BROOKINGS – Dignitaries, South Dakota State University faculty and staff, and others from the agricultural community celebrated the new Animal Disease Research and Diagnostic Laboratory (ADRDL) with a ribbon cutting on campus Friday afternoon.

Ag professors and deans spoke and attended the event alongside SDSU President Barry Dunn and Lt. Gov. Larry Rhoden, who’s shown above center after cutting the ceremonial ribbon.

The laboratory was built in 1967 and with the growth of agriculture and veterinary technology, the lab needed a structural and technological renovation. The 80,000-square-foot expansion and remodeling cost $58.6 million. Plans for this expansion were signed off by Gov. Dennis Daugaard.

“The building project is supported by commodity and farm organizations represented through South Dakota’s Ag Unity, the state veterinarian, the South Dakota Animal Industry Board, South Dakota Veterinary Medical Association…,” according to a SDSU press release.

ADRDL is South Dakota’s “only accredited, full-service, all-species veterinary diagnostic laboratory,” the release said, and the ADRDL performs 500,000 research-based tests every year.

The ADRDL has been on the front lines of fending off animal- and plant-based diseases for more than five decades, said John Killefer, South Dakota Corn Utilization Council endowed dean of the College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences. This lab has been ranked in the top of several fields of research for several years.

The ADRDL has 11 areas of major function: bacteriology, DNA sequencing and bioinformatics, clinical pathology/parasitology, serology, food safety microbiology, virology, histopathology, molecular diagnostics, extension/outreach, research and specialized research testing.

Faculty and students work alongside the South Dakota Department of Health in researching diseases that interact between animals and humans as well as various areas of vaccine development and antibiotics.

“The ADRDL stands ready with modern equipment, proficient staff, and the capacity and capability to diagnose foreign, emerging and zoonotic diseases…throughout the region,” State Veterinarian Dustin Oedekoven said.