Bradley hospital integrative research laboratories

Emma Pendleton Bradley Hospital received a $7,940,991 Project Grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Office of the Director under the Construction Support program (CFDA 93.352) to construct and equip the Bradley Hospital Integrative Research Laboratories. Awarded September 15, 2025, with completion targeted for May 31, 2030, this initiative will deliver a new 13,856 square-foot research facility on Bradley Hospital's East Providence, Rhode Island campus. The facility will consolidate multiple pediatric psychiatry research groups and provide purpose-built infrastructure including 24-hour operational sleep and circadian research suites, biomarker and biospecimen assessment laboratories, centralized performance testing facilities, and three specialized physiological laboratories for electroencephalography (EEG), psychophysiology, and neuromodulation research. The facility will also incorporate joint-use assessment spaces for observation studies, neurocognitive testing, and electrophysiological recordings.

The Construction Support program funds modernization and construction of biomedical research facilities to support basic, translational, clinical, and behavioral research. This award specifically addresses critical infrastructure gaps at the nation's first psychiatric hospital exclusively serving children and adolescents, enabling researchers direct adjacency to patient populations participating in research while advancing state-of-the-art pediatric psychiatry research capabilities. The project meets program requirements for scientific merit, institutional project management capacity, design quality, and sustainable design principles, with non-federal costs supplemented through hospital and corporate funding sources.

Abstract

The proposed research facility will provide biomedical research facilities and opportunities for exceptional state-of-the-art pediatric psychiatry research to bradley hospital, the nation's first psychiatry hospital exclusively serving children and adolescents. The new integrative research laboratories, located on the campus of bradley hospital in east providence, RI, will create a centralized facility for scientists and their research activities on the hospital campus-steps away from patients who participate in science and who may benefit the most from new discoveries. The proposed facility addresses four core needs: (a) centralizing multiple research groups in a cohesive facility immediately accessible to bradley's patient populations who participate in research; (b) modernize and expand the capacities of our aging sleep and chronobiology research facility; (c) build a state-of-the-science child and adolescent psychiatry oriented biomarkers and biospecimen assessment and processing laboratory; and (d) create new joint-use assessment spaces that combine the breadth of modern psychiatric research (e.g., observation studies, neurocognitive testing, electrophysiological and psychophysiological recordings, neuromodulation) into a single facility to facilitate dynamic science and new collaborations. We propose construction of a 13,856 square-foot facility that will occupy the second floor of a new building on bradley's campus (with excess capital costs secured from hospital and corporate funds). These new integrative research laboratories will include: purpose-built 24- hour-operational environmentally controlled sleep and circadian research suites, sample collection, storage and analysis facilities, assessment rooms focusing on child, family, and group observation and research, centralized performance testing laboratories, 3 purpose-built physiological labs (EEG, psychophysiology and neuromodulation), ample instrumentation storage and freezer space, and dedicated fixed equipment to facilitate research success. Together, this new facility will transform the research capacities of bradley hospital, solving multiple long-standing challenges to our scientific endeavors. Research accomplished in these laboratories will benefit the children and families in RI, greater new england, and across the nation by enhancing knowledge and understanding of pediatric mental health. Our construction and design plan meets the highest standards of modern facilities to ensure the long-term utility of this space. We note that the hospital and corporate institution (brown university health) have pledged approximately $13.7 million to ensure the viability of this biomedical research facility. Our new integrative research laboratories facility will provide the infrastructure to support bradley hospital as a national and international leader in child and adolescent psychiatry research well into the 21ST century.