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Anatomy students working in the new dissection laboratory at Western States Chiropractic College won’t need to step out for fresh air. The air will come to them, thanks to a hearty ventilation system.

The new building’s system will replace all the air in the dissection lab with outside air 25 times every hour.

That makes heating and cooling the lab tricky, said Andrew Lasse, an associate with Interface Engineering, the mechanical and electrical engineer for the project.

鈥淭here’s so much air coming in and out, it’s hard to finely tune the space so the occupants have a comfortable environment,鈥� Lasse said.

Construction is scheduled to begin this fall. The building also will have offices and a conference room where the heating, ventilation and air conditioning needs will be dramatically different from the dissection lab. Offices typically need to draw in about 30 percent outside air, Lasse said, and recirculate the rest.

In the anatomy building’s offices, some air will recirculate. But air in the lab and morgue will be drawn out, never to return. That requires systems to recover hot and cool air from the exhaust, plus a heat pump to supplement the building’s heating and cooling needs.

Anatomy students currently work in a dissection laboratory that started life as a caretaker’s shed. The air there is about what you’d expect, said David Wickes, executive vice president and provost for the college.

鈥淚t’s a fairly classic old-time anatomy lab where the formaldehyde fumes are strong,鈥� Wickes said. 鈥淚t’s not a pleasant working environment.鈥�

The current lab has no locker rooms for students and instructors, so they must change into and out of their scrubs in a different building. 鈥淭hat smells up that building as well,鈥� Wickes said. The new building will eliminate that problem, he said. 鈥淎nything that’s used in the anatomy lab stays in that area.鈥�

Bill Borman, chair of the basic sciences division and an instructor, said the present lab has other shortcomings: bad lighting, no bathrooms, no storage, a cramped dissection lab and only one sink for 50 people to share. 鈥淭here will be a lot of cheering when that building gets pushed over,鈥� Borman said.

The new lab can accommodate up to 11 dissection stations, three more than the current building’s capacity. Each station will have a computer terminal to replace anatomy textbooks.

Students at the college spend their first year getting acquainted with their dissection cadavers, Borman said. Once they start preparing for dissections, students get excited about the experience and appreciate that human beings donated their bodies for the students’ educations, he said. But the building itself does nothing to inspire that awe.

The new building, scheduled to be completed in March 2010, will make a better first impression, said Eric Lanciault of Office of Architecture LLC, the project architect. Window panels run all the way up the lobby walls to the 19-foot ceiling.

鈥淭here’s a little bit of 鈥榳ow’ factor, but then you immediately get into a secure dissection suite,鈥� Lanciault said.

鈥淭his building needed to be a background building on campus, not like the Taj Mahal,鈥� he said. 鈥淥n the other hand, it had to be dressed up like it was an important building you were entering.鈥�

The Western States campus is tucked into a residential neighborhood along Northeast 132nd Avenue. As a result, the city permitting process has taken about a year. Plans for the new anatomy building need to clear a conditional use review process before construction can begin, Wickes said.

Final building permits should come in a few weeks, he said, and the college plans to choose a contractor soon after. The 8,000-square-foot, wood-framed building will cost about $3 million, Wickes said.

The new building will serve the community in addition to the students, Wickes said. There aren’t many dissection laboratories in the area, he said, and even fewer that can accommodate visitors.

鈥淭here are a surprising number of high schools (that) like to bring students to the anatomy lab, because it’s such a different learning experience,鈥� Wickes said. 鈥淚t’s exciting, it gets students interested in the human body, and it’s one of the few places you can take people.鈥�