Janelia Research Campus

Most HHMI-funded research supports investigators working at their home institution.[4] However, some interdisciplinary problems are difficult to address in existing research settings, and Janelia was built as a separate institution to address such problems in neurobiology.[5] As of November 2011, it has 424 employees and room for 150 more.[6] They specifically address the identification of general principles governing information processing by neuronal circuits, and the development of imaging technologies and computational methods for image analysis. In 2017, it announced a new research area, mechanistic cognitive neuroscience.[7]

At any given time, Janelia supports several large collaborative projects to address needs for data and techniques of interest to a wide scientific community.[5][8] These currently (as of 2021) include the development of large-scale neuroanatomical data for Drosophila (at the light and electron microscopy levels), a corresponding light level map of the mouse brain, improving the technology of genetically coded fluorescent sensors, and a number of smaller projects. Results include much improved fluorescent calcium sensors and the first entire full-brain image of Drosophila with neuronal resolution.[9][10]

The center was designed to emulate the unconstrained and collaborative environments at AT&T Bell Laboratories and Cambridge's Laboratory of Molecular Biology. Researchers are on six-year contracts and fully internally funded, independent of traditional research grant funding.[11]

Gerald M. Rubin was the first executive director of Janelia, and saw it from concept through construction to operation. Ronald Vale took over as director in early 2020. There are roughly 50 research laboratories headed by senior researchers including Jennifer Lippincott-Schwartz, Gerry Rubin, Eric Betzig, Karel Svoboda and Barry Dickson.[12] Previous lab heads include Sean Eddy, Tamir Gonen, Lynn Riddiford, James W. Truman, and Robert Tjian.

The original Janelia Farm house is listed on the National Register of Historic Places,[13][14] and the property was purchased by HHMI from the Dutch software maker Baan Companies in December 2000.[15] The 281 acres (1.14 km²) main campus features a 900-foot (270 m) long, arc-shaped laboratory known as the Landscape Building.[16] The building, designed by Rafael Viñoly, 270 feet (82 m) wide at the ground floor, is built into a hill and designed to be the primary research facility. A 96 room hotel for conference attendees overlooks a pond and connects to the Landscape Building via a tunnel under Helix drive. Selden Island, a 408 acres (1.65 km²) former sod farm in the Potomac River was added to the campus in 2004 and is popular amongst staff for jogging and recreation.[17][18]

Many employees live on campus. There are two apartments buildings totaling 140 units, 34 single-family townhouses and 21 studio apartments providing housing for more than a quarter of the staff, with another 100 unit apartment under construction as of 2022.[19][18] Other employees commute to Arlington on an HHMI provided shuttle bus.[20] There are extensive fitness facilities, including a yoga studio, bouldering gym, tennis courts and a soccer field.[20][21][22]

Site and landscape design were completed by Dewberry in 2006 and include over four acres of green roof meadow plantings which blend the building into the surrounding site. In 2006, the institute hired landscape architecture firm Lewis Scully Gionet, Inc., to redo some of the previous landscape work which was completed in fall 2008 (and won an Honor Award from the Maryland and Potomac chapters of the American Society of Landscape Architects). This work includes an architectural water feature, expanded path network, and siting of multiple pieces of artwork, as well as comprehensive planting additions. Additional campus-wide landscape improvement designed by LSG Landscape Architecture followed up until now.

Together with the Loudoun Academy of Science,[32] HHMI donates approximately $1 million annual support for science education through the Loudoun County Public School District.[33][34] Janelia also hosts a quarterly public lecture series for the public.[35]

• Salk Institute for Biological Studies
• Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory

• Gerald M. Rubin: Establishing a new Research Institute: The Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Janelia Farm Research Campus. in: Perspectives of Research - Identification and Implementation of Research Topics by Organizations - Ringberg-Symposium 2006 (Max-Planck-Forum 7) Max-Planck-Gesellschaft (Hrsg.), München 2007, ISSN 1438-8715