Janelia Research Campus

Janelia Research Campus is a scientific research campus of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute that opened in October 2006. The campus is located in Loudoun County, Virginia, near the town of Ashburn. It is known for its scientific research and modern architecture. The current Executive Director of the laboratory is Ronald Vale, who is also a vice-president of HHMI. He succeeded Gerald M. Rubin in 2020. The campus was known as "Janelia Farm Research Campus" until 2014.
Research.
Most HHMI-funded research supports investigators working at their home institution. However, some interdisciplinary problems are difficult to address in existing research settings, and Janelia was built as a separate institution to address such problems in neurobiology. As of November 2011, it has 424 employees and room for 150 more.
They specifically address the identification of general principles governing information processing by neuronal circuits, and the development of imaging technologies and computational methods for image analysis. In 2017, it announced a new research area, mechanistic cognitive neuroscience.
There are also several other ongoing projects: high-throughput characterizing of behavioral phenotypes on genetically defined small neural lesions in "Drosophila", the development of large-scale neuroanatomical data for "Drosophila" (at the light and electron microscopy levels), and improving the technology so even larger anatomical projects can be approached in the future. In July 2018, this yielded the first entire full-brain image of "Drosophila" with neuronal resolution.
The center was designed to emulate the unconstrained and collaborative environments at AT&T Bell Laboratories and Cambridge's Laboratory of Molecular Biology. Researchers are on six-year contracts and fully internally funded, independent of traditional research grant funding.
Gerald M. Rubin was the first executive director of Janelia, and saw it from concept through construction to operation. Ronald Vale took over as director in early 2020. There are roughly 50 research laboratories headed by senior researchers including Jennifer Lippincott-Schwartz, Gerry Rubin, Eric Betzig, Karel Svoboda and Barry Dickson. Previous lab heads include Sean Eddy, Tamir Gonen, Lynn Riddiford, James W. Truman, and Robert Tjian.
Campus.
The original Janelia Farm house is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and the property was purchased by HHMI from the Dutch software maker Baan Companies in December 2000. The campus features a 900-foot (270 m) long, arc-shaped laboratory known as the Landscape Building. The building, designed by Rafael Viñoly, deep at the ground floor, is built into a hill and designed to be the primary research facility. Site and landscape design were completed by Dewberry in 2006 and include over four acres of green roof meadow plantings which blend the building into the surrounding site. Additional landscape enhancements were designed by Lewis Scully Gionet, Inc., and were completed in fall 2008 (and won an Honor Award from the Maryland and Potomac chapters of the American Society of Landscape Architects). This work includes an architectural water feature, expanded path network, and siting of multiple pieces of artwork, as well as comprehensive planting additions constructed by Ruppert Nurseries.
Community involvement.
Together with the Loudoun Academy of Science, HHMI donates approximately $1 million annual support for science education through the Loudoun County Public School District. Janelia also hosts a quarterly public lecture series for the public.