National Plant Diagnostic Network

Principal Investigator: Keith Watson

The National Plant Diagnostic Network is part of a United States national plant biosecurity program established by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in June 2002. The NPDN is part of an early warning system for plant pests and disease outbreaks. State departments of agriculture and the USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) rely on the Network to provide early detection and preliminary diagnoses. The Network consists of five regional Network centers and one national database facility. Each NPDN center is located at a land grant university in strategically chosen locations around the US. The regional centers are located at Cornell University (Northeast Region; Ithaca, New York), Kansas State University (Great Plains Region; Manhattan, Kansas), Michigan State University (North Central Region; East Lansing, Michigan), the University of California at Davis (Western Region; Davis, California), and the University of Florida (Southern Region; Gainesville, Florida). The national database is located at Purdue University (West Lafayette, IN). These regional centers provide information technology infrastructure and Internet-based applications for plant diagnostic laboratories in their region. The national database is the central repository for NPDN data.

CERIAS provides information security consulting support to the NPDN. Since January 2004, site security assessments, system administrator training, and diagnostician security awareness efforts have been performed. Based on these efforts, the USDA provided funds specifically for additional information security projects throughout the regional centers. These funds were used to create an information security training and awareness web site for all members of the NPDN as well as a network of automated vulnerability scanning systems deployed at most of the regional centers.

Keywords: risk assessment, training