October 26, 2020
Penn State College of Agricultural Sciences and Maharashtra Animal and Fisheries Sciences University (MAFSU) have now a Memorandum of Understanding in place to develop an international program in areas related to One Health, Food Safety and Diagnostic Medicine. MAFSU was formed on December 3, 2000 with its operational center at Nagpur. The University comprises of five veterinary colleges, two colleges of fishery sciences, and one college of dairy technology. Since 2003, Penn State faculty including Dr. Bhushan Jayarao and Professor Emeritus Channa Reddy have worked with MAFSU faculty and students on several different occasions, including training MAFSU faculty at ADL, providing research and extension programming support in diagnostic medicine, and dairy production. This is a beneficial relationship for both the Department and the College of Ag, and we congratulate and thank everyone involved who made this endeavor official last week!
October 20, 2020
Despite the state's first confirmed case of COVID-19 in a domestic cat, veterinary experts say residents should not be concerned about contracting the virus from pets and other domesticated animals. However, people with suspected or confirmed cases of COVID-19 should take precautions to protect the health of their pets.
October 20, 2020
Nina De Luna is an IID honors student in Dr. Girish Kirimanjeswara's lab. She has been accepted in the NIH STEP-UP program called Year Round Research Program. The STEP-UP Program is a federally funded program managed and supported by the Office of Minority Health Research Coordination (OMHRC) in the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney (NIDDK) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The overall goal of STEP-UP is to build and sustain a biomedical, behavioral, clinical and social science research pipeline focused on NIDDK’s core mission areas of diabetes, endocrinology and metabolic diseases; digestive diseases and nutrition; kidney, urologic and hematologic diseases.
October 17, 2020
Some of VBSC's graduate students had a blast at Way Fruit Farm in Port Matilda on Friday 10/16/20. We were missing a few but a great time was had by all who attended shopping, apple picking and going on hayrides. We hope to have similar outings each month. Look for emails on future adventures!
October 14, 2020
Dr. Margherita Cantorna recently received a Competitive Revision Supplement to her NIH R01 award to “Vitamin D fluctuations and the mucosal immune response” to generate some preliminary data on the effects of vitamin D on host resistance to COVID-19 infection in mice and hamsters. Drs. Girish Kirimanjeswara and Troy Sutton are Co-Investigators.
October 6, 2020
A researcher in Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences is part of a team of scientists working to develop a unique COVID-19 vaccine that uses a bovine adenovirus as a safe and effective delivery vehicle.
October 3, 2020
Former Blue drum major Jimmie Frisbee was featured on The Penn State Alumni Association’s Football letter Live Event on Thursday 10/01/2020. An immunology and infectious diseases graduate in the College of Agricultural Sciences, Frisbee's roots run deep in the band with his parents, grandfather and uncle all wearing the Blue Band blues.
September 28, 2020
With COVID-19 continuing to spread around the world bringing sickness and death, a little-noticed development at Penn State’s Animal Diagnostic Laboratory takes on added significance.
September 26, 2020
September 14, 2020
Retinoid signaling in intestinal epithelial cells is essential for early survival from gastrointestinal infection.
September 13, 2020
Funded by @usdagov they applied filtering approaches to identify numerous genetic interactions related to cardiac-related outcomes as potential targets for therapy. The approaches described offer ways to detect epistasis in the complex traits and to improve precision medicine capability.
September 11, 2020
Leaders from Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences and Office of Physical Plant, HOK architectural firm, and Turner Construction Co. on Sept. 11 held a "topping out" ceremony to mark the halfway point of construction of the Animal, Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences Building on the University Park campus.
September 9, 2020
A grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture will enable Penn State researchers to study the potential for SARS-CoV-2, the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19, to infect and spread among livestock.
September 8, 2020
As part of the University’s testing and contact tracing plan shared during a July 30 community town hall, Penn State has launched the Testing and Surveillance Center (TASC), to be used for random asymptomatic surveillance testing at the University Park campus.
September 3, 2020
The technology “Virus-like Particles as Protein Delivery Vehicles” offers a new tool for delivering therapeutics such as CRISPR enzymes directly into patients’ cells, providing an alternative to AAV vectors and other DNA delivery approaches that can lead to unintended genome changes.
August 26, 2020
A collaborative project between Penn State and Purdue University will develop a novel vaccine solution for COVID-19. Dr. Suresh Kuchipudi, clinical professor of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences and Associate Director of Penn State Animal Diagnostic laboratory will collaborate with Dr. Suresh Mitral, distinguished professor of microbiology, Purdue University on this project. The team has been awarded $3.8 Million by the National Institutes of Health of which over $2Million will come to Penn State.
August 25, 2020
Dairy cows that received a short course of anti-inflammatory medication after calving had lower metabolic stress and produced more milk than untreated cows, according to researchers, who say the regimen they tested could be adopted more easily by producers than previously studied treatment strategies.
August 11, 2020
Jason W. Brooks, associate clinical professor of veterinary and biomedical sciences at Penn State, has been named director of the Forensic Science program in the Eberly College of Science’s Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, effective Sept. 14.
August 10, 2020
Two students in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences, Janelle Answer and Justin Kurtz, have received the Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship.
July 15, 2020
Congratulations to Dr. Suresh Kuchipudi who has received a highly competitive three year grant from USDA-NIFA to study “The Susceptibility and Potential Adaption to SARS-Cov-2 in Livestock” Dr. Kuchipudi is a Clinical Professor and Head of the Microbiology Section at the Animal Diagnostic Lab.
July 14, 2020
Dr.'s Adrian Barragan and Ernest Hovingh’s recent experiment on 246 postpartum dairy cows in PA showed results that supports previous findings showing that the use of anti-inflammatory drugs after calving may increase milk production and affect the metabolic status of dairy cows.
July 10, 2020
Dr. Todd A. Jackson, who holds a doctorate in veterinary medicine and is recognized as a Diplomat of the American College of Laboratory Animal Medicine, has been named Director of the Animal Resource Program at Penn State, beginning Sept. 28 and reporting to the Senior Vice President for Research. Dr. Jackson will also hold a position as research professor in the Department of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences. Welcome to Penn State Dr. Jackson!
July 10, 2020
Alum Dr. Yuanting Chen’s recent pub was a ft. article in This Week in Blood. Chen presents a novel paradigm of the role of erythropoietin (Epo) in stress hematopoiesis.
July 10, 2020
Dr. Josh Kellogg is offering a new course- VBSC 497 Principles of Metabolomics (3 credits) for Sp. 2021 semester. Undergrads and Graduate students will be introduced to the world of metabolomics. The course will cover metabolomics experiments, from sample prep, analytical chemistry, data acquisition and analysis, to statistical treatment of datasets. This will be somewhat hands-on, so students will get experience manipulating data and getting a ‘feel’ for what an experiment is like. Contact the Dept for more details!
July 9, 2020
A collaboration of Penn State researchers, including Dr. Adam Glick, developed a unique nanoparticle to deliver a localized cancer treatment. Once the nanoparticles built up in the cancerous area, they used a specific wavelength of light to separate the miRNA from the nanoparticles. The miRNA then pairs with a mRNA in the cancer cell, causing the mRNA to stop making proteins. Eventually, the cancer cell dies.
July 8, 2020
Graduate student Shaneice Nettleford was first author on a recent publication based on the Prabhu Lab’s student that indicated a crucial role for dietary selenium and selenoproteins in the protection against inflammation following enteric infection via immune mechanisms involving epithelial barrier integrity and innate lymphoid cells (ILCs). Not only does preventative and/or adjuvant therapy with selenium efficiently resolves GI inflammation, such a dietary intervention method also aids in enhancing resolution of inflammation associated with an enteric bacterial infection.
July 1, 2020
Dr. Robert Nichols, postdoc alum from Patterson Lab, received a USDA grant to study "organophosphate (OP) chlorpyrifos" a commonly used pesticide for fruits and vegetables despite its potential to cause neurotoxicity in children and neonates.
July 1, 2020
Congratulations to Asst. Research Professor Dr. Sougat Misra for receiving the 2020/2021 Horace T. Woodward Faculty Development Fund from the Penn State College of Agricultural Sciences! Dr. Misra invented a novel strategy to target cancer cells using specific combinations of nature-inspired small molecules that bring about catastrophic redox anomaly in cancer cells. He will use this funding to further pursue his research in an aggressive model of human leukemia.
June 17, 2020
Dr. Troy Sutton discusses in a new article what it is like to handle the SARS-CoV-2 virus, suiting up, feeling safer in the lab, and how his lab was built for this type of work!
June 11, 2020
Congratulations to Dr. Margherita Cantorna, Distinguished Professor of Molecular Immunology as she has been named a 2020/2021 Big Ten Academic Alliance’s Academic Leadership Program (ALP) Fellow! The intensive experience develops the leadership and managerial skills of faculty who have demonstrated exceptional ability and academic promise.
