The new Science and Engineering Building (SEB) opened to the UTSA community on Aug. 22. The $95 million project has been under construction since 2018 and is a part of the university’s plans to center itself as a research institution.

The SEB is located across from the Biotechnology Sciences and Engineering Building and will house students from a number of STEM departments, including chemistry, biology, chemical engineering and computer engineering. The university has touted the facility’s state-of-the-art 17,000 square foot Makerspace, which includes a design studio, machine shop, 3D printing room, and project assembly and meeting space. Students and faculty members working in the Makerspace will also be able to connect with the Center for Innovation and Technology Entrepreneurship to take products, research outcomes, and services to the marketplace. 

JoAnn Browning, the dean of the College of Engineering, described the possibilities for collaboration at the Makerspace. 

“The Makerspace will host projects that bring engineers, urban planners, social scientists, artists, musicians, athletes, business people, computer scientists, architects, mathematicians — and many more — together to find unique solutions to problems that cross societal concerns,” Browning said in a statement. 

The SEB also has a two-story distillation column that chemical engineering students will be able to use to conduct complex distillations that would not be possible without such a massive structure. The distillation column was a gift from the Klesse Foundation. 

The majority of the $95 million used to construct the SEB came from tuition revenue bonds the Texas legislature passed in 2015. The SEB is the largest construction project UTSA has ever undertaken, and it is the first new building to open at UTSA since the North Paseo Building opened in 2014.