The funds requested in this application will be to used to purchase and install animal drinking water distribution systems in the animal rooms that have no animal drinking water distribution system. The School of Dentistry Animal Care Facility and the Casey Eye Institute Animal Care Facility have no animal drinking water distribution system. The Medical Research Building Central Animal Care Facility has an old watering system in many animal rooms; however, this old system was designed and installed by university employees. The Medical Research Building's old watering system was improperly designed with """"""""dead end"""""""" water lines in animal rooms and no ability to flush the system with clean high pressure water. Historically, many older medical centers were constructed without an animal drinking water distribution systems included in the design and construction. As new materials and technology developed, automatic animal watering systems began to evolve as a safe and effective method of delivering drinking water to research animals. In addition, the water can properly filtered and sanitized to prevent the spread of disease and standardize the water quality. The new automatic watering systems not only provide quality control of the animal drinking water, give warnings of water leaks in the system; but, they save labor costs and save water bottle expense. The funds requested in this grant proposal would replace the Medical Research Building Central Animal Facility's old watering system and install animal drinking water systems in two Oregon Health Sciences University animal facilities that presently have no animal drinking water distribution system.
