The high risk associated with biological threats dictates that any suspicious samples be handled under strict surety and safety controls and processed under high-level containment in specialized laboratories. These laboratories are complex, very expensive to operate, and need to be staffed by personnel from an extremely limited pool of experts. In addition, safe means of transporting samples suspected of containing highly virulent agents to specialized high-level containment laboratories for analysis also is expensive, requiring in many countries the custody of armed personnel. It can be estimated that several million dollars are spent annually worldwide to secure and safely transport an ever-increasing stream of suspicious biological samples, which are collected in theaters of war as well as in domestic environments.