Location: Operations
Project Number: 3022-32000-016-011-M
Project Type: Memorandum of Understanding
Start Date: Sep 8, 2022
End Date: Mar 31, 2025
Objective:
Cooperator will support USDA in the transfer of the scientific mission from the Plum Island Animal Disease Center (PIADC) in Orient Point, NY to the National Bio and Agro Defense Facility (NBAF) in Manhattan, KS by conducting testing of the proposed transport equipment and processes.
Approach:
The goal of National Program 103 (NP 103), Animal Health, is to protect and ensure the safety of the Nation’s agriculture and food supply through improved disease detection, prevention, and control.
The National Bio and Agro Defense Facility (NBAF) will take over the mission of the Plum Island Animal Disease Center (PIADC) and be the ARS lead facility for Foreign Animal Disease research. Furthermore, it will add new capabilities not found at PIADC. It will be the first facility in the United States with large animal capacity with biosafety level 4 (BSL4) containment capability. Further it will house a Biologics Development Module (BDM), an essential facility for scaling up research trials beyond initial laboratory scale experiments, to attract pharmaceutical companies to participate in further development of diagnostics, therapeutics and medical counter measures to foreign animal and particularly zoonotic diseases.
