New Facilities

Kasha Laboratory of the Institute of Molecular Biophysics

The Molecular Biophysics Building was the first academic building constructed in the Science Center complex located near the western end of the FSU campus. It is the home of the Institute of Molecular Biophysics (IMB) which is an interdisciplinary group of life and physical scientists. In the early 90’s the major research emphasis of IMB shifted to Structural Biology. Structural Biologists use powerful physical tools such as X-ray crystallography and NMR spectroscopy as well as computational approaches to study the structures and dynamic properties of large molecules of biological importance.

In 2000 the Molecular Biophysics Building was renamed the Kasha Laboratory in honor of the Founding Director of IMB Michael Kasha, a member of the National Academy of Sciences and former member of the National Science Board. During the period of 2001-2003 the Kasha Laboratory was completely renovated using funds derived from a $2M grant from the National Institutes of Health and a generous over-match from the University.

The renovated Kasha Laboratory contains four core research facilities: X-Ray Diffraction, Eukaryotic Protein Expression, Molecular Modeling & Simulation and the Physical Biochemistry. The faculty researchers housed in the building have appointments in a range of departments/programs including Biological Science, Chemistry & Biochemistry, Computational Science and Physics. The Kasha Laboratory is the administrative hub of the Molecular Biophysics Ph.D. program which has participating faculty from eight academic departments in four colleges.