Narrator: This is Science Today. ‘Pathomics’ refers to a comprehensive strategy to understand more about an individual's response to infectious disease agents, particularly those that represent a threat from bioterrorism. At the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, researchers, including Ken Turteltaub, director of the Biodefense Division, are working to develop new methods to detect and measure pathogens in people and in animals.

Turteltaub: The idea behind pathomics is to take and really focus the resources that the laboratory has and people in the academic community have to come up with a better understanding of the processes involved in being exposed to agents that may be infectious to come up with new ways to detect this earlier than we can do now.

Narrator: The main goal is currently focused on dealing with bioterrorist agents.

Turteltaub: Because the earlier – with biothreat agents in particular – you can tell that you’ve been exposed, the earlier you can intervene and the earlier you can intervene, the greater the chances of being able to successfully prevent a bad outcome.

Narrator: For Science Today, I’m Larissa Branin.