NIH: Building vibrations under control

New measurements taken at the Biomedical Research Center for the National Institute on Aging have determined that building vibration levels will be low enough to allow most research to proceed as usual, despite previous concerns that vibrations from elevators and other sources might disrupt the use of more than 150 pieces of sophisticated equipment. "[T]he latest data indicate that the facility will be capable of accommodating state-of-the-art biomedical research," National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Elias A. Zerhouni wrote last month in response to questions from Senator Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.), who raised concerns about the facility last year. The new facility, scheduled to open early this year, is currently under construction at Johns Hopkins University's Bayview Campus in Southeast Baltimore. It is designed to replace the adjacent Gerontology Research Center (GRC), which was built in the 1950s and is in need of renovation. Earlier reports indicated excessive vibration problems...