Today's world poses a triple threat to the American population: infectious diseases, contamination of food and water, and bioattacks (biowarfare or bioterrorism). At least 17 countries are producing weapons of mass destruction using viruses, bacteria, or their toxins. AIDS, E. coli contamination, drug-resistant tuberculosis, and virulent flu strains are perhaps the best known of a host of disease threats. What these dangers have in common is the amount of data required to achieve solutions; in some cases, as much as a petabit (1 followed by 15 zeros) of data is required to study large numbers of samples from widespread locations.



Firepower in the Lab examines how the nation can combat this triple threat by improving our ability to detect, measure, and monitor harmful biological agents. It explores the potential of today's exciting new laboratory automation and computer technologies as well as the emerging tools of molecular biology—how we can generate and analyze more data quickly and reduce human hands-on involvement, which inevitably introduces errors.



The book discusses how to improve and apply technologies such as robotics, laboratory automation, "lab-on-a-chip," bioinformatics, and Internet control innovations. It reviews lessons learned from our experience with pandemic flu viruses. It also presents strategies for developing new high-throughput technologies, including how to address the lack of public funding for critical research undertakings.Table of Contents


Front Matter
Where the Bucks Stop: A Case for Intermediate-Scale Grants
Tackling Grand Challenges with Powerful Technologies
The Application of Mathematical Models in Infectious Disease Research
Expanding the Worldwide Influenza Surveillance System and Improving the Selection of Strains for Vaccines
Addressing Emerging Infectious Diseases, Food Safety, and Bioterrorism: Common Themes
Laboratory Firepower for AIDS Research
Input/Output of High-Throughput Biology: Experience of the National Canter for Biotechnology Information
Applications of Modern Technology to Emerging Viral Infections and Vaccine Development
Next Steps in the Global Surveillance for Anti-Tuberculosis Drug Resistance
Antibiotic Discovery by Microarray-Based Gene Response Profiling
Sequencing Influenza A from the 1918 Pandemic, Investigating Its Virulence, and Averting Futeure Outbreaks
Ensuring safe Food: An Organizational Perspective
Foodborne Pathogen and Toxin Diagnostics: Current Methods and Needs Assessment from Surveillance, Outbreak Response, and Bioterrorism Preparedness Perspectives
Food Safety: Data Needs for Risk Assessment
Biological Weapons: Past, Present, and Future
National Innovation to Combat Catastrophic Terrorism
Flow Cytometry Analysis Techniques for High-Throughput Biodefense Research
Forensic Perspective on Bioterrorism and the Proliferation of Bioweapons
Biological Warfare Scenarios
Integration of New Technologies in the Future of the Biological Sciences
New Standards and Approaches for Integrating Instruments into Laboratory Automation Systems
High-Throughput Sequencing, Information Generation, and the Future of Biology
Summary and Next Steps
Appendix A: Contributors
Appendix B: Automation in Threat Reduction and Infectious Disease Research: Needs and New Directions (agenda of the April 1999 Colloquium)
Index