A walk through the social areas

 The entrance to the Edward Abraham building is marked with a striking vertical copper fin and approached though a small, formal garden. From the entrance hall, you can take the lift or stairs to the upper level, turn left past the shower rooms and WCs to reach the corridor linking the building with the other buildings on site, or tun right to enter the service area.
*common room
*library
*cafe

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Service area

The first room in this area is the sequencing suite, comprising two automated sequencers, an expert permanent staff and space for two to four visiting scientists to undertake sequencing-related projects. Next door is an instrument room and an ultracentrifuge room. Beyond this lie the wash-up and autoclaving areas and the stores area from which a regular delivery service to the labs operates.

Café, common room and library

At the heart of the project is the café. This lies at first-floor conveniently at the cross-roads between the Edward Abraham Building, the old Dunn School Building and the 1960s Leslie Martin Building. It is a double-height space enclosed in a visually light, strikingly curved wall of glass and steel giving views of the University Parks, and, via the timber-decked roof terrace, to the courtyard garden. From the servery, one can buy sandwiches and snacks or full hot meals. When the servery is closed, nearby vending machines provide drinks and snack service. Seventy people can be accommodated in the café itself, a further 30 on the terrace and perhaps 40 in the common room  {short description of image}
 {short description of image} The common room lies to the right of the servery drum and provides a more subdued environment for refreshment, conversation and reading. The furnishings are comfortable, the floor is carpeted and significant works of art on loan from the Arts Council's collection of contemporary British works hang on the walls. The room is naturally ventilated and cooled by automatic night-time ventilation. The daylight from the South (right) is filtered by an external, slatted cedar screen to avoid glare and heat-gain. Natural light also penetrates to the centre of the room though a shaft that runs along the centre of the building from roof level. At the far end of the common room, one can access the library, the emergency stairs and one of the laboratory suites.
 The library lies at the furthest end of the Edward Abraham Building, offering a quiet place for study. It carries an extensive collection of current scientific periodicals, reference books and scientific texts. It contains a photocopying facility, a large, mark-up table, several smaller tables and twelve IT-enabled study carrels. As with the common room, there is extensive natural light and air. The furthest part of the library is fully glazed, extends to a double-height and projects from the lower storey so that one get the impression of being in the University Parks.  {short description of image}
  On the first floor, above the common room and library, there are three meeting rooms, with capacities from 12 to 30. Two of these can be opened together to provide a seminar room with a capacity of 50 people. In addition to some administrative and professorial offices, this floor also contains the computing services room. This accommodates up to six computing professionals in bioinformatics and network support

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