The Naval Medical Research Center (NMRC) joined more than 60 Department of Defense laboratories at the first DoD Lab Day at the Pentagon, May 14. The event showcased innovations from the Navy, Marine Corps, Army, Air Force and medical research laboratories and engineering centers. More than 100 exhibits were visited by DoD personnel and congressional staff, high school STEM students and many others who saw some of the military's cutting edge science, medicine, and technology breakthroughs.

"What we see today is innovation,' said Frank Kendall, Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics, during the opening ceremony. He added, "There are so many different areas that the Department of Defense depends on, that our warfighters depend on, where we need to be some of the best of the best or ahead of everyone else."

NMRC had the opportunity to highlight its effort in supporting Operation United Assistance in West Africa as team members who were in Liberia during the Ebola epidemic set up a display of one of the two deployed mobile labs. The team members spoke about their experience and expanded on their mission in advance research to develop products and methods to protect against biological attacks and infectious disease outbreaks of public health concerns.

NMRC researchers discussed novel therapeutics for the treatment and prevention of wound infections including phage therapy against Acinetobacter baumannii and Staphylococcus aureus. In addition researchers are working to identify targets for vaccines for the prevention of skin and soft tissue infection associated with multidrug-resistant organisms.

Infectious disease subject matter experts were on hand to talk about work in developing vaccines, therapeutics and diagnostic assays for viral and rickettsia diseases like dengue fever and scrub typhus. Information on the Navy Medicine's latest developments in malaria vaccine research was available. Malaria is a parasitic disease that U.S. military forces are at risk of developing while deployed in endemic areas and malaria was ranked No. 1 by the DoD Infectious Disease Prioritization Expert Panel in April 2010.

Also highlighted was a next generation R&D prototype in prosthetic development focused on osseointegration, a new technology designed to help the warfighter, which includes industry support and civilian partnerships.

A representative from the NMRC managed C.W. Bill Young DoD Marrow Donor Program talked to attendees about the marrow donor program as well as the Bone Marrow Research Directorate that provides military contingency support for casualties with marrow toxic injury.

The NMRC displays set up in the Pentagon Central Courtyard were representative of the work done by the research and development commands. NMRC is the headquarters for the Navy Medicine's research and development laboratories that are engaged in a broad spectrum of activity from basic science in the laboratory to field studies at sites in remote areas of the world to operational environments. In support of the Navy, Marine Corps, and joint U.S. warfighters, researchers study infectious diseases; biological warfare detection and defense; combat casualty care; environment health concerns; bone marrow research and registry; aerospace and undersea medicine; medical modeling, simulation and operational mission support; and epidemiology and behavioral sciences. The goal for all the labs is to deliver high-value, high-impact research products to improve readiness and to support and protect today's deployed warfighters.

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