Discovery Centre (DISC)
AstraZeneca

Abell Nepp have provided laboratory planning services to Herzog & de Meuron and BDP. The £750m building will bring together AstraZeneca's small-molecule/biologics research and development activity, providing a key point of scientific exchange and collaboration in the Cambridge Biomedical Campus (CBC) community.

Using precedence from the Cambridge Colleges, large floor plates enable the building to organised around a central court and limited to 3 stories high, providing a human scale for the 1600+ occupants. The large floor plates support transparent laboratory blocks of adaptable modular laboratories surrounded by open write-up, meeting and collaboration spaces.

The porous building encourages collaboration with public circulation through the site and courtyard with science-on-display in street-level laboratories.