The center bears the name of visionary benefactor and Penn Dental alumnus Robert Schattner (D'48), whose gift played a leadership role in successfully funding the building project.

The center plays a pivotal role in Penn Dental, providing a home for basic science faculty and the facilities needed to support research programs.

In the atrium of the Schattner Center sits the carriage that Evans and Napoleon III's wife, Eugénie de Montijo, used to escape Prussia's invasion into France.

[5] The school's research enterprise is multidisciplinary, spanning both the basic and clinical sciences, concerned with the structures and functions of tissues and fluids and microbial flora in the oral cavity.

Investigations range from such areas as oral microbiology and virology, inflammation and immunity, tooth development, and the use of analgesics and sedatives, to the cellular biology of connective tissues and bone, the applications for state-of-the-art dental materials, and the causes and effects of periodontal disease.