Joe Straus, speaker of the Texas House of Representatives, and Ann Barshop, who along with her late husband, Sam Barshop, gave generously toward the creation of the institute.

The Barshop Institute’s headquarters are now at the Texas Research Park on Lambda Drive in southwest San Antonio.

The first floor of the new building will include open research labs, laboratory support, administrative and research faculty offices, and a large vivarium with support spaces and cage wash facilities. The second and third floors are shell space to accommodate future research labs and faculty offices. An open air bridge will cross over Floyd Curl and connect the Barshop to the South Texas Research Facility.

This vision of a world-class center for aging research first came into focus in 1991, when Dr. Edward J. Masoro founded the UT Health Science Center’s Aging Research and Education Center through a leadership award granted to him by the National Institutes of Health.

In 2001, the Barshop Institute for Longevity & Aging Studies was born thanks to a generous donation from Sam and Ann Barshop, prominent San Antonio philanthropists.

Since that time, the Barshop has grown into one of the world’s premier aging research centers. Barshop researchers move the science of healthy aging from the idea stage to preclinical and animal studies, and then into proving that an intervention works in humans.

The Barshop Institute is now the only aging-intensive research institute in the country to have the following four designations: two NIA-funded centers (Nathan Shock and Claude D. Pepper), a testing site of the NIA-sponsored Interventions Testing Program, and a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Geriatric Research, Education and Clinical Center.

Construction on the new building should begin this fall with an estimated completion date of late 2019. Alamo Architects designed the building and J.T. Vaughn Construction LLC will serve as construction managers.

The groundbreaking event at 10:30 a.m., Oct. 17, is open to the public. Please RSVP to SpecialEvents@uthscsa.edu



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