The new Science II building, set to open next fall, is packed with features that are either new or are improvements over what is currently on campus.

One of these new features will be Central’s first acoustics lab. Andrew Piacsek, professor and department chair of physics, said the lab will have three different components to it.

One is a so-called “anechoic chamber,” Piacsek said. The chamber completely absorbs reflections of either sound or electromagnetic waves, allowing the room to stay echo-free and insulated from exterior noise.

There will also be a vibration lab, “where we can make lots of loud sounds and not bother anyone else in the building,” Piacsek said. “It’s also a room where we might be more interested in how things are vibrating compared to the actual sounds they’re making.”

Piacsek said the third room in the lab will be a multi-purpose room that will have computers and whiteboards, with worktables and benches on which to perform experiments.

The new lab will give students the opportunity to measure and observe many different types of sound, he said.

One of the more visually striking features of Science II is the new observatory dome that is expected to be ready to start taking pictures in summer 2016.

While Lind Hall had an observatory, it wasn’t easily accessible to people with disabilities.

Cassie Fallscheer, Central’s new observational astronomer, says the plan is to use the dome for student and faculty research projects. Just outside the observatory dome is an outdoor plaza with 20 cement blocks for mounting smaller telescopes.

“The plan for those [20 mounted telescopes is] that everybody will have a chance to point and use a telescope with a very hands-on approach,” Fallscheer said.

Lind Hall has only been equipped with a couple of telescopes and not every student gets a chance to learn how to thoroughly operate a telescope, she said.

Science II will also contain a new rock-crushing lab, which will be used by scientists in the geology department, and a new ice core lab, which faculty member Susan Kaspari will use to study climate change.

Another new feature in Science II is an 80-seat lecture hall that doubles as a planetarium, a first for Central’s campus. It will be tied for largest planetarium in the state, according to Joanne Hillemann, Central’s project manager for Science II.

The Center for Excellence in Science & Math Education, which had a couple of offices in Lind, will get a half-dozen offices and an open, changeable area where students and faculty can do research and check out computers.

The new space will rival that of a similar education center at Western Washington University, which Central visited while planning the new building, Hillemann said.