Project Details
Description
University research and academic laboratory facilities are key element in the support of a successful education and research experience. World-class universities pay attention to their research and academic facilities, since this ensures that the best of students are produced through these facilities; while the university also ensures its place as a world class institute of learning through research. The functionality of research laboratory facilities is strongly linked to its functional performance through its design and spatial arrangement, this consequently influences the productivity of students, teachers and researchers who use these facilities. Hence, a systematic study into the functional performance of laboratory facilities through a hybrid of quantitative and qualitative approaches becomes inherently important. This will ensure that a holistic view of the performance of such facilities is properly captured. The space syntax theory and the principle of post occupancy evaluation are found to be very robust and highly valuable in achieving this aim. Though these tools have been used in the built environment for a long time, attention has been given mostly to residential, commercial and classroom facilities. None of the studies has employed either of these tools to research and academic laboratories, talk less of combining them to derive more holistic results. Thus this research project is designed to (1) evaluate the functional performance of various university laboratories using the space syntax approach (2) develop KPIs for the evaluation of academic and research laboratory facilities (3) carry out a Post Occupancy Evaluation of various laboratory facilities (4) develop guidelines and provide sample drawings for optimal space design of laboratory facilities. The methodology will involve the acquisition of academic and research laboratory floor plans, and consequently the acquisition of a space syntax software (DepthmapX or AGraph) which will be used to evaluate the various floor plans in terms of the Mean Depth (MD) of space and Real Relative Asymmetry (RRA). The results obtained from the space syntax analysis, together with a thorough and extensive review of literature will be used to develop a unique set of KPIs for the evaluation of laboratory facilities. Subsequently a Post Occupancy Evaluation of selected laboratory facilities will be carried out based on the perception of users including students, teachers and researchers. Finally, the previous steps will lead to the development of design guidelines and sample sketches illustrating the optimal use of laboratory functional space. The developed guidelines will also be reviewed and validated by professional experts.
Status | Finished |
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Effective start/end date | 11/04/17 → 11/09/19 |
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