Vying for biodefense dollars

University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), University of California (UC), Davis and University of Texas Medical Branch (UT) at Galveston are the three known contenders for $275 million in federal grants to build one or two new top-security biodefense laboratories. The Midwest and East Coast powerhouses — and the tough little East Texas comer quick to point out that it is already building a Biosafety Level 4 (BSL-4) lab — are vying for the lead slot in the nation's new biodefense infrastructure. The institutions that win grants to build new laboratories capable of keeping the most lethal pathogens safely contained will be positioned to take in millions in new research dollars going to biodefense. Other BSL-4 contenders may yet emerge, including, perhaps one from New York State, where Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) is believed to be spearheading an effort that will parlay its long connection to state biomedical research efforts into a new national laboratory. "We have no information that we can share," RPI spokeswoman Megan Galbraith told The Scientist. Winning institutions will also be positioned for plenty of heat. New laboratories to experiment with the vilest organisms on the planet are bound to provoke strong reactions from the community. The University of Washington in Seattle balks at the idea of putting a BSL-4 lab in that city, said Karen VanDusen, director of environmental health and safety for the school. Yet part of UIC's public relations campaign claims that locating a new BSL-4 lab near the corner of Roosevelt Road and Wood Street would "ensure that Chicago would be among the best-prepared cities in the world in the case of a bioterrorist attack." UC Davis goes into the competition under the pall of recent scandals at Los Alamos National Laboratory and Lawrence Livermore Laboratory. For decades, UC has run the two major nuclear weapons research facilities for the Department of Energy. On Christmas Eve, however, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham put UC on notice that the relationship could end due to the school's "systematic management failure." Months of probes have revealed that more than 250 computers have gone missing and employees charged almost $5 million in improper expenses on their lab-issued credit cards. Managers resigned in a shakeup this month, and the university promised a cleanup. "They are dealing with the issue," Virginia Hinshaw, provost and executive vice chancellor of UC-Davis, told The Scientist. "We are starting afresh with this new lab, starting from the ground up." Urban pressures and recent scandals are not a problem for the UTMB in Galveston, population 58,000. Historically, the big problems in the city on the Gulf of Mexico coast were cholera, yellow fever and typhoid, and that, the school says, is exactly what makes it a contender. UTMB's virus-hunters are already working with the bugs most likely to be used in biological warfare, the little Texas school points out, and it will have the first full-size BSL-4 lab operating on a university campus this fall, federal money or no federal money. Such ebullience has lured scientists including professor of pathology Alan Barrett, who brought an entire research team from the United Kingdom in 1993. UTMB enticed virologists Robert Shope and Robert Tesch away from Yale University, also in the mid-1990s. CJ Peters, principal investigator on the NBL effort, left his post as chief of special pathogens at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to come to UTMB at the end of 2000. Prior to that, Peters was chief of disease assessment at the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID). Even before the terrorist attacks of 2001 raised the likelihood of more and continued biology-based threats on US soil, the shortage of BSL-4 lab space had public and private researchers worried. Most institutions operate labs at the BSL-3 or BSL-2 level, considered adequate for most research purposes, but BSL-4 lab space has been tight. "It's sad that we got a terrible reminder about the need for BSL-4 space. But I went to a meeting ten years ago where this was discussed," Hinshaw said. Bid documents to fund new BSL-4 space were out even before the Homeland Security Act became law. Bidding closes Feb. 10, 2003 on the National Biocontainment Laboratory grants being handed out by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), which will also be handing out contracts to build or expand Regional Biocontainment Laboratories. Unlike the NBLs, RBLs only have to be capable of handling BSL-2 and BSL-3 work. The government plans to spend $100 million to build or expand eight–to–12 RBLs over the next two years. Bids are due this week on a preliminary event: National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants to create "Regional Centers of Excellence for Biodefense and Emerging Infectious Diseases Research" in universities. A prerequisite of being considered for an NBL is that a school be involved in one of these regional collaborations for sharing resources to counter bioterrorism. Columbia University and the New York State Department of Health's Wadsworth Center are leading a collaboration of 25 schools and research institutions and 10 state and federal agencies in such a regional effort spanning New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. The dollars may be fewer on the regional bids, but preparations are fierce. "People are really investing their time and energies," said Columbia's W. Ian Lipkin. One of the earliest scholars of the West Nile virus, he is leading the Northeast biodefense consortium with Wadsworth Center director Larry Sturman. Geography is expected to be a major factor in naming a winner, and one that puts a damper on East Coast participation. Most of the existing BSL-4 lab space is in the east, at government strongholds: the CDC in Atlanta; the NIH in Bethesda, Md.; and USAMRIID at Fort Detrick, Md. Georgia State University has a small BSL-4 capability, and no plans to expand it, a spokeswoman said. Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore will not be bidding for a BSL-4 lab, a spokesman said. Neither will Harvard University, although the Boston school is asking for funding to expand its BSL-3 capability, according to a spokesman. Besides geography, financial pressure is keeping the field of competitors for the BSL-4 lab grant small. The federal money is not free. For every three dollars of federal money an institution gets, it must come up with one dollar of its own. "Money is going to be an issue for every institution in the running," said UIC vice chancellor Charles Rice. Among the options for the Chicago school is a bond issue to be paid off by the flow of new biodefense research dollars that will come to the school, thanks to the new lab. The university is likely to put together a combination of state and internal funding, he said. A win would bring $140 million in federal money to the region, not counting additional grants. It would also add 1,000 construction jobs and 350 permanent jobs to area payrolls, another important plank in the Chicago school's plan to get the local community on board. California is also counting on new research funding to make its match, Hinshaw said. "Where is the money to come from? A lot of places, and with difficulty," the UC Davis vice chancellor said. "What we're looking at currently is approaching the state to contribute half of the match because of the public health emphasis." As for little UTMB, the university board of regents has already approved a plan to raise $40 million with a bond issue, bonds to be re-funded by user fees. It also expects to get $20 million from private philanthropists, for a total $60 million match on a proposed $180 million bid.

Vying for biodefense dollars

The Scientist ARCHIVES

Become a Member of

Meet the Author

Peg Brickley

Related Research Resources

A Nanoparticle Delivery System for Gene Therapy

Research Resources

Podcasts

Webinars

Videos

Infographics

eBooks

Enhancing Therapeutic Antibody Discovery with Cross-Platform Workflows

Considerations for Cell-Based Assays in Immuno-Oncology Research

From Water Bears to Grizzly Bears: Unusual Animal Models

Sex Differences in Neurological Research

Products

Product News

Scaling Lentiviral Vector Manufacturing for Optimal Productivity

Optimizing In Vitro Production of Monocyte-Derived Dendritic Cells and Macrophages

Putting Pathogens to the Test with Wastewater Surveillance

Generating High-Quality mRNA for In Vivo Delivery with Lipid Nanoparticles