Senator Robert C. Byrd, who was a proponent of the project and helped receive funding for its construction.

[1] The second floor is tailored to the College of Science, where labs for biotechnology research and teaching will reside alongside "student study spaces."

To obtain funding for the Biotechnology Science Center, Robert C. Byrd requested $35.6 million in Congressional appropriations.

Many of the researchers and faculty were separated from the main campus by as much as eight miles (13 km) at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Spring Valley.

The latter will host students and faculty who work on three-dimensional modeling, animation and simulation technologies, and would complement the Biotechnology Science Center and the new engineering program at the university.