The Minister for Health, Mr Martin, will today lay the foundation stone at a new €8 million Environmental Research Institute at University College Cork.
The institute will draw on expertise in areas such as zoology, chemistry and engineering as well as government and social sciences and draw on staff from 11 academic departments across four UCC faculties.
Among the established training programmes and research themes on offer at the new institute are ecotoxicology, environmental biotechnology, environmental chemistry, coastal infrastructure and development.
The institute's building will provide laboratories, offices and meeting rooms for around 60 researchers and is due to be completed in early 2005.