About - The Regional Biocontainment Laboratory

What is a Regional Biocontainment Laboratory (RBL)?
Research on many infectious diseases requires a very specialized facility. The facility must be built to complex specifications for design, facilities, operations, maintenance, and operating procedures that ensure a high level of containment, or "biocontainment" since researchers are working with biological materials. The Centers for Disease Control and the National Institutes of Health provide containment guidelines, depending upon the types of biological materials under study. These range from biosafety levels 1 to 4 (BSL-1 to BSL-4). These requirements are designed to provide an environment that maintains safety for the research, the researchers and the adjacent communities. Extra security measures that are not typically found in academic laboratories also contribute to a safe environment in an RBL.

Because the Federal government is encouraging and funding research on infectious diseases that typically require BSL-3 biocontainment, they also have provided construction grants to increase the number of facilities nationwide. In 2003, the National Institutes of Health awarded the University of Missouri-Columbia funds to construct an RBL, biosafety level 3. As one of 13 such laboratories in the United States, the Regional Biocontainment Laboratories are tied to Regional Centers of Excellence (RCE). MU’s facility is tied to the Midwest RCE for Biodefense and Emerging Infectious Diseases Research led by Sam Stanley at Washington University in St. Louis.

Laboratories that are designed for research on infectious diseases are classified into four categories, BSL-1 through BSL-4. While much of the infectious diseases research is done in laboratories with BSL-1 and -2 capabilities, a BSL-3 laboratory is required to provide a safe environment for work with more serious agents associated with human disease, especially those that can cause illness by spreading through the air. A BSL-3 laboratory is designed to protect researchers and has special engineering and design features to prevent microorganisms from being disseminated into the environment. Researchers who use the BSL-3 laboratories have thorough training in handling hazardous infectious agents. Access to the laboratory is strictly controlled.