Award of Merit Higher Education/Research

Photo courtesy of DPR Construction

The building features a serpentine-like design.

Nestled in the hillside of UCSF's Parnassus Campus, the $123-million, 660-ft-long Regeneration Medicine Building features a serpentine-like design with four split-level floors and terraced living roofs, sitting on a structural framework 40 to 70 ft off the ground.

One of the main challenges was inserting a high-profile medical science and stem cell research building into a densely packed urban university campus in a seismic Zone 4, which significantly increased the complexity for the team. Furthermore, the project is situated at the base of Mount Sutro, which slopes up to 60 degrees from the adjacent road. The structural design included 42 friction pendulum seismic isolators located between the foundation and the structure at each of the building's anchor points,

Key Players

Owner: University of California, San Francisco

General Contractor: DPR Construction, Redwood City

Construction Management: Nova Partners, Redwood City

Architect: SmithGroup, San Francisco

Civil Engineer: Creegan + D'Angelo, Fairfield

Structural Engineer: Forell/Elsesser Engineers, San Francisco

MEP Engineers: Cupertino Electric, San Francisco; ACCO, San Leandro

Submitted by:

DPR Construction