Animal Research

The Australian Animal Health Laboratory (AAHL), a high-containment facility in Geelong, Victoria, has been operating 24/7 with no shutdowns, even for maintenance or upgrades, for nearly 30 years, thanks to the initial design, selection of materials, and quality of construction.

The AAHL—with BSL-2, BSL-3, and BSL-4 biocontainment areas—has an extensive redundant plant to ensure that critical systems, such as the air handling units, remain continually operational. The facility was one of the first in the world to use microprocessor control for all engineering systems.

AgriBio, Centre for AgriBioscience is one of Australia's premier biosciences facilities, with a key emphasis on supporting and protecting Victoria's $8.4 billion (USD) agricultural sector by focusing on cutting-edge research to improve productivity, fight disease, and reduce environmental impact. The state-of-the-art research facility serves joint venture partners La Trobe University (La Trobe) and the Victorian Department of Primary Industries (DPI).

The University of Edinburgh opened the first phase of the National Avian Research Facility in early 2013. The $7.9 million facility is part of a collaborative two-building research campus currently under construction for the Roslin Institute of the Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies and The Pirbright Institute. Ground was broken on the project in early 2013. Phase two of the $22 million project is expected to open in late 2014.

Non-residential construction volumes and pricing continued their upward trend in the second quarter, with prices increasing an average of 2 to 4 percent in the first half of 2013. These factors, along with growing market confidence and a narrowing labor supply, will continue to push new construction costs closer to the trend line for the near to medium term.

Washington State University’s three-story, 62,000-sf Paul G. Allen Center for Global Animal Health is the first of a two-phase project dedicated to infectious disease research and animal diagnostics. It houses the Paul G. Allen School for Global Animal Health, which provides innovative solutions to global infectious disease challenges through research, education, global outreach, and application of disease control at the human-animal interface. The second phase will be completion of the Washington Animal Disease and Diagnostic Laboratory.

The University of Georgia is building the $97.7 million Veterinary Medical Learning Center (VLMC) in Athens, Ga. Providing five buildings and approximately 300,000 sf for the College of Veterinary Medicine, the campus will include an academic building, a teaching hospital, a covered arena, a large animal isolation barn, and a theriogenology and farm field services building. Ground was broken on the project in November of 2012 and construction began in March of 2013. Completion is expected in 2015.

The new ANSI Standard Z9.14-201X will govern the testing and performance verification methodologies for ventilation systems for BSL-3 and ABSL-3 facilities. High containment laboratory verification is the systematic review and evaluation of all safety features and processes associated with the laboratory, including engineering controls, personal protective equipment, SOPs, administrative controls, and building and system integrity.

Texas A&M University is building an 11,000-sf research aviary for the College of Veterinary Medicine & Biomedical Sciences. Located in College Station, the facility will include a biocontainment laboratory, a bird hospital, quarantine suites, two isolation rooms, classrooms, and administrative offices. Completion is expected in May of 2014.

The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) will be collecting comments through Sept. 10 on its new standard, Testing and Performance-Verification Methodologies for Ventilation Systems for Biosafety Level 3 (BSL-3) and Animal Biosafety Level 3 (ABSL-3) Facilities, also known as ANSI Standard Z9.14-2013. The 127-page document provides guidance for the inspection and testing of ventilation system components of new or existing BSL-3 and ABSL-3 laboratories, including research, pharmaceutical, and insectary facilities.

The 33,000-sf Clara Christie Centre for Mouse Genomics (CCCMG) at the University of Calgary—a centralized facility for the production and breeding of transgenic mice—expands mouse housing, provides procedure spaces for researchers, enables mouse transgenics production, and creates new space to phenotype the transgenic models.

Auburn University is building the Wilford and Kate Bailey Small Animal Teaching Hospital in Auburn, Ala. The 208,000-sf facility features designated units for each type of hospital service, each including an exam room, a treatment room, and a student seminar room. The hospital will also house a sterile surgical suite, a critical care unit, diagnostic imaging, radiology, and clinical pathology. Construction began in spring of 2012 and completion is expected in fall of 2014.

Annual revalidation of BSL-3 biocontainment facilities—which involves verifying that systems are operating to specifications—is important not only to maintain a safe working environment for scientific needs, but also to reduce utility and maintenance costs and protect the substantial financial investments such buildings represent. The time and expense of the revalidation process can be minimized with careful preplanning.

The five-story, 237,000-sf Sandler Neurosciences Center creates a new hub for the Mission Bay campus of the University of California, San Francisco, with the consolidation of the Department of Neurology, the Neurodegenerative Disease Research program, the Center for Integrative Neurosciences, and the Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases. The 38-year lease, after which UCSF will own the building, represents the first time the University of California System has used a public-private-partnership funding model for a solely programmatic facility.

Newly designed, individually ventilated cages (IVCs) can potentially reduce HVAC costs by up to 75 percent and improve living conditions for the mice inside. The bedding sits on a perforated false floor, which is suspended over the normal cage floor to create an air plenum. Air percolates up from the plenum, through the false floor and bedding, and out the top of the cage. This airflow maintains a low relative humidity in the cage and actively dries the bedding.

The Vaccine and Gene Therapy Institute of Florida (VGTI), an offshoot of the VGTI at Oregon Health and Science University, is dedicated to developing vaccines and immunotherapies to combat diseases such as AIDS, cancer, tuberculosis, and diseases associated with emerging viral infections such as Dengue fever and pandemic influenza. The three-story, 101,000-sf facility contains 11,000 nsf of vivarium/containment space with integrated procedure and in-vivo imaging spaces, nine bioscience research lab groups, specialty support labs, offices, and conference space.