CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA (CVILLE RIGHT NOW) – The highest beam was put in place at a topping off ceremony Monday for the Paul and Diane Manning Institute of Biotechnology’s 350,000-square-foot facility at Fontaine Research Park.

Ground was broken for the project in December 2023, and work is expected to be completed by December 2027. The Mannings seeded the project with a $100-million gift.

“Today we are celebrating a step forward as we continue to build a thriving biotech ecosystem in central Virginia that will compete with the leading biotech centers globally, probably the best in class when we are done,” Manning said before the beam was placed.

“I am delighted to be one step closer to opening the Manning Institute’s state-of-the-art new facility and grateful to everyone who has worked so hard on this project,” said Paul G. Mahoney, the University’s interim president. “The Manning Institute has already accelerated research and discovery within the University and the Commonwealth. I am eager to see what our talented faculty, staff and research teams will accomplish in the Institute’s new home.”

Research Mark Esser, PhD, is the leader of the new institute after serving as Vice President for Vaccines and Immune Therapies at Astra Zeneca.

“Our mission is simply transforming science into medicines. I’ll say it again because if there’s one thing you remember from me today I hope it’s our mission is to transform science into medicines,” Esser said.

Esser talked about what Governor Youngkin mentioned at the groundbreaking with this center being a lynchpin in what is called a research diamond.

“Technically, it was going to the be the Virginia Research Rhomboid, which just doesn’t sound as good as the Research Diamond,” Esser joked.

“A lot of this work is being funded by the state,” Esser said with, in addition to the $100-million Manning gift, the Commonwealth has initially matched that with another $100-million, and UVA is spending another $150-million for a total initial $350-million investment.

“We’re doing collaborative work with Virginia Tech, Virginia Commonwealth University, Old Dominion University, and I think we’re bringing in George Mason, and we took a little artistic liberty, so it’s a diamond.”

Manning expanded on Esser’s main focus, “We’re going to build a facility here that does research, and we’re going to have a regulatory team that’s going to help our researchers get the product into phase one studies, we’re going to have manufacturing that will make the product, then we’re going to push it over to the medical center to treat patients in clinical studies,” he said. “Our goal is to cure these diseases. Our goal is not to do the research for the sake of research, but to cure diseases.”