The Advanced Research Projects Division (ARPD) of the Defense Department is financing the construction of two additional floors for the Gordon McKay Laboratory of Applied Sciences.

Work on the $800,000 addition started this week. When it is completed in September 1962, the structure will house laboratories for a reasearch project on materials, contracted by the ARPD.

Under an unusual financing arrangement, the ARPD has promised to pay for the building over ten years in the form of special use allowances charged by the University.

This is the first time the Defense Department has paid for construction at the University. Previously, its grants for contract research covered only operating expenses, forcing the University to pay for space with its own funds.

F. Kenneth Willenbrock, Director of Laboratories in the Division of Engineering and Applied Physics, yesterday called the new arrangement "very attractive."

The research project on materials, which is already underway with an ARPD grant of $1.7 million for the first four years, involves chemists and geologists as well as researchers from the Engineering division. According to Willenbrock, and will study and try to improve the optical, mechanical, and electrical properties of metals and other materials used in the defense program.