Establishment of the Bat Resource Center for the Study of Zoonotic Diseases

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Project Summary This proposal outlines request to establish the Bat Resource Center for the Study of Zoonotic Diseases at Colorado State University. The Bat Resource Center is a $7.99M facility located adjacent to the Center for Vectorborne Disease and the Rocky Mountain Regional Biocontainment Laboratory. It is uniquely designed to be a vivarium with the necessary environmental and biosafety controls to successfully breed and maintain bats for use as animal models. This important animal model is critical to our understanding of viral pathogenesis and disease transmission as bats have been shown to be a reservoir for a number of human pathogens including the recent COVID-19 pandemic. The Bat Resource Center will greatly enhance our abilities to study these agents and will serve as a national resource for others using bat models.