UC Davis News: Veterinary Medicine

UC Davis plans 13 commencements, will graduate first nursing students

Tue, 08 May 2012 11:25:00 -0700

Thousands of students from the University of California, Davis, will participate in 13 commencement ceremonies this spring, including the first class from the new Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing.

Commencement season begins Thursday, May 17, and concludes Sunday, June 17.

Guest speakers will include:

Goodwin Liu, an associate justice of the California Supreme Court, at the commencement for the School of Law on May 17;
Marie V. McDemmond, president emeritus of Norfolk State University in Virginia, at the commencement for the School of Education on June 13;
James C. Davis, president of Chevron Energy Solutions, at the commencement for the Graduate School of Management on June 16; and
Secretary General Chris Buijink of the Ministry of Economic Affairs, Agriculture and Innovation for the Netherlands, at the commencements for the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences on June 17.

For more about speakers, visit: http://commencement.ucdavis.edu/speakers.html.

Commencement dates, times and locations are as follows:

May 17 — School of Law at 2 p.m. at the Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts;
May 19 — School of Medicine at 10 a.m. at the Mondavi Center;
June 13 — School of Education at 4 p.m. at the Mondavi Center;
June 14 — Graduate Studies at 4 p.m. in the ARC Pavilion;
June 15 — College of Biological Sciences at 9 a.m. in the ARC Pavilion;
June 15 — School of Veterinary Medicine at 10 a.m. at the Mondavi Center;
June 15 — College of Engineering at 3 p.m. in the ARC Pavilion;
June 16 — College of Letters and Science at 9 a.m., 1 p.m. and 5 p.m. in the ARC Pavilion;
June 16 — Graduate School of Management at 10 a.m. at the Mondavi Center; and
June 17 — College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences at 9 a.m. and 2 p.m. in the ARC Pavilion.

In addition, the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing will hold a special celebration of its first graduates at 12:30 p.m. on June 14 at the UC Davis Conference Center, before students participate in the Graduate Studies commencement. About 25 nursing students are candidates for a Master of Science degree.

Established in 2009, the nursing school admitted the first students to its master’s and Doctor of Philosophy programs in fall 2010. The school focuses on preparing graduates as educators, researchers and leaders to promote health, advance quality of care and safety, and shape policy.

The School of Law will award 23 Master of Laws and 202 Juris Doctor degrees at its ceremony, and the School of Medicine will award 108 Doctor of Medicine, four Master of Health Informatics and 24 Master of Public Health degrees.

Estimates of degrees to be awarded at the other ceremonies will be available in June. In 2010-11, UC Davis conferred 8,350 degrees.

Tickets are required for all commencement ceremonies except Graduate Studies, and they are distributed to graduating students by individual schools and colleges.

UC Davis will offer live and on-demand webcasts of each of the commencements at http://commencementvideo.ucdavis.edu/.

Genomes of two champion bulls sequenced

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 10:49:00 -0700

With more than 60,000 descendants in six generations, Pawnee Farm Arlinda Chief and his son Walkway Chief Mark cast a long genetic shadow. New research on the genomes of the two bulls show how portions of their DNA that control important traits such as disease resistance or milk production have spread throughout the contemporary Holstein breed, the world’s highest-producing dairy animal.

The research, published online April 23 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, may provide for faster and less costly methods to breed genetically elite cattle.

"The technique we developed, called ‘haplotracking,’ allows researchers to identify chromosome segments that are under selection in a certain population and match them with genes controlling specific traits," said Harris Lewin, senior author of the paper, who led the research project while at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Lewin is now vice chancellor for research at the University of California, Davis.

The cattle genome research offers a window into evolution, showing how selection affects genes that control complex traits like resistance to infectious diseases, Lewin said.

Chief, born in 1962, and Mark, born in 1978, each account for about 7 percent of the genomes of the current North American Holstein cow population, according to research published previously by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The new study allows researchers to track specific genes in the population.

"These were two of the greatest bulls in the history of the Holstein breed," Lewin said.

Lewin and his colleagues sequenced the genomes of both bulls, identifying more than one million single-nucleotide polymorphisms. These changes, known as SNPs, occur when a single letter of the genetic code is changed. The researchers used this information to identify haplotypes, or stretches of DNA, that Chief and Mark had passed down to their descendants intact.

Within these haplotypes, the researchers identified genes and SNPs related to fertility, milk yield and virus resistance – all traits that could potentially and significantly augment the economic viability of a dairy cattle-breeding operation or dairy farm.

Dairy cattle have been under intense selection for economically important traits such as milk yield and milk fat for more than a half-century, resulting in large databases of production data and DNA samples – much more information than is available for human populations. The comparative wealth of genetic information about cattle, especially the ability to reconstruct and track individual haplotypes, may prove vital in understanding the genetic basis for complex traits in both human and other animal populations, Lewin said.

The first author of the paper is Denis Larkin of the Department of Animal Sciences at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, now at Aberystwyth University in the United Kingdom. In addition to Lewin, other authors include: Hans Daetwyler, Mike Goddard, Iona Macleod and Ben Hayes at the Department of Primary Industries, Victoria, Australia; and other researches at UIUC; the University of Melbourne, Australia; La Trobe University, Australia; Roche Inc., Indianapolis; and 454 Life Sciences, Branford, Conn. The research was partly supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

3 from UC Davis are new fellows of the American Academy of Microbiology

Wed, 14 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Three professors at the University of California, Davis, are among the newest class of fellows in the American Academy of Microbiology:

• Patricia Conrad — Department of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology, School of Veterinary Medicine.

• Jonathan Eisen — Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology, School of Medicine, and Department of Evolution and Ecology, College of Biological Sciences. He is also affiliated with the Genome Center and the Center for Population Biology.

• Wolf Heyer — Departments of Microbiology, and Molecular and Cellular Biology, College of Biological Sciences. He is also affiliated with the Cancer Center.

The academy describes itself as the honorific leadership group within the American Society for Microbiology, the world’s oldest life science organization.

Peer voting determines who gets in to the academy, based on the candidates’ scientific excellence, originality and leadership; high ethical standards; and scholarly and creative achievement.

The academy then calls upon its membership for authoritative advice and information on critical issues in microbiology, from responding to congressional inquiries to organizing meetings and workshops.

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James Sanchirico, a natural resource economist at the University of California, Davis, has been named the 2012 recipient of the Rosenstiel Award in Oceanographic Science.

Sanchirico received a doctorate in agricultural and resource economics at UC Davis and later joined the faculty of the Department of Environmental Science and Policy.

He applies quantitative methods to study the design and evaluation of policy instruments aimed at conserving natural resources. His ocean-related research takes in marine population and habitat management, and the design of market-based policies, such as fishing quota systems.

His website lists the following among the projects that he is working on at this time: bioeconomic analysis of stellar sea lion conservation, and coral reef and mangrove management.

He serves the National Research Council as a member of two new committees, one that is reviewing the National Ocean Acidification Research Plan and one that is evaluating the effectiveness of stock rebuilding plans in the 2006 Fishery Conservation and Management Reauthorization Act.

The University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science administers the award, with support from the Rosenstiel Foundation. A school spokeswoman said the award (including a $10,000 prize) will be presented to Sanchirico during a dinner April 24.

And, while visiting the school, Sanchirico will deliver one or two lectures, the spokeswoman said.

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Mathematics professor Naoki Saito of the University of California, Davis, has been elected to a two-year term as vice chair of the Activity Group on Imaging Science of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics.

Saito is chair of the Graduate Group in Applied Mathematics.

His own studies take in such topics as harmonic analysis, signal processing, image analysis, data analysis and compression, pattern recognition and human and machine perception.

Mad cow disease experts at UC Davis

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Two Northern California residents were recently diagnosed as having a type of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease that is sometimes associated with mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE). The following UC Davis experts are available to answer questions about mad cow and associated diseases.

Diseases caused by prion proteins

Christina Sigurdson is an assistant professor in the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, based at UC San Diego as part of the UC Veterinary Medical Center - San Diego. Her research focuses on the molecular basis of a group of diseases, including BSE and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, which are caused by proteins called prions. She studies the genetic and the environmental factors that influence prion transmission. Contact: Christina Sigurdson, UCVMC - SD, (858) 534-0978, csigurdson@ucsd.edu.

Dairy cattle

Terry Lehenbauer, director of the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine’s Veterinary Medicine Teaching and Research Center in Tulare, can discuss procedures that are taken to protect dairy cows from mad cow disease/BSE and programs in place to ensure the safety of the beef supply against exposure to BSE. Lehenbauer is an expert on dairy cattle herd health, the epidemiology of cattle diseases, and animal health economics of cattle production systems. Contact: Terry Lehenbauer, Veterinary Medicine Teaching and Research Center, (559) 688-1731, tlehenbauer@ucdavis.edu.

Protecting against mad cow

James Cullor is a UC Davis veterinary professor and director of the UC Davis Dairy Food Safety Laboratory. He is an authority on dairy cattle and dairy farming. Cullor can discuss the biology of mad cow disease/BSE, how it spreads and is controlled, the adequacy of U.S. surveillance programs and the prevention of BSE in large dairy herds. He can also discuss the proportion of dairy cattle in the U.S. beef supply. His research lab developed a quick test that uses DNA forensic techniques to detect the presence in livestock feed of prohibited materials from cows, sheep, goats and deer. Contact: James Cullor, UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, in Tulare at (559) 688-1731 (extension 202), cell (559) 936-0510, jscullor@ucdavis.edu.

Beef cattle

John Maas, a UC Davis Cooperative Extension veterinarian, is a national expert on raising animals for food, particularly for beef. He also has been an active cattle rancher for 40 years. Maas has been to several European countries on a USDA mission to review mad cow disease/BSE diagnosis, testing and control systems. He is a frequent speaker to consumer, beef producer and veterinary groups and to the media. Maas can discuss U.S. cattle-tracking methods and disease-surveillance programs from regulatory, industry and university perspectives. Contact: John Maas, UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, (530) 752-3990, jmaas@ucdavis.edu. (Maas is away from campus but will respond to messages.)

Modern dogs are more Asian fusions than Euro pups, study finds

Mon, 19 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Don’t close the book on Fido’s genealogy just yet: A new study led by University of California, Davis, wildlife genetics researchers provides a surprising glimpse into the global heritage of both wild and domestic dogs.

Results from the study, which examined the DNA of 642 dogs, suggest that European and American canine breeds were much more influenced by dogs from Southeast Asia than by ancient Western dogs or by dogs from the Middle East, as was previously thought.

Findings from the study by UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine researchers Ben Sacks, Sarah Brown and Niels Pedersen, along with collaborators in Iran, Taiwan and Israel, appear online in the journal Public Library of Science (PLoS) One.

“The two most hotly debated theories propose that dogs originated in Southeast Asia or the Middle East,” said study co-author Ben Sacks, director of the Canid Diversity and Conservation Group in the Veterinary Genetics Laboratory in the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine. The laboratory is an international leader in animal genetics research and provides DNA testing and forensic analysis for numerous wildlife, companion animal and livestock species.

“In contrast to those theories, our findings suggest that modern European and American dogs are overwhelmingly derived from dogs that were imported from Asia since the silk trade, rather than having descended directly from ancient dogs native to Europe,” Sacks said. “Therefore, previous arguments against Europe as a potential site of dog origins, based on modern European dog DNA, must be reconsidered, and our high-resolution Y-chromosome data from indigenous dogs of the Middle East and Southeast Asia now provide the means to test this hypothesis using ancient European dog DNA.”

Sacks said that it was particularly surprising to find that Middle Eastern dogs had almost no influence on Western breeds, even though Europe is geographically closer to the Middle East than to Southeast Asia.

Other findings from the study demonstrate that Middle Eastern and Southeast Asian village dogs must have originated from a common gene pool thousands of years ago or from distinct groups of wolves or wolf-like dogs. The findings also indicate that Southeast Asia likely played an important role in the evolution of Western breed dogs.

In order to compare the evolutionary relationships between the dogs of Europe, the Middle East and Southeast Asia, the researchers analyzed DNA samples from nine wild members of the dog family and 633 domestic dogs. The domestic dogs were mostly from villages in the Middle East and Southeast Asia; they also included Australian dingoes, desert-bred salukis, which are Middle Eastern sight hounds, and 93 purebred dogs representing 35 other breeds.

The village dogs of Southeast Asia and the Middle East were chosen for the study because they are considered to have developed independent of modern breeds and are likely to reflect the genetics of ancient dogs of their regions. The Australian dingoes and Bali dogs were included because they have been isolated from other canine populations for thousands of years.

“Our findings demonstrate the importance of village dogs as windows into the past, providing a reference against which we can examine ancient DNA samples to shed light on the origins and spread of the domestic dog,” Sacks said.

Funding for the study was provided by the UC Santa Cruz Pacific Rim Research Program of the Center for Global, International and Regional Studies, and the UC Davis Veterinary Genetics Laboratory.

Faculty recognized for contributions to science

Mon, 12 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

The following scientific societies have named UC Davis professors as fellows in recognition of their outstanding contributions to science and society.

Seven professors have been named fellows in the American Chemical Society: Distinguished Professor Alan Balch, Professor Emeritus William Jackson, and professors Sheila David, Susan Kauzlarich, Gang-yu Liu and Claude Meares, all of the Department of Chemistry; along with James Seiber, professor and chair of the Department of Food Science and Technology. The fellows program began in 2009 to recognize and honor members of the society for outstanding achievements in science, and for contributions to science, the profession and the society.

The American Physical Society welcomes three new elected fellows from UC Davis: Mark Asta, adjunct professor, Department of Chemical Engineering; and Niels Gronbech-Jensen and Francois Gygi, professors, Department of Applied Science.

Professors James Carey, Bruce Hammock, Thomas Scott and Diane Ullman are newly elected fellows of the Entomological Society of America.

Ronald A. Hess, professor, Department of Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering has been elected a fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.

The American Association of Anatomists has named Dallas Hyde a new fellow. Hyde is director of the California National Primate Research Center and a professor of anatomy, physiology and cell biology in the School of Veterinary Medicine.

Laura Marcu, professor of biomedical engineering, was elected to the College of Fellows, American Institute for Medical and Biomedical Engineering, in recognition of her work on light-based instruments for diagnosing and treating cancer and atherosclerosis.

Anna Scaglione, professor of electrical and chemical engineering, was named a fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, the world’s leading professional association for advancing technology.

Professor Tim Caro of the Department of Wildlife, Fish and Conservation Biology has been appointed to a three-year term as a fellow of the Wildlife Conservation Society, in appreciation of his commitment to wildlife conservation. The Wildlife Conservation Society was founded in 1895, with the mission of saving wildlife and wild places across the globe.

The Weed Science Society of America announced that Kassim Al-Khatib and Joe DiTomaso have been named fellows, the society’s highest honor. Al-Khatib and DiTomaso are weed specialists with Cooperative Extension, and each heads a statewide program: Al-Khatib, Integrated Pest Management, and DiTomaso, the Weed Research and Information Center.

Animals’ disease-fighting strategies mirror foundations of human medicine

Tue, 01 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

When avoiding or dealing with disease, animals and people use strikingly similar strategies, many of which appear to have evolved into the foundational “pillars” of human medicine, reports Benjamin Hart, a pioneer in veterinary aspects of animal behavior at the University of California, Davis.

In a review paper to appear in the November issue of the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, Hart examines parallels between such disease-avoiding strategies in animals and humans. He also explores the possibility that humans needed to develop a more complex system for disease prevention when they started eating meat. Eating meat may have reduced their intake of health-promoting plant compounds, leading to more frequent illnesses. he said.

“The existence of disease-causing viruses, bacteria and parasites represents a profound force that shapes behavior in both humans and animals,” said Hart, a distinguished professor emeritus in the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine.

“We often forget this because the animals that are closest to us live in clean environments, are vaccinated against diseases and receive medical care when they are sick,” he said. “But it was much different for their ancestors, which evolved and thrived in natural environments that were teeming with pathogens and parasites.”

Hart’s study deals with the historical theme of comparative medicine, the branch of biomedical research that focuses on the similarities and differences in disease processes in all higher animals. With its schools of veterinary medicine and medicine as well as its primate center, Mouse Biology Program and Center for Comparative Medicine, UC Davis plays a leading role in exploring these processes and fostering an appreciation for the interconnections among humans, animals and ecosystems, a concept known as One Health.

In his new paper, Hart describes five disease-preventing behaviors observed in animals, including:

• avoidance or removal of disease-causing pathogens or parasites using techniques like grooming of skin parasites, licking wounds or swatting biting flies;

• quarantine through preventing territorial intrusion by members of the same species and cannibalization of sick newborns that could infect littermates;

• use of herbal medicine by consuming plants that purge intestinal parasites, or nesting with plants such as bay leaves that kill fleas;

• boosting the immune system through exposing young animals to other members of the same species; and

• helping sick or injured group mates.

None of the animal species included in the review made use of more than one or two of the strategies to prevent or cope with disease.

Hart said that the strategies are reflected in the “four pillars” of human medicine — quarantine, medication, immunization, and nursing and caring.

Funding for this study was provided by the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, and the UC Davis Center for Companion Animal Health.

Medical school dean, veterinary parasitologist elected to prestigious Institute of Medicine

Mon, 17 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Claire Pomeroy, vice chancellor for human health sciences and dean of the UC Davis School of Medicine, and Patricia Conrad, a professor and veterinary parasitologist in the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, have been elected to the Institute of Medicine, one of the nation’s highest honors in health and medicine.

“In electing Dean Pomeroy and Professor Conrad, the Institute of Medicine has chosen two of the brightest, most visionary health scientists in the nation,” said UC Davis Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi. “Their innovative thinking will be a tremendous asset in guiding the nation’s key decision makers.

“It is quite fitting that together, they represent the field of One Health, which encompasses both human and veterinary medicine and is one of UC Davis’ exceptional strengths as it addresses vitally important health issues at home and abroad,” Katehi said.

One Health is a global movement that promotes collaborative efforts between health professionals from various fields, working with other disciplines to find solutions to human and animal health challenges and environmental change.

The election of Conrad and Pomeroy brings to 11 the total number of current and emeritus UC Davis faculty who are Institute of Medicine members. This prestigious group has more than doubled in the last year. This year UC Davis successfully recruited two members of the Institute of Medicine: James Hildreth, dean of the College of Biological Sciences, and Michael Lairmore, dean of the School of Veterinary Medicine.

The institute, an independent, nonprofit branch of the National Academy of Sciences, announced the elections of Pomeroy and Conrad today, along with those of 63 other new members and five foreign associates, during its 41st annual meeting. Lifelong members and associates volunteer their time and expertise for a variety of activities, including participation on national advisory committees that offer authoritative advice on health and health-care issues.

Pomeroy oversees UC Davis Health System and all of its academic, research and clinical programs, including the School of Medicine, the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing, the 800-member UC Davis Medical Group and the 645-bed acute-care UC Davis Medical Center.

Pomeroy’s dedication to reducing health disparities and improving health outcomes has made her a role model for academic health leaders nationwide. She created the UC Davis Center for Reducing Health Disparities to directly address the social determinants of health. She also led the way in creating medical education programs designed to increase the number of physician leaders who are trained in and committed to serving medically underserved communities.

Pomeroy’s inspiring creativity has resulted in multiple high-impact programs that incorporate advanced technologies to improve health-care access and quality. Under her leadership, UC Davis established one of the nation’s most expansive telemedicine networks to enhance access to clinical services in rural and other medically underserved regions of the state. Recently, UC Davis Medical Center achieved the Stage 6 designation of the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society Analytics Electronic Medical Record Adoption Model, a distinction recognizing the use of technology solutions to improve patient safety and quality of care.

Pomeroy has nurtured several transformative, interprofessional research and education endeavors to bolster the next generation of pioneering investigators and trainees. Her accomplishments include establishing the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing, creating the UC Davis Clinical and Translational Science Center, starting the Building Interdisciplinary Research Careers in Women’s Health program at two institutions, and advancing the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine as a member of its governing board. As one of the nation’s leading infectious disease physicians, Pomeroy has conducted significant research on the role of a group of proteins known as cytokines in modulating viral infections. She is chair-elect of the board of directors of the Association of Academic Health Centers and incoming chair of the council of deans of the Association of American Medical Colleges

Conrad, an expert on how disease-causing single-celled parasites are transmitted between wildlife, humans and domestic animals, is co-director of the One Health Center at the University of California Global Health Institute. In this leadership position, she promotes collaborative research and education that address the interconnectedness of humans, animals and the environment. Information about the center is available at: http://www.ucghi.universityofcalifornia.edu/.

Conrad is known worldwide for her work on babesiosis, a tick-transmitted parasitic disease that afflicts humans, rodents and dogs. Her experience working on tick-transmitted diseases in Africa led to the discovery of two new species of related babesial parasites in dogs and humans in the United States.

In addition, she and her collaborators in the School of Veterinary Medicine have worked to improve the diagnosis and control of neosporosis, a major cause of fetal death in cattle, which takes a significant economic toll on the California dairy industry.

A member of the UC Davis faculty since 1984, Conrad leads a team of researchers investigating the presence of disease-causing parasites and bacteria in freshwater, marine and coastal ecosystems in California. Of particular interest are parasites and pollutants that are finding their way into the coastal waters and undermining the health of sea otters. Information about the project is available at http://seaotterresearch.org.

In addition to her research, Conrad is a mentor to graduate and professional students and has developed innovative computerized educational programs to encourage active, problem-based learning in parasitology and global One Health.

In 2004, she became the first veterinarian to receive the prestigious Aldo Leopold Leadership Fellowship for her work on pollutants and the health of the Southern sea otter. She continues to be committed to conveying science to policymakers and the public, to improve animal and human health and environmental sustainability.

About UC Davis Health System

UC Davis Health System is advancing the health of patients everywhere by providing excellent patient care, conducting groundbreaking research, fostering innovative, interprofessional education, and creating dynamic, productive partnerships with the community. The academic health system includes one of the country's best medical schools, a 645-bed acute-care teaching hospital, an 800-member medical group and the new Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing. It is home to a National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center, an international neurodevelopmental institute, a stem cell institute and a comprehensive children's hospital. Other nationally prominent centers focus on advancing telemedicine, improving vascular care, eliminating health disparities and translating research findings into new treatments for patients. Together, they make UC Davis a hub of innovation that is transforming health for all. For more information, visit http://healthsystem.ucdavis.edu.

About the School of Veterinary Medicine

The UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine provides statewide teaching, research and service programs of the highest quality to advance animal health, public health and environmental health in California and beyond. The School of Veterinary Medicine is California’s only public school authorized to confer the Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree, a four-year course of academic study and clinical training. The school also offers master's and doctoral programs in disciplines related to veterinary medicine and science. Faculty experts treat more than 35,000 animals each year, teach essential clinical skills to veterinary students and train specialty veterinarians at the William R. Pritchard Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital. Faculty accomplish their research in academic departments and centers of excellence that promote studies into the health of food animals, wildlife, equines, companion animals and other species. For further information, visit http://www.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/.

FDA grant will fund national food safety training program

Wed, 05 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

A $1.3 million grant to develop a new food-safety training program for government and industry has been awarded by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to the University of California, Davis, School of Veterinary Medicine.
The grant funds the first year of a five-year agreement, and is renewable for a total of $6.5 million. The grant is focused on preventing food-borne illnesses, which each year sicken 48 million people in the United States and cause 3,000 deaths. It is part of an FDA competitive grants program that aims to build an integrated national food safety system, as mandated by the U.S. Food Safety Modernization Act of 2011.
“UC Davis, with its deep expertise in veterinary medicine, agriculture and human health, is ideally equipped to address the food-safety training needs of the United States,” said UC Davis Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi, “We are proud to play this important role in safeguarding the nation’s food supply and the health of our citizens.”

The goal of the newly funded project is to develop a National Food Safety Curriculum that can be used to train food-industry and agency personnel at all levels, including inspectors, managers and leaders. The project also will create and improve course content to meet or exceed a national accreditation standard, with a focus on specialty produce crops, dairy and laboratory operations.

The FDA will use the information to develop uniform national standards for inspections, investigations and laboratory testing, as well as training and certification requirements, auditing criteria and metrics for evaluating program performance.

The School of Veterinary Medicine is noted for its strengths in developing training programs for food professionals and in conducting epidemiological, diagnostic and research efforts. It will work cooperatively through the Western Institute for Food Safety and Security at UC Davis. The institute was established in 2002 to draw together leading food-safety scientists from academia and state government to study food safety and security issues, and provide food-safety education programs for consumers and food-related industries.

“Foodborne illnesses annually cost the U.S. economy $152 billion in health care expenses, lost wages and production inefficiencies,” said Bennie Osburn, principal investigator for the grant and dean of the School of Veterinary Medicine.

“We are confident that with proper standardized training, government inspectors, regulatory officials and food-production employees can perform their work with greater precision and dramatically reduce the annual rate of food-related illness in the United States,” Osburn said.

Osburn retired this year after serving 15 years as dean of the veterinary school and was recalled to serve as dean until Oct. 24, when incoming Dean Michael D. Lairmore assumes that position.

$34 million grant awarded to create mouse models of human diseases

Thu, 29 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

A consortium of U.S. and Canadian health science partners, including the University of California, Davis, has been awarded $34 million in grants by the National Institutes of Health to support creation of mouse models of such human diseases as cancer, obesity, diabetes and heart disease.

The new five-year cooperative agreement funds the second phase of the Knockout Mouse Project — or KOMP — first funded by the NIH in 2006. Knockout mice are genetically customized mice that have individual genes turned off or “knocked out,” or have a gene ramped up, to make them either more prone or more resistant to specific diseases.

“In this consortium, we have assembled world experts in mouse stem cell biology, genetics, breeding, and phenotypic analysis who are dedicated to ensuring the successful outcome of KOMP2, on time and on budget,” said Kent Lloyd, director of the UC Davis Mouse Biology Program and principal investigator and director of the newly funded project. Lloyd is also a professor of anatomy, physiology and cell biology at the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, and serves as the school’s associate dean for research.

The consortium includes UC Davis, the Toronto Centre for Phenogenomics, the Children’s Hospital Oakland Research Institute in Oakland, Calif., and Charles River Laboratories International Inc., based in Wilmington, Mass.

“We are very pleased to have this opportunity to support the effort to develop better models of human disease, which could lead to new therapies for patients with unmet medical needs,” said Iva Morse, corporate vice president for genetically engineered model services at Charles River.

Other leaders in the consortium include Colin McKerlie, director of research partnerships for the Toronto Centre for Phenogenomics, and David West, research scientist at Children’s Hospital Oakland Research Institute.

Global initiative to create better disease models

KOMP2 is part of a global initiative to create a repository of knockout mouse lines and phenotype data, which researchers can use to develop better models of human diseases such as cancer, heart disease, neurological disorders, diabetes and obesity.

Phenotype refers to an organism’s physical characteristics, while genotype refers to an organism’s coded, inheritable information.

The goal of the first phase of the global initiative — known as KOMP1 — was to create a mutation in embryonic stem cells for each of the approximately 21,000 protein-coding genes in the mouse genome, which would allow researchers to determine the role of each gene in normal physiology and development. KOMP1 successfully completed work on 8,500 genes, and work on the majority of the remaining genes will be completed by scientists in Europe and Canada.

In KOMP2, 2,500 of the mouse embryonic stem cells created in the first phase will be used to establish and breed mouse colonies, which will then be phenotyped. The mouse lines and phenotype data will be accessible to researchers around the globe.

Oct. 15 Dog 'n' Jog event to help fight infectious diseases

Thu, 29 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Oct. 15, Saturday — Fitness-minded dogs and their two-legged running buddies will team up for the annual Dog ‘n’ Jog fun run, coordinated by UC Davis’ Student Chapter of the American Veterinary Medical Association. This year’s event follows the theme of "Taking Strides Towards Vector-Borne Disease Control Awareness." All levels of runners and walkers are welcome, and participants don’t have to be accompanied by dogs.

The event will begin near Gladys Valley Hall, northeast of the Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital, with on-site registration opening at 7 a.m. A 5K and 10K run will start at 8 a.m. and a 1.5-mile run at 10:30 a.m. The run will be followed by a Puppy Palooza Health Fair.

Registration is $15 for the 1.5-mile run, $20 for the 5K and $30 for the 10K. Proceeds will benefit the national veterinary student organization and its One Health Initiative Vector-Borne Disease Control Awareness Program. One Health is an international movement focused on fostering unity among the human and veterinary health sciences, by incorporating concepts of public, human and animal health to combat disease epidemics, especially those that affect both people and animals.

Registration for the run is available online at: http://www.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/clubs/scavma/dognjog.html. Runners are encouraged to register by Oct. 12 to be guaranteed a shirt. For more information contact Colleen Geisbush, Student Chapter of the American Veterinary Medical Association, cmgeisbush@ucdavis.edu.

$3.8 million grant to establish international resource for mouse-based health studies

Mon, 26 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

The National Institutes of Health today awarded $3.8 million to the University of California, Davis, to fund a new mouse-based research center devoted to studies of the physiology and genetics of obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular health.

A major focus for the new Mouse Metabolic Phenotyping Center will be cardiovascular disease, which affects more than 82 million Americans, costs an estimated $444 billion annually and is the nation’s leading cause of death.

The new center will provide scientists worldwide with complete physiologic characterizations of mice that have been genetically altered for metabolic studies. It will be one of only six such centers in the United States, and the only one that can create the mice for researchers.

The genetically customized mice have individual genes systematically turned off or “knocked out,” or have a gene ramped up to make them either more prone or more resistant to specific diseases. Such mice play an important role in studying the relationships between specific genes and the complex traits that define a disease.

“Funding for the new center allows us to apply our expertise in mouse biology to specifically address the causes and effects of disease in multiple organ systems that are involved in metabolism, endocrinology, obesity and appetite regulation,” said Kent Lloyd, the grant’s lead researcher. Lloyd is a professor and associate dean for research at the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine and director of the UC Davis Mouse Biology Program.

“The detailed mouse model assessments that we will provide through the new center will save significant time in launching new studies focused on developing treatments for these diseases,” Lloyd said.

The mouse assessments will cover everything from mouse behavioral patterns to organ pathophysiology to single-cell and single-molecule studies.

The new funding also will expand UC Davis’ technological capabilities in mouse imaging and behavior, including such sophisticated equipment as devices for measuring a mouse’s feeding frequency and preferences, activity levels and metabolic rate.

“The center will set UC Davis apart when it comes to advancing understanding of the foundations of metabolic disease,” said John Rutledge, a professor of cardiovascular medicine and a co-investigator on the new grant. “Knowing both the genetic deficiencies and the physiological changes they create will give us a clear picture of what these diseases entail and how best to eliminate them.”

Rutledge is an expert in atherosclerosis, a disease characterized by the accumulation of fatty deposits in the arteries, and in lipid disorders. He is particularly interested in using the new center to study inflammation of the brain’s blood vessels and ailments such as Alzheimer’s disease.

“We will be able to conduct those assessments at such detailed levels that we can finally resolve the debate over whether there is a vascular component to Alzheimer’s disease,” he said.

Collaborating in the new center are UC Davis School of Medicine researchers Craig Warden, scientific director of the Mouse Metabolic Phenotyping Center and a professor of pediatrics, and neurobiology, physiology and behavior; Amparo Villablanca and Nipavan Chiamvimovat, both professors of cardiovascular medicine; Liming Jin, an assistant professor of endocrinology; and Thomas Huser, an adjunct professor of endocrinology.

Collaborators from the School of Veterinary Medicine include clinical professor Stephen Griffey; Peter Havel, a professor of molecular bioscience; Philip Kass, a professor of statistics; Jon Ramsey, an associate professor of molecular bioscience; Helen Raybould, a professor of physiology; and assistant clinical professor Katherine Wasson.

Other collaborators include adjunct assistant nutrition professor Sean H. Adams, a supervisory research physiologist at the USDA-Agricultural Research Service’s Western Human Nutrition Research Center at UC Davis; associate professor of nutrition professor Fawaz Haj; and Mari Golub, an adjunct professor of toxicology.

Collaborating in the center from the College of Engineering is biomedical engineering professor Katherine Ferrara.