The Galveston National Laboratory (GNL) in

Galveston Galveston ( ) is a coastal resort city and port off the Southeast Texas coast on Galveston Island and Pelican Island in the U.S. state of Texas. The community of , with a population of 47,743 in 2010, is the county seat of surrounding Galvesto ...

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

, United States, is a high security National Biocontainment Laboratory housing several Biosafety level 4 research laboratories. The lab is run by the

University of Texas Medical Branch The University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) is a public academic health science center in Galveston, Texas. It is part of the University of Texas System. UTMB includes the oldest medical school in Texas, and has about 11,000 employees. In Febr ...

(UTMB) for exotic disease diagnosis and research. The GNL is one of the 15 biosecurity level 4 facilities in the United States and the largest one in the world located on an academic campus.

History

In the early 2000s, several incidents in the U.S. led to the federal government pushing for the creation of more facilities to provide research to help defend against

bioterrorism Bioterrorism is terrorism involving the intentional release or dissemination of biological agents. These agents are bacteria, viruses, insects, fungi, and/or toxins, and may be in a naturally occurring or a human-modified form, in much the same ...

attacks. Under the direction of the U.S. Congress, the

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health, commonly referred to as NIH (with each letter pronounced individually), is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in the late ...

(NIH) began a nationwide search for a location to build a National Biocontainment Laboratory. In 2003, UTMB was chosen by the NIH as the site for one of two such national laboratories, and a $174 million federal grant was issued to pay for its construction. The Galveston National Laboratory is one of only two such facilities in the United States. The other one is the

National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories The National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories, or NEIDL, is a biosciences facility of Boston University located near Boston Medical Center on Albany Street in the South End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. The lab is part of a nati ...

(NEIDL). In 2020, the

United States Department of Education The United States Department of Education is a Cabinet-level department of the United States government. It began operating on May 4, 1980, having been created after the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare was split into the Department ...

launched an investigation of the Galveston National Laboratory regarding any past interaction with the

Wuhan Institute of Virology The Wuhan Institute of Virology, Chinese Academy of Sciences (WIV; ) is a research institute on virology administered by the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), which reports to the State Council of the People's Republic of China. The institute ...

Statistics

Galveston National Laboratory is an eight-story structure that was built using construction standards designed to resist a Category 5 hurricane. In addition to structural design elements, other protective measures included support pilings reaching a depth of into the earth and the placement of all lab facilities at a height of at least above the 100-year floodplain. The building houses more than of laboratory space, of which is dedicated to BSL-4 use. Other labs located in the building include BSL-3 facilities which research select & non-select agents in cell cultures, animal and insects. The laboratory became operational in November 2008 and was dedicated by U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison. Attached to and functioning as a part of the GNL is the older Keiller Building, which houses additional BSL-2 and BSL-3 laboratories, including an insect BSL-3 lab. Also attached is the Shope BSL-4 lab, a smaller BSL-4 facility built in 2005.

References

External links

Official Site

Galveston National Laboratory Fact Sheet

{{authority control 2008 establishments in Texas Buildings and structures in Galveston, Texas Medical research institutes in the United States Biological warfare facilities Economy of Houston Infectious disease organizations University of Texas Medical Branch Biosafety level 4 laboratories Zika virus Research institutes in Texas

History

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See also

References

External links