Breaking new ground for TBSI

Chancellor Christ, Shenzhen mayor Rugui Chen  and Tsinghua President Qiu plant a banyan tree at the groundbreaking ceremony. (Photos courtesy TBSI)The Tsinghua-Berkeley Shenzhen Institute (TBSI) reached a major milestone this month as ground was broken on a new campus in Shenzhen, China. The graduate-level research and education institute was jointly established in 2015 by UC Berkeley and Tsinghua University with the support of the Shenzhen Municipal Government.

Berkeley Engineering plays a leading role in the TBSI partnership, taking advantage of decades of faculty collaborations with engineering colleagues at Tsinghua. Since the institute’s inauguration, 21 UC Berkeley faculty from engineering, physics, molecular and cell biology, optometry and other disciplines have participated in TBSI’s research and educational programs.

In a ceremony marking the start of the first phase of construction, UC Berkeley Chancellor Carol Christ, Tsinghua University President Yong Qiu and Shenzhen mayor Rugui Chen laid the foundation stone and planted a banyan tree for the new campus. During the visit, they were also given tours of research labs and updates on the institute’s development plans through 2020.

The new campus will cover an area of ​​about 5.6 acres and include nearly 1.7 million square feet of classrooms, research laboratories, production facilities and more. The Shenzhen government is financing the $220 million cost for constructing the new campus, which is scheduled to be completed in 2021.