Grieser, the unit commander, in a September press release. Those kinds of threats are what Packiam and other experts at 1st AML are meant to help stop, said Col. Though national security news today often deals with high-tech weapons such as hypersonic missiles, loitering munitions and even laser rifles, the World Health Organization still considers biological agents to be a serious concern, with an increasing risk of terrorists using them in an attack. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, the Army’s center for researching medical countermeasures against biological warfare. “Identification of unknown etiological agents in the sample plays an important role both as a clinical microbiologist working in hospital as well as a subject matter expert working towards theater-level validation for the 1st Area Medical Laboratory,” said Packiam, who also serves as officer-in-charge of bio-surveillance at the U.S. Army’s only active duty deployable laboratory for theater level validation of Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear agents. Matthew Grieser as the new commander, July 23, 2021, at the Mallett Auditorium on Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland. The print on the 1st Area Medical Laboratory’s unit patch reads, “Mad Scientist,” and was on display during a change of command ceremony, which welcomed Col. In fact, identifying threats is the key mission of Packiam’s unit, the 1st Area Medical Laboratory. After all, it is difficult to fight a threat without knowing what it is and how to defeat it. Identifying pathogens is not just helpful for endangered species, it also is a useful skill for defending against biological warfare. With that knowledge the zoo can better protect its red pandas, Packiam explained. But the team discovered that the agent that killed the panda was actually Sarcocystis neurona, for which opossum is the most likely source of infection. At first, the scientists suspected the pathogenic agent was Toxoplasma gondii, a disease-causing parasite for which cats serve as the most likely source of infection in a zoo setting. Packiam’s expertise paid off while investigating the death of the red panda. Army team contributed to an investigation into the cause of death of a Red Panda at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute (NZCBI) and the findings will ultimately help to protect the endangered species. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases on Fort Detrick, Maryland. The 163-acre (0.66 km 2) National Zoo is a Smithsonian facility in the District of Columbia and is staffed 24 hours a day by full-time US National Zoological Park police officers.
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