Purchase of a Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction System to Maintain and Expand VetLIRN Capacity

There is a public health need for veterinary laboratories to have significant capacity to test animal diagnostic specimens and food/feed samples rapidly and accurately for the presence of important pathogens including Salmonella, Campylobacter, Listeria and SARS-CoV-2. The FDA Veterinary Laboratory Investigation and Response Network (Vet-LIRN) is a group of veterinary laboratories tasked with protecting the health of humans by being able to rapidly and robustly respond to outbreaks associated with animals and animal products. This equipment-only grant requests support for the purchase of a QuantStudio 3 real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) system to maintain the capacity of a Vet-LIRN member laboratory (Ryan Small Animal Hospital Clinical Microbiology Laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania) to perform testing for diagnostic, monitoring and surveillance purposes. It will also allow the laboratory to more fully engage with proficiency testing and interlaboratory comparison exercises developed by Vet-LIRN.