BOSTON-In a move expected to solidify the city's status as a world-class research center, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center will take 350,000 sf of lab and office space in a $300-million building planned for Boston's Longwood Medical area. The 705,000-sf Center for Life Science Research, which will be completed by fall 2007, will be the largest research center of its type in the city's Longwood Medical Area.

The center should attract some of the nation's top biotech and pharmaceutical firms to the city, Robert Green, chief operating officer for New Hampshire-based Lyme Properties, tells GlobeSt.com. "Boston is already a major player, but anything that adds to the critical mass of research space and labor pool will make it more sustainable." Lyme Properties is developing the site.

Green says Lyme Properties, which has been hammering out a deal with Beth Israel since the beginning of the year, has also entered lease negotiations with several other institutions and research firms. Beth Israel will occupy seven floors of the 18-story structure currently under construction at 3 Blackfan Circle.

The glass-and-steel research facility will be part of a two-building complex that will include a second smaller building containing 500,000 sf. Together, the buildings will put about 1.2 million sf of laboratory space in the area, Green says.

The facility is designed to complement a growing list of research firms that are currently located across the Charles River in Cambridge. The Longwood area has turned into the hub of Boston's research industry with the recent construction of several new facilities, including a laboratory complex constructed by Merck & Co. which is located next door to the Lyme site.

Children's Hospital opened a 12-story research building in 2003 and Harvard Medical School opened a research complex last fall. Partners Healthcare Systems Inc., the parent company to Brigham and Women's Hospital, and Massachusetts General Hospital also hold leases on approximately 200,000 sf in the Longwood area and Children's Hospital and the Joslin Diabetes Center are planning to build another nine-story research facility just down the street.