Delays in plans for an addition to the Chemistry building played a key role in prompting four prominent UA scientists to depart for the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Construction on the 88,500 square-foot, $45 million addition is expected to start in February, but Jean-Luc Bred‡s and his three colleagues, chemistry professors Seth Marder and Joseph Perry, and optical sciences associate professor Bernard Kippelen, had been expecting the project for years.

"At this stage it's too late," Bred‡s said.

Those four professors, who frequently collaborate, and who work at the forefront of their field, had met with success in recent years attracting research grants. But now they are relocating to Georgia Tech, where they will find more research space and better facilities.

Based on grant money they've already earned, they will have at least $5 million to start with at Georgia Tech, said Mark Smith, head of UA's chemistry department.

"They were very productive faculty members. They collectively received several permanent awards over the last year or two," Smith said.

But throughout their UA careers, they faced shortages in space. At one point Marder and Perry were even forced into lab space at the UA Science and Technology Park, about a 25-minute drive southeast of campus.

Marder was moved onto campus about two years ago, and the university had intended to move Perry as well, but into "space of not optimal quality," Smith said.

When Marder and Perry were hired about five years ago, it was with the implicit promise that their research space would be expanded, Smith said.

They had hoped the Chemistry building addition would solve the problem, but financial problems delayed construction. Last summer, it appeared the plans were falling off the radar completely, Smith said.

Without the new space, the department would have a hard time attracting and housing new faculty, and professors there are already overextended, Bred‡s said. There are only about 30 faculty in the department, and he believes that number should be at least 40.

Until the addition to the Chemistry building is completed, likely in fall 2005, faculty will have to deal with the limited space in their current facility.

The space shortage in the chemistry department is reflective of a problem across Arizona, where the three universities have only as much combined research space as the University of California, San Diego, said Joaquin Ruiz, dean of the College of Science.

The state Legislature is debating whether to fund the building addition, as well as $400 million for other university research buildings across the state. University leaders have been pushing for passage of that bill, but some legislative Republicans have questioned whether the state can afford those projects in a time of steep budget deficits.

Bred‡s was critical of those lawmakers, saying they don't recognize that spending money on university research can stimulate economic development.

"There are too many politicians · that just look at the cost of the university without thinking about the impact that the university has in terms of attracting businesses," Bred‡s said.

For the chemistry department, the loss of these three professors brings its total to five departures over the past 12 months. One professor died, and another left for personal reasons.

Such a loss will leave the department scrambling to hire temporary faculty to cover classes in the fall, and it could mean some chemistry professors will be asked to take heavier teaching loads, Ruiz said.

But the department will suffer unless permanent replacements can be hired soon, he said.

"(These) are temporary fixes for a few years," Ruiz said. "But not for a long time."

The four professors are the latest casualties of a phenomenon known as "brain drain," which has occurred in recent years as faculty have left for better-paying jobs at universities with better facilities.

But slowly, their situation may become more the exception than the rule.

In 1999, "brain drain" cost the UA 74 faculty members, but only 49 left last year. Over the same period, the number of faculty who stay at UA after receiving offers from other universities rose from 42 to 76.

The trend toward better faculty retention hinges at least partly on continuing to create a better research infrastructure, Ruiz said.

In recent years, the UA administration has also set aside more money for making counter-offers to professors considering leaving.

With salaries near $140,000 per year, Bred‡s and Marder were the two highest-paid faculty members in the department.

But the salary increases they'll get at Georgia Tech weren't the main incentive driving the professors to leave, Bred‡s said.