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'NBAF-revelant' research starts at K-State next year
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| By: Ryan D. Wilson, Staff Reporter |
November 09, 2009 |
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Kansas State University Vice President for Research Ron W. Trewyn told those at Thursday night's Chamber banquet the university has taken steps to start "NBAF-relevant research" even before the completion of the $600 million NBAF lab in 2015.
Research in the 500,000 square-foot National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF) won't start until construction of the facility is complete.
Next year K-State will be able to do research similar to what the NBAF lab will be doing at its new Bio-Security Research Institute (BRI). Similar research opportunities and support companies could spill over into the surrounding region, Trewyn told Chamber members at the banquet.
After Sept. 11, 2001, the Kansas Legislature funded K-State's BRI, so the university would have capability to work on threats to food crops, plants and animals, Trewyn said.
The purpose of NBAF is similar to that of the BRI -- to protect the ag infrastructure from foreign animal diseases, Trewyn said. When NBAF opens in Kansas it will initially work on eight foreign animal diseases. The current Plum Island, NY facility works on two diseases.
He cited West Nile and H1N1 as animal diseases that travel to humans and are ones to worry about.
"As you can see there's a real reason to worry about them," Trewyn said. "Foreign animal diseases are on the move. They hit here by accident or just by global trial."
With the threat of bio-terrorism expected by 2013, NBAF research is especially relevant, Trewyn said.
"This is a big deal folks, there is no facility in the U.S. to do this research."
He showing a list of animal diseases written on a cave in Afghanistan, including foot and mouth disease, a cattle plague, New Castle which affects poultry, and hog cholera. There was also a list of plant, crop and human diseases.
"Al-Qaeda was planning to bring this stuff here," he said. "All of this, a whole bunch of diseases could arrive here tomorrow, without global travel. So this is a big deal."
Getting the NBAF lab was a process that started in Jan. 2006, Trewyn said.
"There were 29 proposals that we submitted for 34 sites in the country and in the end, our belief is the only one that really hit the mission was Kansas," Trewyn said.
He talked a little bit of why Manhattan was an ideal site, the "real discriminator" being the proximity of similar research being done at K-State, but tremendous community and regional support also played a major part, he said.
The Kansas site was the unanimous choice by the scientific review committee, Trewyn said.
Kansas has reached out to partners in and outside of the state for the facility, including other sites consider as a possible site for NBAF, the "animal health" corridor in Kansas and Missouri and a university in Texas that has expertise in poultry.
In 1999 K-State developed the Homeland Defense Food Safe and Emergency Preparedness Program and proposed the need for a bio-containment facility at K-State. In October 1999 the university's president testified before the Senate's Emerging Threats Subcommittee on the agriculture and biological weapons threat. That gave Manhattan and K-State a lot of credibility in locating the NBAF lab there, Trewyn said.
A preliminary layout has been chosen for the 48-acre NBAF facility that will be located near the university and $32 million is allocated for the design. The design team has been on campus this week, Trewyn said.
The research park for companies and similar research facility to support and compliment the NBAF last will also be located close to the university and the NBAF site, including USDAs Arthropod Animal Disease Research Laboratory which has announced it will relocate to Manhattan. However, those companies aren't just interested in sites in Manhattan, but also the surrounding area.
"You would be amazed at the number of companies since we were named in January that have been out, calling or contacting, wanting to know about sites not only in Manhattan but in the region," Trewyn said, "and I understand Clay County has land available ... There are opportunities. The company want to have capability near, so they know what's going on and take part in it. I honestly believe a few years from now people will look back on NBAF as the small part of what this has done for the area."
The regional support for NBAF makes locating support sites for the facility throughout the region attractive to those companies, Trewyn said.
"This really will be a big deal for the whole area and some these companies will want to locate in Clay County," he said.
Only about 350 people will work at the NBAF lab, but the site will create 1,600 construction jobs, and many other jobs through the support and like research facility that will be relocated along with NBAF.
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©Clay Center Dispatch 2010
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