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The United States Department of Homeland Security's Office of Procurement Operations will award approximately $24 million over several years to the Plum Island Animal Disease Center in Orient Point, N.Y. The project will improve research productivity and safety at the BSL-3 facility, which accommodates research on harmful zoological disease agents. Laboratories will be expanded to house more animals; vaccination research rooms will be redesigned and modernized; necropsy areas will be upgraded; and existing containment space will be restructured for maximum efficiency. The project contractor is The Whiting-Turner Contracting Company of Baltimore. Construction is expected to begin in spring of 2008, with the first phase of upgrades reaching completion in one year. Plum Island is one of several locations being considered for the new BSL-4 National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility.