To attract the best and brightest faculty and students, universities today are asking architects for buildings that not only serve their academic goals but also bring prestige to their campuses through innovative design. The Genome Sciences Building (GSB) at the University of North Carolina (UNC) in Chapel Hill succeeds on both levels. Designed by the Chicago office of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM), the GSB is an integral part of the university’s Bell Tower District, for which the firm designed the master plan in 2004. “The resulting plan serves as a vital link between the historic north campus and the medical school to the south, forming a series of new quadrangles, a park, and expansion of the existing Coker Woods,” explains SOM associate director Peter Van Vechten.