Vivarium & Lab Design Readiness Checklist

Use this early to surface decisions that affect biosecurity, workflow, capacity, cost, and long-term operability before they become expensive to change.

Project Snapshot

Add the project context you already know. Leave unknown fields blank.

Organization or project Prepared by Facility or project location Your role Expected Project Start Expected Project Completion Project type

Current stage

Concept planning Programming or design Construction or commissioning Renovation or optimization

Before you begin: Check the boxes for work already completed or decisions already confirmed. The remaining gaps will help frame project priorities, scope, and the support you may need.

Optional follow-up fields appear only where a short detail would be useful.

1. Program Goals & Capacity

Species, study types, census, and growth assumptions are decided.
Success criteria balances the science, animal welfare, operations, schedules, and cost.
Housing, procedure, support, storage, and circulation needs have been calculated.
Phasing, budget, and schedule assumptions identify and include key decisions.

2. Risk, Containment & Biosecurity

Program risks are identified and drive containment levels, barriers, and access controls.
Clean and dirty routes are defined for people, animals, supplies, and waste.
Gowning, PPE, air pressure relationships, and transitions support each zone.
Quarantine, decontamination, exposure, and containment-failure responses are planned.

3. Workflow, Adjacencies & Movement

Daily, peak, and emergency workflows are mapped with future users.
Adjacencies and travel distances support frequent and sensitive activities.
Receiving, staging, storage, elevators, and loading routes are included.
Cross-traffic and bottlenecks have been tested with realistic scenarios.

4. Housing, Procedures & Specialized Spaces

Housing and support spaces fit species, caging, and husbandry methods.
Specialized procedures and shared capabilities are defined and appropriately located.
Equipment, furniture, caging, and clearances are coordinated before layout lock.
Lighting, acoustics, vibration, privacy, and animal-welfare needs are addressed.

5. Cage Wash, Sanitation & Logistics

Cage wash capacity, equipment, staging, and soiled-to-clean flow are sized.
Finishes and equipment tolerate cleaning, disinfectants, impact, heat, and moisture.
Feed, bedding, consumables, waste, and carcass logistics are planned.
Ergonomics and material handling reduce repetitive, heavy, and awkward work.

6. Environment, Utilities & Resilience

Temperature, humidity, airflow, lighting, noise, and vibration criteria are defined.
Utility and structural loads reflect planned equipment and future demand.
Alarms, monitoring, emergency power, and response ownership protect critical functions.
Redundancy and recovery priorities match animal, research, and business consequences.

7. People, Operations & Maintainability

Staffing, hours, roles, supervision, and training needs are defined.
SOPs, startup, move-in, qualification, and change-management work are planned.
Equipment and systems can be maintained without compromising containment or operations.
Security, occupational health, after-hours, and continuity responsibilities are assigned.

8. Compliance, Delivery & Future Change

IACUC, AAALAC, IBC, EH&S, DEA, USDA, facilities, and operations requirements are identified early.
Commissioning and acceptance testing verify systems under realistic operating conditions.
Turnover documents, training, punch-list closure, and post-occupancy review are planned.
Future program, species, equipment, and expansion changes can be accommodated.

Where would an outside perspective help most?

Optional: name the decision, risk, or constraint you would most like to pressure test.

Using Your Results

Unchecked items are planning questions, not automatic deficiencies. Prioritize gaps that affect containment, workflow, utilities, animal welfare, or decisions that become costly after construction.

Thank you for completing the checklist.

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