Manchester's National Science Institute Approved

Plans to build a new £235 million national science institute at Manchester University have been approved by the council.

The Sir Henry Royce Institute will be situated on the university's campus on Upper Brook Street, between the Alan Turing building and a multi-storey car park.

The centre was granted funding by the former chancellor George Osborne in 2014 and is intended to become an international flagship centre for high-tech research. In particular, it will focus on developing new substances in relation to Manchester's ground breaking research into graphene.

Over 500 scientists will be based in the 10-storey building and university bosses hope it will reinforce Manchester's status as a centre of excellence for advanced materials science.

The university also argue the development will make use of a vacant site on a main travel route into the city, while complementing the rest of the campus, which itself is undergoing a £1bn ten-year revamp.

Two additional advanced materials centres have been developed nearby following the university's graphene discovery. Situated on Booth Street West, the £61m National Graphene Institute opened in 2015, while the £60m Graphene Engineering and Innovation Centre on Sackville Street should be complete by the end of this year.