Friedrich Loeffler Institute

The Friedrich Loeffler Institute, in German the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institut or FLI, is the federal institute for animal health of Germany and the country's leading animal disease center. It was founded in 1910 and took the name of its founder, the bacteriologist Friedrich Loeffler, in 1952. The institute sits on the Isle of Riems, which belongs to the city of Greifswald and can be reached by a dam that can be closed during an outbreak. It studies livestock health, molecular biology, diagnosis of viral infections, immunology and epidemiology, serves as national reference laboratory for several viral diseases, and researches foot and mouth disease, mad cow disease and avian influenza.