IHMC’s ‘habitat for innovation’ grows with new $40M research complex in downtown Pensacola
Dozens of residents, staff members and local officials gathered on Tuesday morning to cut the ribbon on the newest addition to the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition’s (IHMC) campus in downtown Pensacola.
The new $40 million multi-floor facility will serve as the IHMC’s Healthspan, Resilience and Performance research complex as well as an economic/intellectual beacon for the entire Northwest Florida region, according to Marcas Bamman, a senior research scientist at IHMC and the director of their new complex.
The new research complex now stands in the city’s skyline at 40 S. Alcaniz Street in downtown Pensacola.
“We’re very excited about the interdisciplinary collaboration between the computer scientists and the people that work in the biological sciences,” said Ken Ford, IHMC founder and chief executive officer.
Researchers working in the new research complex are literally an arm’s length reach away from fellow experts in different fields, such as AI, cognitive psychology, computational modeling or data visualization.
“I didn’t have, in the early days, the thought that (IHMC) would become this. I thought it would be successful, but over time some things have a life of their own and they start to go in new directions that in the beginning weren’t anticipated,” Ford continued.
IHMC is headquartered in Pensacola and is a not-for-profit research institute of the Florida University System where researchers pioneer science and technology aimed at leveraging and extending human capabilities. The IHMC was founded in 1990 and has been focusing on machine learning like robotics and artificial intelligence since, however this new complex will allow them to dive into newer, more community-oriented waters as part of their aim to improve people's overall health.
Local home collapses: Grande Lagoon home fell apart after shoddy work, couple says. They want builder penalized.
What will happen in the new IHMC building?
The new biomedically-based research complex will have multiple floors, 44,000+ square feet and serve as an accelerator in the IHMC’s plans to help the community stay healthier. Research on things like de-aging, neurodegenerative diseases, musculoskeletal problems and chronic metabolic condition will be carried out.
“Pushing the boundaries of science to maximize the performance and resilience of human beings has long been a foundational tenet at IHMC,” Ford said. “In our healthspan, resilience and performance research thrust, the vision has always been to work from the molecular level to the whole human. This facility brings that to life.”
IHMC won a $6 million Triumph Gulf Coast grant in 2021 to kickstart its research into human health and performance. Triumph nearly doubled that grant to $12 million in 2022 to build on the program's early success.
The research institution has already had about a dozen employees working on the subject since early last year. The new building will allow the institute to triple the size of that team over the next few years within a dedicated lab environment.
From its biochemistry lab to its high-resolution imaging facility, the new complex is outfitted with a wide range of equipment that are top of their class.
The new facility also puts Pensacola and Northwest Florida at the center of a human and biological sciences economic ecosystem that did not exist before the facility’s creation, with the potential to draw in new funding in federal and industry-sponsored research. It also serves as a draw for top research talent to the area from all over the world.
“I think it’s going to be transformational to the way medicine treats people,” said David Bear, chairman of the Triumph Gulf Coast Board. “The projects and the research they’re doing will change medicine as we know it worldwide, so we’ll have a much better, healthier population... I think everybody should be excited about what they’re doing here.”
IHMC already occupies two other buildings in the area, which have had a focus on robotics and artificial intelligence since its founding in 1990.
How can the researchers collaborate?
No matter what floor of the IHMC staff are on, help will literally always be around the corner.
By creating a conducive professional space where collaboration is encouraged, researchers and staff at the IHMC will have each other’s expertise at one another’s disposal during all times of the day, which will speed up each of their processes.
“The building is sort of designed to facilitate collaboration and human interaction… It’s not meant to be the most efficient use of the space, but it’s meant to sort of inspire the people,” Ford said.
A group of Air Force cadets, including Connor Manion, are already working at the IHMC for their Cadet Summer Research Program. In the program, cadets do research through an internship with companies who are already working with the Air Force.
These interns are currently working on building cognitive models that map stress resilience and the energy needed for it. “It was sort of a regimented plan of putting these people through stress to see how they react to these certain simple tasks,” Manion said.
IHMC researchers and staff also collaborate extensively with the government, industry and academia to help develop breakthrough technologies.
The new facility could even draw more top scientists from around the globe to Pensacola in order to utilize the new campus’ tools, collaborative framework and technological capabilities, a possibility that Pensacola Mayor D.C. Reeves is looking forward to.
“Having IHMC’s presence here is something that we brag about as a community because it’s an honor to have this level of research, any mayor in any community would be extremely grateful to say that IHMC is one of their own,” Reeves said.
“This is just another chapter and expansion of being able to say we have world-class research and an amazing work force that continues to grow,” Reeves continued. “We know the work that they’ll do here will not only change the (Pensacola) community, it’ll change the world.”
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: IHMC Healthspan, Resilience and Performance research complex opens