After over four years of construction, The Mike and Ophelia Lazaridis Quantum Nano-Centre (QNC) officially has a grand opening date. Scheduled for September 21, 2012, the grand opening will be 10:00 – 11:30 AM featuring guided tours.
In June 2008, at the ground-breaking of the QNC, we reported that the completion date had been steadily pushed back from 2009 to an estimate of “sometime in 2011”. However, the 285 000 square foot, $160 million building with a 17 000 square foot laboratory is finally ready to open its doors.
The design principles of the building included meeting the highest scientific standard, encouraging interaction and collaboration between researchers and students, and serving as a magnet for top scientists to Waterloo. In addition, the honeycomb structure on the side of the building was inspired by the hexagonal carbon structure of graphene, a nanomaterial consisting of a single layer of carbon atoms.
Built on top of what was previously the Biology 2 green, funding for the building was provided by Ophelia and Mike Lazaridis ($101 million), the Canada Foundation for Innovation and the Province of Ontario ($17.9 million each), and multiple other sources. It will house the Waterloo Institute for Nanotechnology and the Institute for Quantum Computing. The building is even rumoured to have an entire floor devoted to space for undergraduate education.
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