The following is an edited transcript of Tom Martin's interview with Yehuda Elram, CEO and co-founder of eggXYt. Click below to hear the full interview:

Tom:            I'm talking with Yehuda Elram, co-founder and CEO of eggXYt, a Jerusalem-based startup among the 2018 Pearse Lyons Accelerator finalists. The company has developed a novel CRISPR-based technology for the chicken industry, and Yehuda's here to share the details. Thank you for joining us. What is the problem that you hope to solve?

Yehuda:        Each year, the egg industry has to kill 7 billion male chicks. Doing so wastes billions of dollars and, of course, unnecessarily hatches and disposes those male chicks. And why? Because there are two kinds of chickens in the world: broilers who go to the meat industry, and the layers for the egg industry. The female layers are those who lay the 1.2 trillion eggs we eat. The male layers don't have meat on their body and they don't lay eggs, obviously. So, like us male homo sapiens, they're useless.

Tom:            Well, tell us about the technology that you developed to address this problem.

Yehuda:        The industry today sends 14 billion fertile layer eggs to hatcheries to be incubated for three weeks, and then they meet — as they hatch — human chicken sexers (there is such a profession), and those chicken sexers check if the chickens are male or female. They send the female to market and the males to their immediate death. So, what if you could do that process of detecting the sex at the input side of the hatchery and prevent those potential male chicks from being incubated and hatched? That's what eggXYt does. We make it possible to count your chickens before they hatch.

Tom:            This is where the CRISPR technology comes in, correct?

Yehuda:        Exactly, yes. By using CRISPR — a game-changing revolutionary technology — we edit chickens to lay sex-detectable eggs. The male eggs will carry in their DNA a biomarker. Our device, which we developed and branded as seXYt, can look into the eggs and pick up that signal at the entry point of the hatchery, preventing those male eggs from being hatched to become chicks.

Tom:            So there's actually a way of looking into the egg?

Yehuda:        Yes. But before we develop the technology that enables looking into the egg, we had to develop the technology that creates this DNA marker that then we can see. We make the sex chromosomes, which are the differentiator between male and female, detectable. We can see them, so to speak. That is possible by using CRISPR to edit the chickens to carry that marker in their DNA.

                    The beauty of this is that only the males carry the biomarker. The desirable product — the female that reaches the market — doesn't have any gene addition. It's 100 percent identical to a regular egg as we know today.

Tom:            That is a disruptive technology, obviously, but can you elaborate on how?

Yehuda:        Again, this is very scientific, but CRISPR is a new tool introduced to the world a few years ago, which enables a very precise intervention into the DNA — into the gene set of any organism — be it a plant, an animal or human.

                    With that technology, once you have the map of the genome, you can influence by either removing a gene that you don't want to express or adding in a gene that you do want expressed. By doing so, you can create new possibilities, eliminate diseases or create other efficiencies like we are doing.

Tom:            I'm curious about the background. We don't have a lot of time to go into it in depth, but what brought you to this project?

Yehuda:        One day, while I was sitting at my desk at the law firm at which I’m a partner, one of my favorite clients, professor Danny Offen, phones me and tells me, "I know you don't believe all my stories, but this is another one. I'm having breakfast and we're eating eggs, and my friend shows me this video showing the maceration of male chicks. I was amazed to find out that eggs are laid with 100,000 embryonic cells, more or less. So, the DNA signal is there; the information — male or female — is there as the egg is laid. Yet, as I found out watching that video, nobody knows how to look inside these eggs."

                    “Being the brain scientist,” — Danny is the head of the neuroscience lab at the medical school at Tel Aviv University — “it didn't leave my mind, this issue, which I came across by chance and inspired by the usage of CRISPR and brain research, which I'm busy with,” he tells me. “I thought, ‘I can solve it in the egg world as well.’”

                    He approached me to do some IP research to see what's going on. I was then fascinated to find out that this is a problem that the world has been dealing with for decades, and so many attempts to solve it have been tried, but there's no solution at market until this day. The way that it's done is that the male chicks are actually hatched and only then disposed after going through this sex detection.

Tom:            Interesting. Okay. Could you briefly describe for us your business model?

Yehuda:        We are creating value in many areas of the egg and chicken industry. I'll go through them quickly. In the egg industry, we double the capacity of hatcheries. Instead of hatching two eggs, now you need to hatch only one egg, because the male eggs will stay outside. You eliminate the need of those chicken sexers, because the sexing is actually done at the entry point of the hatchery by automation, not by human labor.

                    Then you have those male eggs that you created: instead of becoming waste, after three weeks, they become a product. They can be sold to markets such as the pharma and cosmetic industries that use egg protein for their manufacturing processes.

                    In the poultry world, the ability to introduce an elegant and cheap way to do sex determination is also important because the industry, more and more, is raising the males and females separately because of efficiency of feed. The FCR — the feed conversion rate — of males and females is different. You want to raise them separately to save on feed cost. This also has a huge environmental impact because, now, you can save all that feed.

                    Lastly, you can sell at supermarkets these ethical welfare eggs — the culling-free eggs — at a much higher price. It’s the same concept as today, when you can find premium eggs that are organic-fed or cage-free. This is obviously a higher level of premium eggs that we can introduce to markets.

Tom:            Your informational materials state that you are tackling a truly global problem, creating both economic value and social impact for societies in every nation on earth. Talk to me about the social impact part of that.

Yehuda:        There's this whole new concept that is relatively new and attributed to millennials, that they care — of course, it's not just them — about what happens to the food from farm to fork. People are more conscious of what happens to what they eat, even if they're not vegetarian or vegan. If they eat an animal product, they want to know where it came from, how it was treated and what the ingredients are. The impact of enabling people to eat eggs without carrying this price of needing to kill those 7 billion male chicks makes a huge impact.

                    Of course, the fact that we do not need to hatch these eggs minimizes the carbon footprint of this industry, because you don't need to waste all the resources of electricity, et cetera, that it takes to incubate and then sex those eggs. As I just said, in the poultry industry, the fact that you can minimize feed cost has a huge global impact as well.

Tom:            Have you received funding?

Yehuda:        Up till recently, we were “boot-strapping,” and we received grants from European governments, and we also won some accelerator prizes. We're just now finalizing our first round and accelerating our progress to go to market.

Tom:            Speaking of markets, what are your targets?

Yehuda:        It’s a global issue and the whole world is our target. The main driver of where we go to market first will be the regulation. CRISPR is new. Usually, regulation follows technology. That's how it should be, because technology comes first. So we are talking to regulators across the world and figuring out the pathway to market given this new technology.

                    Just recently in the U.S., at the end of March, the United States Department of Agriculture announced that in plants, CRISPR is seen as accelerated natural selection and, therefore, if it meets certain criteria, will not be regulated. We believe that animals are next, and we want to be there.

Tom:            Is the application of your technology limited to eggs?

Yehuda:        CRISPR is now creating a revolution in all fields of science: Human, plants and animals. We’re building eggXYt as a platform for CRISPR innovation in livestock.

                    The next venture in our pipeline is in the avian world: The elimination of diseases, which is a huge pain point to the industry. But then, we will also look at other livestock — cows, pigs — and see what we can do there.

Tom:            Tell us how The Pearse Lyons Accelerator program has affected your business.

Yehuda:        The Accelerator was a great experience. Unfortunately, it's ending soon, but it's really been great — mainly because of the ability to work with, as a startup, a well-established global company such as Alltech, which has presence in 128 countries. The doors it can open for us within the company and within the network that Alltech has is a stage that would take years to reach. The people at Dogpatch Labs, who run the Accelerator together with Alltech, have been very helpful by introducing us to partners and to mentors that really helped us improve what we're doing and to accelerate many processes.

Tom:            Yehuda Elram, co-founder and CEO of eggXYt, thank you very much for being with us.

Yehuda:        Thank you.

Yahuda Elram and his team presented eggXYt during ONE: The Alltech Ideas Conference(ONE18). All presentations from ONE18 are now LIVE on the Alltech Idea Lab! Click the button below to view presentations for FREE after sign-up. 

Achieving good bird, barn and gut health requires operational excellence and attention to detail. A combination of quality nutrition, veterinary guidance, and increased consideration of barn and bird management will help to ensure birds have the best possible chance to perform at their maximum potential.

The acronym “FLAWS” has commonly served as a reminder to check feed, light, litter, air, water, (bio)security, sanitation, space and staff. FLAWS actually serves as a detailed approach to best management practices, not only during brooding but throughout the life of the flock.

Some critical focus areas are as follows:

1. Biosecurity

Well-defined biosecurity practices throughout broiler production (pre-, during and post-placement) are crucial to successful poultry production.

Effective biosecurity can aid hygiene, vermin and insect control on-farm and help to limit disease transmission within and between barns.  

2. Downtime between flocks

Adequate downtime of at least 14 days with appropriate cleaning and disinfection measures between flock placements helps to reduce transmission of disease between flocks and allows time to prepare for the next flock.

3. Pre-placement preparation

Pre-placement preparation is needed before the new flock arrives to help prevent losses during brooding and the rest of grow out.

Checkpoints to keep in mind: heaters, floor temperature, temperature and relative humidity probes, ventilation, drinkers, feeders, etc.

4. Coccidiosis prevention

Coccidiosis is a disease caused by a microscopic intestinal parasite. This parasite can have an impact on intestinal integrity and may predispose birds to other intestinal problems. Maintaining intestinal integrity during this time through innovative technologies provided in the Alltech^® Gut Health Management program is critical in allowing birds to perform to their maximum levels despite gut health challenges.

5. Brooding management

With today’s improved genetic capabilities and the fast growth of birds, more time is being spent during the critical brooding phase. As a result, ensuring a good start in poultry production can have a significant impact on the future health and performance of the birds.

The brooding period is an important time for intestinal growth and the development of a balanced microflora.

6. Litter management

The litter in a poultry house acts as bedding for the birds. In addition to standing and resting on the bedding, birds will naturally peck at the litter. Litter condition and quality have an impact on broiler intestinal health and profitability, starting from when the chicks are placed all the way through production.

Wet litter presents a vicious cycle for intestinal health. Without proper management, even in patches, wet litter can serve as a breeding ground for potential pathogens and may be a starting point for intestinal stress that develops and leads to disease. As wet litter problems increase, ammonia levels in the barn rise, which can be potentially detrimental to bird health. It is much easier to prevent and manage litter moisture conditions before they start. 

Some factors to consider which may help prevent the development of wet litter: type of material, quality of litter, litter depth, water quality, drinker line management, lighting management, ventilation and temperature.

Litter that is too dry and dusty can be one of many indications that the birds may not be drinking enough. Too much dusty material may lead to respiratory problems.

7. Water management

Drinking water accounts for 70–80 percent of the bird’s daily drinking needs. Poultry will generally consume more water than feed. As a result, water is the most critical nutrient for poultry. An abundance of clean water will reduce challenges and maximize performance.

Factors to consider when thinking about water management include:

Quality, height, pressure, mineral content and accessibility

Cleanliness of drinker lines/regulators prior to flock placement and during production

Flushing water lines between flocks and during production

Elimination of biofilms and mineral buildup

Drinker equipment maintenance

8. Feed management

Birds must have easy access to feed. Proper feeder line height corresponding to the height of the birds helps to reduce feed wastage and mixing feed with litter, and it ensures that all birds have access to feed. Adequate feed access is also achieved by following the feed line manufacturer’s recommendations for the number of birds per feed pan or line of trough feeder.

Birds will naturally peck at litter but avoiding “out-of-feed” events helps to reduce the potential for birds to peck excessively at the litter. Simple measures like activating trigger feed pans and monitoring feed bin levels during barn checks can help to prevent such events.

Good feed quality that avoids contaminants like mycotoxins is important to ensure performance.

9. Stocking density

A higher stocking density of poultry in addition to crowded housing conditions has been shown to have a negative impact on performance, causing stress to both the birds and intestinal microbiota.

Lowering stocking density throughout the overall production of the birds may help to reduce challenges.

10. Environmental management

General environmental management of the barn includes many components, such as temperature, relative humidity, ventilation and lighting.

Understanding that these components work both separately and together can help to guide your management practices.

11. Monitoring during times of transition

Increasing the frequency at which barns are walked and examining the activity of the flock can help with early disease detection.

Daily monitoring of temperature, humidity and ventilation inside the barn as well as outside temperature is recommended.

Monitoring transition times can help with understanding what is happening in the barn (e.g., from day to night, when birds are placed, during half-house brooding, feed changes, etc.).

Monitoring feed and water consumption helps to monitor the flocks’ progress.

12. Keeping an eye on equipment

Walking the barns routinely will also help to ensure equipment remains in working order.

13. Mortality checks

Cull diseased birds as early as possible.

14. Flock health management

Work with your veterinarian to design a program customized for your flock’s health.

15. Communication and teamwork

Ensuring strong communication and coordination between all those involved in helping your farm run smoothly will ensure a stronger and more successful gut health management program for your birds.

This article originally appeared in Chicken Farmers of Canada's January 2018 issue on antimicrobial use strategy.

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The below is an edited transcript of Nicole Erwin's interview with Dr. Rebecca Delles, research scientist in meat chemistry at Alltech. Click below to hear the full interview:

Nicole:           Consumers are increasingly concerned with the quality of their meat and how it's produced. I'm talking with Dr. Rebecca Delles, research scientist in meat chemistry at Alltech. Her research primarily focuses on the impact of nutritional strategies on the oxidative stability of fresh meat products. Welcome, Dr. Delles.

Dr. Delles:     Thank you.

Nicole:           Consumer concerns with meat quality and production kind of brings to mind the old adage “You are what you eat.” How significant would you say this saying is from farm to table? In other words, how does what our meat chooses to eat affect consumer perceptions?

Dr. Delles:     A great deal, to be perfectly honest. I don't think a lot of consumers really think about what the animal eats and how that impacts them at the end of the day. It's amazing how something so small, such as minerals — which are essential not just for you and me, but also for the animal themselves, and we typically add a very small amount within the diet of the animal — makes such a huge impact on the oxidative state of the animal, of the meat, and, ultimately, it will impact your health as well.

Nicole:           So, if animals aren't getting what they need nutritionally, could it lead to something like woody breast syndrome in poultry?

Dr. Delles:     Possibly. It's such a complex issue. To be perfectly honest, it seems like it's a multifactorial issue and that we're not quite sure exactly what's causing it. It could be that the animal themselves aren't getting the proper nutrition to sustain the type of growth rate that we're pushing. That's just due to a genetic selection. It's nothing abnormal that's going on. But it could be partially a genetic predisposition for it. I don't want to say it's just solely a nutritional component because it seems that we have to look at it more in a holistic way.

Nicole:           For people who don't really know what woody breast syndrome is, can you explain that a little bit?

Dr. Delles:     Yeah. The decisive marker is palpatory hardness. Is that fillet, the breast fillet, tough to the touch? That's the identifying marker, but it can range in severity. You have a normal fillet, a mild, moderate and severe. In the mild severity cases, it will be slightly tough to the touch, not too bad, and it will typically just be in one part of the fillet. But when you start seeing it in moderate and severe cases, it will be throughout the whole fillet. In fact, you can see those bulging ridges in not just the cranial portion, but also the caudal region, which is the part that tapers down. So those are typically what you see with the severe cases.

                        In addition to that — it's quite complex — but you can also see signs of inflammation, and that's usually basically bruising on the fillet itself. You see hemorrhages. Also, there can be exudate on the surface of that fillet, and that's only seen in severe cases. That does not reach the consumer.

Nicole:           Animal rights activists have said that the condition is linked to genetics, which you touched on, and market demands that require industries to grow birds bigger and faster, causing muscle tissue to tear. Is that something that you've seen in your research?

Dr. Delles:     They are correct in that there seems to be a genetic component, and it's also associated with growth rate. We are growing these birds quickly and they are big. But it's not dangerous, and we're not doing it in an inhumane way. A lot of times — and I know this starts getting into a whole pool and a different discussion, and I don't want to really go into that — but it benefits producers to have the growth rate of the bird in the production be as humane as possible. They don't want to raise these birds in inhumane conditions. Typically, that slows down growth rate, and it’s likely these animals will become sick. So, it's to the best advantage for the industry to always raise these birds in humane and healthy ways.

Nicole:           When would you say that this problem started to surface, and how much can it actually affect a producer's bottom line?

Dr. Delles:     This has arisen about, I would say, eight years ago, and it was a small percentage. It’s grown substantially over the past seven, eight years. It's also a global issue. We didn't really see it in the United States until about five years ago, but it was more seen in, say, Denmark and other European countries back then.

                        With regard to the United States, the United States government has decided to step in. Before, if you had mild to moderate severity of wooden breast, it would become a downgraded product, so, usually, it would become a processed meat product and be used in something like a hot dog, but not anymore.

                        The United States government decided this is becoming a big issue, and consumers are really making their voices heard, so they've decided to step in, and now they are inspecting and removing that product from that line. It is not a zero-tolerance policy. It's basically what we consider a quality adulteration. We're supposed to be selling the consumer a grade A product, and since it's not a grade A product, it's considered now a quality adulteration.

                        What they've decided to do is have inspectors on the line and personnel within the processing facility trying to minimize what goes to the consumer. What ends up happening is that product is completely removed, so you're having a substantial amount of money being lost. Last year, it was estimated that $200 million in revenue was lost for the United States poultry industry. Now they are anticipating that number will rise to close to half a billion dollars, if not a little bit over.

Nicole:           Well, could woody breasted meat still be cooked and eaten safely?

Dr. Delles:     Yes. It's not dangerous to the consumer. It's not dangerous if you have a tough fillet and you decide to give it to your dog. It's not dangerous whatsoever. The consumer could eat it. They would be fine. It's just more of a palatability issue. They don't like how it tastes. They don't like the texture of it. So, if you were to give it to your dog, that would be perfectly safe for Fido.

Nicole:           Are there ways that you could cook it, maybe, to make it taste a little bit better?

Dr. Delles:     There's been quite a bit of research done by multiple universities throughout the entire world. There’s been work on increasing the palatability of the chicken through a marination approach. Also, you can make a processed meat product with the chicken. For example, you could make a sausage out of it and use other compounds.

Nicole:           So, you're doing a value-added product.

Dr. Delles:     Exactly.

Nicole:           Okay. Woody breast sounds like it would be limited to birds. Are similar characteristics found in other meats that we consume but just simply called by another name? Or is it mainly a poultry problem?

Dr. Delles:     This appears to be just solely a poultry problem. You have the exact opposite issue when we're talking about other quality deterioration within meat products. Pale, soft and exudative meat —  or PSE —  can be seen in poultry, but I wouldn't really characterize that as a myopathy. That's more about how stressed the animal was upon entering the slaughtering facility. That work has been very well-characterized, and we now know what we can do to minimize that impact.

Nicole:           What are some quality issues noticeable in pork?

Dr. Delles:     In pork, mainly it's pale, soft and exudative meat. That issue was probably around 20 years ago. They did a lot of research on that, and they know exactly what causes it. There used to be a genetic component to that as well, but they were able to breed out that issue.

                        Another issue that you can see in pork meat could be dark, firm and dry. Typically, we don't see that very often. You can see it more in beef products.

Nicole:           Can some of these issues be curtailed through nutrition?

Dr. Delles:     Yes, you could take a nutritional approach to it, making sure that you are feeding the animal appropriate diets. But, to be perfectly honest, I think management is the best way to tackle that particular issue.

Nicole:           How holistic should the approach toward a nutritional management plan in livestock be when producers are considering their feed?

Dr. Delles:     I would relate that a lot to what you want in your diet and your lifestyle. People and animals go hand in hand. A lot of times you hate to admit it, but your parents or your guardians are right. You want to eat a healthy, balanced diet, exercise, but everything in moderation. So, when we're talking about animal nutrition, we want to make sure that the animal is cared for in the proper way. You want to feed them the diet that they need to grow properly, to remain healthy, but management is also a very important part of that as well. You don't want these animals to be overly stressed because they're not going to feel hungry. They're not going to eat. They're not going to grow properly. You're completely right when you're talking about looking at it as a holistic approach.

Nicole:           What should consumers keep in mind when they look at a package at the store before buying, if they're trying to consider all of these things?

Dr. Delles:     I would always say, “Eat with your eyes.” You want to make sure that the product looks fresh, looks wholesome and looks like it will be delicious. You want to make sure when you're looking at that product that it looks uniform. You don't want to see some discoloration in certain areas. It’s not that it will be dangerous, it's just that it's been oxidized more so than a product that looks completely pink, such as your pork chop. If you have a completely pink pork chop, you don't want to see little areas of discoloration. Not that it's not fresh, but it just means it's been oxidized. That could be from the nutritional standpoint of the pig or it could be a processing issue or packaging issue. Knowing exactly what that causes is pretty hard to pinpoint when you're just looking at a package.

Nicole:           Anything that you look forward to in our future abilities to alleviate these kinds of concerns?

Dr. Delles:     I hate to say it, but I find the whole wooden breast issue exciting. As a meat scientist, it's fascinating. We have never seen anything like this before. So, meat scientists are all talking, and we all congregate and we all share ideas. Everybody has a different approach to it, which is absolutely fascinating. From a meat scientist standpoint, or even a protein standpoint, it's really amazing to see what can occur when you don't have all the components perfectly together. I see this issue continuing. I see it improving shortly. Hopefully, we'll be able to remove that issue altogether.

                        But what I'm really hoping to see is someone coming up with the exact cause and the complete mechanism of what is going on. To be honest, we will have to figure out the whole biochemical process of the conversion of muscle to meat, and that's going to be quite time-consuming. We've been working on it for decades. Even to this day, people are coming up with new concepts and figuring out small pieces to this whole puzzle. I don't see us having this issue in other animals such as beef or pork.

                        I hate to say it, but I think we might see another myopathy in poultry occurring called spaghetti meat. That seems to be the exact opposite of wooden breast meat, but it seems to be making its way globally and slowly becoming a bigger and bigger issue. It might be because the genetics of these animals are a little more limited than what's seen in the pork and the cattle industry.

Nicole:           With the spaghetti meat, because you mentioned it, is that also safe to consume like the woody breast?

Dr. Delles:     Yes, it's perfectly safe to consume. It's just the exact opposite texture. With woody breast, you typically see fibrosis, which is collagen. You have more connective tissue. When we're talking about spaghetti meat, you don't have as much collagen that's needed to support that muscle fiber —  the whole muscle itself. It’s two ends of a spectrum and it's pretty fascinating to see. I'm hoping that talking to other meat scientists and protein chemists, we'll be able to come up with a solution to the problem soon.

Nicole:           Dr. Rebecca Delles is a research scientist in meat chemistry at Alltech. Thank you so much.

I would like to improve nutritional management in my poultry operation.  

The following is an edited transcript of Tom Martin's interview with Dr. Kayla Price, poultry technical manager for Alltech Canada. Click below to hear the full interview:

After you read or hear this interview, you may never look at an egg quite the same way again. Dr. Kayla Price is poultry technical manager for Alltech Canada. Price joined Tom Martin from Ontario, Canada, to talk about eggshell quality and why it matters.

Tom:                          For this discussion, we're focusing on the outside of the egg. Let's first go to the basic question: What is eggshell quality? What does that mean?

Kayla:                         I think eggshell quality means different things to different people. And when we focus on the outside of the egg specifically, we’re looking at things like eggshell thickness, what is the eggshell strength, how difficult or how easy is it to actually break that egg. And then, what does that egg look like in terms of dirty spots on it, or anything else to that effect. The external quality is very different than the internal quality. But, for this podcast, we're just focusing on the outside of the egg.

Tom:                          And do the uses of eggs vary according to how they are graded?

Kayla:                         Absolutely. If you look at the grading system — and it's only a little bit different where I'm from in the Canadian grading system versus in the U.S. or even globally — there are some basic commonalities. We’re looking at eggs of different sizes, which can go from small to large, extra-large or jumbo. Most of what you see that comes to the table is going to be that larger size, whereas the other sizes may be beneficial in terms of eggs that come in cartons, so they're already cracked, versus the eggs that would be table eggs. You also have lower-graded eggs that may have a small crack on them or a small dirt spot, but the inside is still usable.

Tom:                          Are there specific strategies for developing quality shells of different sizes?

Kayla:                         In general, the hen is always going to be laying the same part of the egg, whether that egg is small, large or extra-large. So, when we talk about eggshell quality, we’re really talking about it in general. We really want that hen to be getting the nutrients and the management that she needs in order to build the shell of that egg.

                                    That being said, with the hen, she's laying the same amount of shell components whether she's young and laying a small egg or whether she's older and laying a larger egg. So, in that bird that is older or toward the extra-large, that same amount of shell component is going to cover a different amount of space versus that same amount of shell component on a small egg. But again, we can use the same management techniques regardless of the size of that egg, because you're trying to avoid those under-grade eggs, which are your dirty eggs or your cracked eggs, regardless of the size.

Tom:                          Okay. Now, if I’m going after a premium quality egg, what are the essentials that I need to take into consideration?

Kayla:                         When I start thinking of the word “premium,” I'm really looking for an egg that is going to have a good, hard shell to it, so it will not break easily. It won't break when it’s at the farm, when it’s moving to the processing plant and, ultimately, it won’t break when it's in the carton before we break that egg to put in the skillet. We’re looking for that outside eggshell quality just as much as that internal quality, like making sure that the yolk looks good and the egg white looks good.

                                    In terms of the essentials, there are a couple of things to consider. You can start looking at the nutrition of the bird — what goes into making that eggshell just as much as the internal component — and you also have to start thinking about management: the health of that bird, how old is that bird and what needs to be changed depending on the age, the environment and, to a small extent, the genetics. The things that we can change would certainly be nutrition management, health and environment.

Tom:                          At what point in bird's life cycle should producers start thinking about egg development and eggshell quality?

Kayla:                         I think that's a really interesting question because when people start thinking about eggshell quality, the first thing that comes to mind is when the hen actually starts laying that egg, which is about halfway through her full lifespan. If you only start looking at eggshell quality halfway through, then you’re really only capturing half the potential. I think it's really important to start having that conversation when that poulet or hen starts to be placed in her housing system and continue all the way through the growing phase, before she reaches the age of maturity to be producing an egg and then also continuing it through. The idea being that you're setting up the bird for proper body confirmation and skeletal development, which are going to have an impact on the eggshell quality — shell thickness, —  just as much as they impact the size of the egg and how well the bird can lay that egg. So, again, I think it's important to start thinking about things from the very start, as opposed to when that hen starts laying that egg.

Tom:                          Why should calcium receive particular attention?

Kayla:                         Calcium is something that people always go to when they start thinking about eggshells because many people know the eggshell has a good amount of calcium within it. So, this is the first thing that people start thinking about. It is incredibly important because the eggshell itself is about 95 percent calcium carbonate. One of the main components of calcium carbonate is calcium. So, this is something that certainly needs particular attention.

Tom:                          Is the size of the calcium particle important?

Kayla:                         Yes, it is. This is something that people in the industry are taking more notice of. It’s important to talk about the different sizes. So, you can go from a fine calcium particle size to a medium calcium particle size to a coarse calcium particle size.

                                    What’s important is, you have to think of the fine calcium size as giving that quick shot of calcium. The bird can absorb it quite quickly because they don't need to break it down at all. But, if you start moving toward the coarse calcium, this one is good because it takes more time for that bird to break down the calcium and a longer amount of time for that bird to absorb the calcium. This is important as the bird goes into nighttime and starts really putting that calcium onto the shell or laying down that shell, because when it’s nighttime, she’s not eating. This slow release or slow breakdown of coarse calcium really helps out during this time.

                                    It’s not that you only need one or only the other — you need a good combination of both. This changes as the bird gets older. As the bird gets older, you’re tending toward going more and more coarse but still having a certain amount of fine particle size in there. It’s really about knowing your ratios, and that's where the nutritionist can help in terms of how to deal with the fine-to-coarse calcium ratio.

Tom:                          What other nutrition elements such as minerals can impact eggshell quality, and how?

Kayla:                         In terms of other nutrition elements, I think it's important to start thinking about what they are. As I said before, when people think of eggs, they often think of calcium in terms of the actual eggshell, but there are other components to it.

                                    In the eggshell itself, you have an inner as well as an outer shell membrane. That outer shell membrane is the calcium carbonate, and the inner shell membrane is made of many other components. You want to make sure that you're building strength, not just in your outer shell membrane, but also in that inner shell membrane. This is really where other nutritional elements come into play — like minerals, which have a very important role in building that eggshell, somewhat in terms of the outer, but also somewhat in terms of the inner shell membrane.

                                    For example, minerals like copper, which helps a little bit in collagen formation in terms of that eggshell membrane. Similarly, minerals like manganese and zinc, each sort of playing their own different role. Then you can look to minerals like selenium, which supports the reproductive tract itself.

                                    So, these elements, and components like that carbonate component of calcium carbonate, or all other elements that are important for the actual eggshell quality, have very different roles to play within the whole system itself.

Tom:                          How is eggshell quality impacted by gut health? Is there a direct relationship?

Kayla:                         It's more of an indirect relationship. I always say that the bird is ultimately a gut with lots of things attached to it. That can be applied to any bird that we want to talk about because, ultimately, what we're putting into the bird and having that bird eat, we want it to be able to translate into the performance factors as well as health factors.

                                    In this case, with the laying hen, a hen that is going to provide us our table eggs, we want our feed ultimately to translate into table eggs, or more table eggs, at the end of the day. So, if we have a gut that is healthy and that is acting the way we want it to, it means this gut is able to absorb nutrients and translate those nutrients as well as absorb things like calcium, like minerals and, ultimately, translate that so it can be used within that reproductive tract or other places within the body. So, direct, perhaps not, but certainly indirect, and there is a role between them.

Tom:                          What are some of the more common problems being encountered today by egg producers that they're trying to work around or work through?

Kayla:                         There are always many different kinds of problems, and new problems evolve as we keep raising these birds. But I think the one specifically related to the egg itself at the moment would be — that isn’t related to viral issues, which are certainly happening in the industry and are very important and I wouldn't want to ignore — but relating specifically to the egg, would be looking at things like deep cracks in the eggs, especially as people start either thinking or moving toward, or are already using, these alternative housing systems. You want to make sure you have a nice strong egg that is not going to be easily cracked by other things happening within the system just as much as you want to make sure you have a good internal eggshell quality, and you want to make sure that you are able to maintain that food safety aspect so that you're able to provide safe food or safe eggs, ultimately, for the public that is consuming those eggs. So, those would be common problems encountered by egg producers. And, again, the biggest one being those downgraded eggs, which would be your cracks, which would be your dirty eggs.

Tom:                          What does it mean to support the good guys in relation to eggshell quality?

Kayla:                         I think it's a very interesting phrase, “supporting the good guys.” It relates back to this indirect relationship between gut health and eggshell quality. So, ultimately, with gut health, we want to make sure we're maintaining a healthy and well-balanced gut, meaning that in the gut, there can be good microbes or good bacteria. There can be bad bacteria or bad microbes, or those that are potentially bad. Those that are potentially bad are opportunistic. Given the right environment, they will become bad or they will become a problem.

                                    When we relate back to gut health, we want to make sure we have this balance between our good guys, our potentially bad guys and our bad guys. In order to help with gut health and, ultimately, help with how that gut is able to digest and absorb nutrients and then translate this within the body to help with the egg and the eggshell, we want to make sure that we're supporting those beneficial bacteria — or supporting the good guys. The end goal is to maintain good gut health.

Tom:                          How do you manage and sustain that balance?

Kayla:                         There are a couple different factors. It's never just one thing that's going to solve the problem. Everyone always looks for that silver bullet, but when it comes to animals and to biology, a silver bullet is almost an impossible goal. You want to make sure that there is a good combination of management practices. We want to make sure that we're using the best practices in managing the birds, just as much as biosecurity on the farm — which is incredibly important as we start thinking about other viral or bacterial problems that can potentially impact these birds — and the type of nutrition that these birds are receiving.

                                    We want to make sure that they are receiving the best nutrition possible with the best ingredients possible. We want to make sure that those ingredients are free from contaminants like mycotoxins and use minerals in their best possible form that are most available and well-absorbed by the bird. This would be things like organic trace minerals versus what is very commonly used as inorganic trace minerals.

                                 And then also making sure when we talk about management, we want to make sure that there's proper water quality. At the end of the day, we just want to make sure we have a good combination program within the diet and the nutrition, a good feed additive program, to help with that just as much as a good management program and good biosecurity.

Tom:                          Dr. Price, when we began the conversation, I said we were going to focus on the outside of the egg, but I'm wondering, does the internal quality of an egg in some way impact the quality of its shell?

Kayla:                         That’s an interesting question because we're still talking about the egg itself. But when we talk about the internal quality of the egg, we're really talking about aspects like the yolk color, what the yolk looks like or how high that yolk is, just as much as what the egg white looks like and how that egg white spreads. So, in terms of if the internal eggshell quality is going to have a direct effect on how easily or if the shell cracks, possibly not. I think this is more of an indirect relationship where if you're focusing on a good quality internally and externally, ultimately, you're going to have a good-quality egg overall. That’s really the target: making sure we have a good-quality egg that is safe for consumers.

Tom:                          Are there some programs for enhancing eggshell quality that you recommend?

Kayla:                         I think this goes back to that combination program. Again, it's important to look at not only management, biosecurity and nutrition, but also the feed additive program.

                                 We touched a little bit on organic trace minerals and making sure that you're using organic trace minerals that are bioavailable to the bird, supporting good absorption and using other additive components that can help in terms of supporting those good guys or supporting the beneficial bacteria within the gut.

                                    This can mean using components like mannan-enriched fractions, which help selectively remove bad bacteria and allow room for good bacteria to thrive. There are plenty of other feed additive components that can be built into a program to make sure that you have a comprehensive program on the feed additive side. That can be combined with a full program on the nutrition side and with management and biosecurity.

Tom:                          Are there any emerging trends in poultry out there that you're watching that have captured your interest and attention?

Kayla:                         Yes. There are always some new and interesting things. Unfortunately, sometimes it relates to viruses. I think something to watch in the layer world — people have been talking about this virus — is false layer syndrome. We are certainly watching how this can be handled. This is one of many emerging things, along with making sure that we have the right biosecurity to avoid any other possible avian influenza outbreaks, which we haven't seen at all lately. Hopefully, we will not see any in the future. And, of course, making sure that we do what we can to achieve fewer cracks and dirty eggs.

                                 So, there are a couple of different things to watch out for. Another one is the constant concern about food safety and making sure that we're producing safe food for our consumers and being transparent in showing that we’re producing safe food for our consumers. 

                                    Those are a couple of different things that really grab my attention and I will continue to follow.

Tom:                          Dr. Kayla Price is poultry technical manager for Alltech Canada.  And thank you so much for joining us.

When you hear the word “nutrigenomics,” your first reaction may be “What in the world is that?” Nutrigenomics is an up-and-coming research field that aims to understand how nutrition can influence an animal’s genome and what that means for animal health and production. It isn’t genetic engineering or modification, but rather a way of measuring changes in the activity of genes that result from changes in an animal’s diet. This field of research opens many doors that were previously closed in classic animal nutrition and allows us to better understand how “you are what you eat,” or rather, your chickens are what you feed them.

What is nutrigenomics?

Before we can talk about nutrigenomics, let’s do a quick review of molecular biology. Each animal has what’s called a genome that contains all of the genetic material, or DNA, of an animal and provides the basic blueprint for life. These carefully drawn out plans provide the blueprint for that animal’s life. However, outside influences, such as nutrition, can have a strong impact on the expression of this genetic information, or essentially how that blueprint is read.

Over the last decade, genomes have begun to be sequenced. This means that we know the approximate makeup of an animal’s entire genome. Identifying the genome sequences opened the door for cutting-edge research approaches to understand the molecular mechanisms behind everyday life. Even more importantly, we can now use genomic technologies to understand how each of the genes in that genomic sequence responds to outside influences and how this relates to the health and disease of an animal. The genomic sequence is very stable, so changes in function and activity come from up-regulating (“turning on”) or down-regulating (“turning off”) individual genes to produce (or decrease) products called transcripts in response to a stimulus like nutrition.  These transcripts code for the proteins that make up structures and functions in the cells, so the result is that changes occur in physiological processes like energy production or immune response.

Nutrigenomics is the field of research we use to study these changes in gene activities that occur because of changes in the animal’s diet. This information can help us better understand how nutrition influences animal health and production by giving us insights into what is going on within the cell in response to changes in the diet. We can measure the response in animal tissue using a technology called DNA microarrays. These tools are the basis of nutrigenomics studies and allow researchers to profile the activity of all the genes on a genome at once. The information gathered from nutrigenomics studies can provide us with a better understanding of nutrition by giving us clues to how nutrients work, why different forms of nutrients have different effects and how such nutrients can be optimized for health and production.

How can we use nutrigenomics to further poultry nutrition?

Current research can paint us a picture of how nutrigenomics is being applied to poultry nutrition. For example, recent work at Alltech has helped decipher why different forms of nutrients in the diet, such as Bioplex® organic minerals versus inorganic forms of minerals, can have very different effects on animal health. Before nutrigenomics, analyses like animal growth and tissue nutrient content gave us only part of the picture. But now, we can understand why changes occur.

Mineral matters

We know that Bioplex minerals support increased tissue levels. Through nutrigenomics, we identified changes in important transport proteins in the intestine that lead to increased mineral uptake into tissues when Bioplex zinc is used in poultry diets. In a similar fashion, we used nutrigenomics to understand why Sel-Plex® has a greater effect on reproduction than inorganic selenium. Traditional poultry nutrition studies were only able to reach the conclusion that it was due to selenium’s role in antioxidant defenses. However, nutrigenomics data confirmed this and, more importantly, indicated that selenium in the form of Sel-Plex could alter genes involved in energy production and reproductive signaling in the oviduct. In males, it made a clear impact on genes involved in tissue structure and function.

Early birds

Another area in which nutrigenomics is leading to a new understanding of the importance of nutrition is nutritional programming. This concept is the idea that nutrition, especially early in life, can have lasting imprints on an animal’s entire life. By understanding the gene expression patterns that are targeted by early life nutrition, we can begin to determine how this programming occurs and use it to our advantage in poultry production. For example, nutrigenomics studies have shown that changing the trace mineral content in the post-hatch diet can have long-term effects on genes in the gastrointestinal tract that are important for nutrient transport and for intestinal tissue structure. These genes remain changed in the adult bird weeks after the post-hatch period.

In the future, the information that nutrigenomics provides us could change the way we feed birds and make poultry nutrition a more precise field. Molecular findings can add to our understanding of how nutrition influences animal production and health and how we can use nutrition to get the best out of our animals. Nutrigenomics provides a way to know preciously what nutrients, timing of nutrients or combinations of nutrients are optimal. Through this information, we can not only streamline nutrition, but improve performance, efficiency and health.

Have a question or comment?

Below is a transcript of Tom Martin’s interview with Dr. Karl Dawson, vice president and chief scientific officer at Alltech and co-director of the Alltech Center for Animal Nutrigenomics and Applied Animal Nutrition.

Click below to hear the full interview:

                                    Over the last 10 years, scientists at Alltech have been using nutrigenomics to define a variety of new nutritional concepts, manage product development and redefine our view of nutrition. What are the practical applications of the science, and what does it mean for the future of feeding and farming? Tom Martin talked with Dr. Karl Dawson, vice president and chief scientific officer at Alltech.

Tom:                          Let’s begin with the question: What is nutrigenomics?

Karl:                            Nutrigenomics is a system for looking to see how the environment, disease processes and nutrition influence gene expression in an animal. This is taking the basic information that comes in an animal’s genetic makeup, its DNA, and looking to see how that's used. This system allows us to look at numerous genes at a time. And in some of our studies, we would be looking at as many as 25,000 genes at a time. So, we get very precise in our measures of what the environment, or disease — or, in this case, nutrition — does to that animal.

Tom:                          In a recent panel discussion, the webinar “Farming the Future,” you said that nutrigenomics is really going to redefine things, if it hasn't already. Can you elaborate on that?

Karl:                            Yes. We’re going to be looking at nutritional processes in a totally different way. We could also look at things like diseases in a different way. The way we look at nutrition today is based on a narrow group of responses in an animal to a nutritional strategy. Nutrigenomics allows us to do that same kind of thing while looking at many, many different characteristics at once and very rapidly. We can look at changes induced by nutrition within several days instead of waiting for a whole production cycle, which may take anywhere from 42 days to two years.

Tom:                          The name of the field, nutrigenomics, might lead us to believe that it’s limited to exploring how nutrition influences the expression of individual genes, but is it more than that? Does the science also look at disease and environmental factors and how they’re related to nutrition?

Karl:                            Yes. We can look at all of those things and how they're related. “Nutrigenomics” may be a misnomer. In the science world, we call it “transcriptomics,” the idea of looking at these genes and how they're transcribed. But the word “nutrigenomics” has taken off, and it’s really being used to describe just about anything to do with gene expression and factors that influence gene expression.

Tom:                          How is this tool being used to define new feeding strategies?

Karl:                            We can talk about a couple of examples that have developed over the last seven or eight years. One of those is the feeding of young animals. We could take a chick during the first 96 hours after hatching and change its nutrition — by limiting its nutrients, we can change how that animal performs throughout its life or its nutrient requirements throughout its life. We would not have been able to know what that looked like until we had this nutrigenomics tool.

                                 We can show that the gene expression pattern changes in a young bird when you've limited its nutrients, but those changes that take place in that gene are reflected throughout the life of that bird. So, some 24 days later, that bird has a totally different environment that it is working with, and the types of nutrients it requires have changed. It's a totally different animal when it comes to its nutritional requirements.

Tom:                          And does this bring more consistency, more precision to farming?

Karl:                            Yes. It’s going to bring a lot of precision, but it actually gives you a new tool because, in some of those changes we’re seeing, we can decrease the amount of nutrients that animal is requiring. You condition it to a low nutrient value or nutrien. As it grows, it’s expecting that as it goes on through its life. So, for example, its mineral requirement may be decreased by as much as 50 percent. That’s a totally different world for that animal to grow in, and it changes the way we feed that animal to optimize its performance and health.

Tom:                          Let's say there's been a blood draw or a tissue sample taken from the herd or the flock on the farm and brought to the lab to process. How long does it take to get that information back to the farm?

Karl:                            It only takes about 48 hours for us to process a sample, but I don't want to mislead you here. We would not necessarily use this as a diagnostic tool at this point. Today, it's a research tool to show you what changes happen with a new trend. We can use it to screen new nutritional strategies or look at nutrients in the way they're influencing that animal. Eventually, you’re going to see some diagnostic tools coming from that. But today, that probably isn't a very realistic approach for this type of technology.

Tom:                          What are some new commercially useful feeding concepts that have come directly from the use of this molecular tool?

Karl:                            A couple come to mind immediately. One of them has been a rather surprising observation. Often, in the growth of that young animal and growing livestock, we’ll use enzyme supplements. The idea behind using an enzyme supplement is really to change what is happening to the food, how it's digested. Well, one of the surprising things that we found using nutrigenomics is, that is reflected not only in the digestion process, but actually the way the tissue develops in that animal. It changes the receptors for hormones. It changes the way that animal responds physiologically.

                                  That technology has moved forward and is the basis of a couple of different programs that we’re using in beef cattle today — to use enzymes to enhance their growth and performance. In some systems, we found that this can be worth as much as $15 to $20 per head when that animal reaches its final stages of growth or finishes out and goes on for beef production. So, it's a pretty substantial thing. We never would have seen that, or even thought about doing that, if it hadn't been for that nutrigenomic tool that allows us to see those changes in those animals.

Tom:                          I also recall from the webinar, “Farming the Future,” some discussion about the influence of minerals.

Karl:                            Absolutely. Minerals are very important, and that's one of the areas that probably was the hallmark of our nutrigenomics work when we started out. One mineral, specifically, is selenium. Selenium is a nutrient that's very important, but we had no idea of how much or what the ramifications of feeding selenium really were. We found all sorts of hidden traits that are influenced by selenium, all the way from reproduction to the development of brain tissue and the speed at which an animal grows.

                                    One of the most interesting traits is the way that animal generates energy. We found very early on that we could change the function of the mitochondria and the cell. This is the energy-producing organ within that cell. We can increase its efficiency by about 15 to 20 percent. That doesn't sound like a big number, but using a dairy cow for example, that means we can improve its energy efficiency by that same amount, which probably means 2 to 3 liters of milk a day from a cow.

                                 So, this is turning everything upside down. We've changed what we thought we knew about energy metabolism, and it's a totally different world now. We're going to have to go back now and redefine energy metabolism — not based on the energy content of the feed, but based on these minerals and the way they are interacting with that energy source.

Tom:                          Let's say there's a new feed supplement out there on the market and you want to determine its value as quickly as you possibly can. Can nutrigenomics do that?

Karl:                            Absolutely. That’s one of the most exciting examples I have right now. Several years ago, we were asked to come up with an alternative antioxidant to help us address the shortage of vitamin E. We took a nutrigenomics approach to that issue and developed what we thought was a new material to serve as a booster for vitamin E activity. Normally, to evaluate a new antioxidant system like that, we would have done it over a period of several years. It takes time to grow the animals, look to see what the vitamin E is doing, to harvest the meat product and evaluate the way that is responding to oxidative stress.

                                    With a nutrigenomics approach, we were able to do the same types of evaluation, but we can look at gene expression as our measure. In doing so, we could shorten that two-year period to about six weeks. We could actually evaluate what that new ingredient was doing during that very short time.

Tom:                          By applying this tool, you're gaining a lot of information, a lot of knowledge. How does that information influence the way you think about nutrient requirements?

Karl:                            We’ve changed a lot in terms of nutrient requirements. We talked about selenium a minute ago. We used to have a fairly standard idea of what selenium requirements were. Using nutrigenomics, we’ve been able to redefine that, and found that by changing the form of selenium — by putting it in the form of a selenium yeast, for example — we could decrease its requirements by about 50 percent.

                                    We’ve gone on to look at all sorts of different minerals. We know that we can cut back on a lot of the requirements we expect for copper and zinc in the diet. We can cut those by as much as 75 percent. So, we have really started to change that. Instead of asking what a mineral is doing, we look at the form of that mineral as well as how much we're providing it. Again, it’s turning things upside down. The old requirements we had for some of these minerals have really changed.

Tom:                          How is nutrigenomics being used to demonstrate the effects of maternal nutrition on the growth or development and the disease resistance of offspring?

Karl:                            This has been another very exciting area. We did some studies several years ago in pigs — looking to see what would happen to the offspring if we fed a particular carbohydrate or supplement to the sow. We fed the sows a particular carbohydrate called Actigen^®, which is a yeast product. Then, we looked to see what was happening in the piglets. To our surprise, by looking at the gene expression in those piglets, we could easily differentiate the piglets that came from the sow that was fed that material. In fact, we found some very specific genes were being changed. One of the more interesting effects was to the hormones that influenced the ability of that young pig to eat.

                                 We could stimulate intake in those young pigs, not by feeding the young pigs the material, but by feeding the sow. That changes what we think in terms of overall production, because now we have a different animal to work with. They have different gene expression patterns and, in fact, different nutrient requirements. Their resistance to specific diseases has changed.

Tom:                          Does this enhance that consistency that we were talking about earlier across generations?

Karl:                            Yes. That's the idea. We've always thought that consistency occurs, and we have evidence of it in the human population — that you are what your mother eats. Nutrigenomics actually gives us the tools to see what is changing specifically, and to program that into the production process.

Tom:                          We've been talking about animals here as though they were something separate and apart from us, but we're animals as well. Does nutrigenomics influence the way that we think about human nutrition?

Karl:                            Absolutely. We’ve really projected into the human population from what we've done in animals with nutrigenomics. One of the star programs that we have right now is a set of compounds that we've developed to provide a preventative for Alzheimer's disease. This program came directly from our observations of what was happening to gene expression. We realized that the genes that were being expressed — or not being expressed — in Alzheimer’s patients were, in fact, associated with Alzheimer’s and the development of neurological tissue. We were able to track that relationship down, and it’s in clinical studies today.

                                 We've done similar things with some of the yeast products that we’re using. We know that they influence animals. We are now doing the same types of nutrigenomic studies in humans to evaluate how these might be useful to address health issues.

Tom:                          I know from past conversations with you about the science of nutrigenomics that you feel that it holds a lot of promise. What is your take home message about this science?

Karl:                            That this is an extremely powerful tool. It probably gives us more information and more precision for feeding animals — and probably even humans — in the future. It’s going to be a very powerful tool for changing the way we develop our feeding strategies. So, my take home message is, “This thing is going to be something that will influence the way science changes our nutrition.”

The following is an edited transcript of Tom Martin’s interview with Dr. Kristen Brennan, a research project manager at the Alltech Center for Animal Nutrigenomics and Applied Animal Nutrition in Nicholasville, Kentucky.

Click below to listen to the podcast:

                                    Dr. Kristen Brennan is a research project manager at the Alltech Center for Animal Nutrigenomics and Applied Animal Nutrition in Nicholasville, Kentucky. In this interview with Tom Martin, Brennan helps us gain a better understanding of her field, nutrigenomics, and its role in sustainable agriculture.

Tom:                            What is the science of nutrigenomics?

Kristen:                        The easiest way to think about nutrigenomics is to break the word down into what it is: “nutri" and “genomics.” What we're aiming to study with nutrigenomics is how nutrition — whether that’s nutrients, forms of nutrients, diets, timing of diets — influences the animal's genome. So, we’re not changing the genome, but influencing the activity of all the genes of that animal’s genome.

Tom:                            Is this an outgrowth of the human genome project, or has it been around a lot longer than that?

Kristen:                        Nutrigenomics is something that's been around forever. From the time the first living organism evolved, it needed nutrients, and those nutrients had influence on the activity of the genes within that animal or cell. The thing that we've done within the last several years is to figure out how to capture that information. It's always been there, we just never had a way of measuring it before. Technologies like genome sequencing are the core foundation for measuring what we're seeing.

Tom:                            Is there a point in time when we realized that nutrients were having an impact on genetic expression?

Kristen:                        I think we’ve known for a long time the importance of nutrition. Centuries and centuries ago, they had an idea that nutrition had a vital role. I don't know if we knew at that point, really, what DNA was and what genes did, but we knew that nutrition could influence the outcome, or a phenotype of an animal — what we're seeing on the outside — and how important it was for good health.

Tom:                            What are the advantages of nutrigenomics in animal studies?

Kristen:                        What I think makes this field so exciting is that, first of all, when we’re dealing with actual sampling, we need a very small sample amount. We can do this with, for instance, a small draw of blood from an animal, or we can take a small biopsy. So, you're not having to euthanize an animal to get tissue.

                                       Even more of an advantage is the amount of information we get. If you think about most genomes, you're talking about thousands of genes. We can measure in a single snapshot how every one of those genes is behaving in response to a diet or nutrition. That is an amazing amount of information.

                                       The other advantage is that it can be really rapid. From the time we get a sample to the time we have an output of data, it can be as short as just a few days in the lab. So, a lot of information, small input and a ton (of data) in a very rapid way.

Tom:                            And are you able to understand why some animals respond differently than others to the very same nutrients?

Kristen:                        Yes. We can use this information to understand that. An example would be healthy versus diseased animals and why nutrition may play a role in how they respond to that illness. More and more, we're starting to understand how differences on a genetic level — different breeds of animals, different production states, things like that — can influence how that animal responds.

Tom:                            Are you able to dig down into it and figure out how nutrients and bioactive components in the food turn on or turn off certain genes?

Kristen:                        Yes. The biggest amount of information we get is just a simple “Do they or do they not turn genes on or off?” So, how does each individual gene activity respond to what you're feeding? As we’re understanding that more and more, we can take a step back and start to understand how they're doing it. They are what we call signaling pathways, which are like, if you set up a row of dominoes and you hit the first one, it sets everything off. It’s the same thing with gene activity. There is a series of molecules that are responsible for regulating or activating other ones. And we can start to decipher how we get from the nutrient that we’re feeding or the diet we're feeding to that endpoint, that last domino in the line.

Tom:                            You can actually target issues that call for some kind of nutritional intervention?

Kristen:                        Yes. And that's obviously one of the most exciting applications of this research. We can use this to define precision nutrition.

                                    One of the challenges with feeding animals, or people in general, is that there are so many environmental factors that influence how an animal responds to diet — things like illness and disease, but also production state, where they're living, what their basal diets are. And so, we can use this technology to get precise information on how we can use nutrition to get the best performance or best health out of that animal.

Tom:                            How do you carry out your research? What goes on in Kristen Brennan’s laboratory?

Kristen:                        It’s magic! This research is done in several steps. It’s really a team effort. The simplest study we have is between two groups of animals, and because so many things could influence gene expression, we want to make sure that those two groups of animals are as identical as possible — same breed, sex, age, production state, and they’re housed in similar environments. The only thing we want different between those two groups is the nutrient we’re interested in.

                                    For instance, if we’re looking at a form of a mineral like selenium, we might have one diet that contains selenium in the form of sodium selenite, and we might have the exact same diet for the other group that has selenium in the form of organic selenium like our Sel-Plex® product. Once we have fed these diets for a given amount of time — it just depends on what we're interested in looking at, what tissues and what nutrients we’re evaluating — then we obtain a sample. It can be as simple as just a very tiny muscle biopsy or a few milliliters of blood. We bring that to the lab, and our laboratory technicians will essentially take that tissue, rupture the cellular membranes and then the nuclear membranes and purify what we call the mRNA, or the transcripts, that are located within the nucleus. We make sure that transcript, or a total RNA, is of super high quality and purity because these assays are so precise. We have high standards for what we can use.

                                       And then we use a commercially available DNA microarray. And what that allows us to do is profile. It has probes for each gene on the animal's genome — for example in the case of a chicken, it has something like 18,000 probes — and that allows us to measure whether the mRNA, or the transcript, for each of those genes has been increased or decreased in response to the nutrient that we fed.

                                       At the end, we get a long spreadsheet that says gene A is increased, gene B unchanged, gene C is decreased.

                                       Then the tough part comes, and that is the data analysis. So, we have all of these data points — you’re talking about thousands — and it is sort of like taking one of those huge puzzles. If you took that box of puzzle pieces and threw it on the ground, you would just have a giant mess, right? When I get that Excel spreadsheet of thousands of rows and columns, that’s what it’s like, essentially. So, we need help to try to piece those puzzle pieces together. If we took one piece out, we might find a corner and that's really important. Just like if I look at that spreadsheet, I might find a gene that's very important, that's very highly increased or decreased. That's a starting point.

                                    What we really need to do to see the big picture is piece those puzzle pieces together. We use what we call bioinformatics — essentially biological statistics — and we use software programs that say, okay, these 100 genes are related, they all have a common biological function, and based on their activity, we predict that biological function to increase or decrease. And that helps us make sense of this information.

                                    So, just like piecing those puzzle pieces together, we get that big picture of what's going on inside an animal that results in what we're seeing on the outside like improved growth, or improved feed efficiency, or improved markers of health.

Tom:                            I'm under the impression that the “Holy Grail” for you would be to find and establish a link between nutritional genomics approaches and applied nutritional research. Can you explain?

Kristen:                        Sure. The ultimate goal, at least in my view, for nutrigenomics is when we do traditional nutrition studies, we take an experimental diet, we feed it to an animal and we look at a phenotypic output. So, what do we see in the whole animal? That might be body weight change, growth rates, feed efficiency — things we can measure in the whole cow or by just looking at the animal. We might look at blood markers, stuff like that. What often is lacking and what we can use nutrigenomics for is, how do we get from point A to point B? How do we get from feeding this diet to the response in the whole animal?

                                       What nutrigenomics gives us is a tool to look at a molecular reason for those changes. We can use nutrigenomics to figure out, are we affecting energy expenditure in the cell? Are we affecting protein translation in the muscle? Things like this can help us explain what we're seeing in that animal instead of just guessing on how something works.

Tom:                            Does this technology, nutrigenomics, reduce our reliance on large-scale animal studies, and is it less invasive than the traditional approach?

Kristen:                        I think so. When we do these studies, we can work with a much smaller number (of animals) per treatment. So, where you might need hundreds of animals to get, say, carcass quality measurements that are significant, we can use six or 10 animals per treatment and still get some of the same information that would explain why we see changes in a large animal. Obviously, they're complementary, but we use this technology to minimize the number of animals we need per treatment.

                                      The other advantage is the obtaining of samples. We don't need a whole kilo of skeletal muscle to do our analysis. We need a tiny amount. So, that really is noninvasive. We can use a simple blood draw that is noninvasive and get this information out of that.

Tom:                            The 21^st century farm is a changed place compared with that of the previous century. A big reason for that is the arrival of a lot of science, technology and big data. If we were to take your science, nutrigenomics, out of the laboratory and into the farm, how would producers use what you've learned?

Kristen:                        I think one of the major ways they can use it is precision nutrition — really formulating diets to meet the actual needs of an animal. And also to understand the form versus function of different nutrients. So, how do we get the best that we can get out of an animal through nutrition? Nutrigenomics gives us that tool to understand how.

Tom:                            To carry that further, beyond helping to determine what will work for an animal's genetic type, is nutrigenomics helping explain why we need to find what works for a given animal?

Kristen:                        Absolutely. And I think it really helps push the idea of precision behind nutrition. For so long, we've overfed nutrients. We haven't really paid attention to form versus function. Nutrigenomics is giving us reasons why form is so important in nutrients, and why precise levels are important. We're taking the guessing game out of animal nutrition.

                                       I think as our population grows and the need for food continues to increase, that really optimizing nutrition based on an animal’s genetic potential is going to be really, really important.

Tom:                            How can this genomic information help us better understand nutrition and nutrient science?

Kristen:                        That’s a great question. This gives us a good understanding of the hidden effects of nutrition — the things that we don't really understand; why we see the changes. Why are we seeing increased energy efficiency with different forms of selenium, for instance? If we just look at our traditional nutrition research, we have no idea. But we use nutrigenomics to say, “Okay, well, the genes that control, say, mitochondrial growth in the skeletal muscle in the animals are turned on by Sel-Plex, and that explains why we see changes in energy expenditure.”

                                       That’s the type of stuff that we can get through traditional animal nutrition research, and nutrigenomics really helps push that information ahead and gives us a better understanding of how nutrients function — things that we can't see by just looking at an animal.

Tom:                            One final question: Among the things that you're working on right now, what really interests you and excites you?

Kristen:                        Everything, as a true scientist! One of the areas that I'm completely fascinated by, and have been for years — and we've done quite a bit of work on it, but it's just something that I start to think about and almost gives me a headache — is the idea of nutritional programming. This is the concept of how early life nutrition — whether that's in a neonatal animal or even in the gestating diet, looking at offspring — how nutrition early in life influences an animal throughout its lifespan.

                                    We've done a lot of work to look at some of the things that happen, like gene expression changes that occur. When we change the diet of an animal in the first 96 hours of life, those patterns and the changes stay with that animal throughout its lifespan, and that completely fascinates me.

                                       I think that's an application that is something that can be applied through all different species of animals, whether that’s livestock or even humans. We think about how you are what you eat, but you're also what your mother ate and what her mother ate and then maybe what her dad ate. It starts to really fascinate you. So, that’s probably one the most exciting areas that we work on.

Tom:                            Dr. Kristen Brennan is a research project manager at the Alltech Center for Animal Nutrigenomics and Applied Animal Nutrition in Nicholasville, Kentucky. Thank you for joining us.

Kristen:                        Thank you.

Looking for more information on the science and business of agriculture? Click here. 

Discussion topics to include digital technologies, superior eggs, meat quality and the use of antibiotics  

Register before March 31 at  one.alltech.com for savings of $400

[LEXINGTON, Ky.] – Poultry producers and industry experts from around the world will gather at ONE: The Alltech Ideas Conference (ONE18), held May 20–22 in Lexington, Kentucky, to share ideas and discuss advancements in the industry.

ONE18 poultry focus sessions include*: 

• Flocking to Digital: 8 Disruptive Digital Technologies

• Hatching a Plan for Superior Eggs

• Winner Winner Chicken Dinner

• Less is More: Going Organic to Improve Profitability

• Cleaner Meat

• Clearing up Confusion: Therapeutic Antibiotics

The poultry industry is seeing a 50-gram increase in weight for a 42-day-old bird every year. By using perinatal nutrition to guide epigenetic responses, we can improve the quality, immunity and adaptability of these rapidly growing birds before they even hatch.

Tom:                            Dr. Peter Ferket is a professor of nutrition and biotechnology in the department of poultry science at North Carolina State University and the author of more than 500 publications and seven patents. He is known for his work on perinatal nutrition and development and other nutritional factors that affect the yield and quality of meat, nutritional value of food, industry coproducts and nutrient management. He’s here to talk to us about improving the quality of chickens and turkeys before they hatch.  Thank you for joining us.

Peter:                          Thank you, Tom.

Tom:                            First, let’s take a look in the rearview mirror. How far have we come in poultry?

Peter:                          When you consider what the poultry industry has done over the past 60 years or so, it’s been nothing short of amazing. Sixty years ago, to get to our consumer-size market, it took 12 weeks. It was just a small, scrawny, little bird. But that same 4-pound broiler chicken today can do this in almost 30 days.

                                       When you think about the genetic potential for growth for these amazing animals, we are seeing about a 1 percent improvement in live performance every single year. That’s a 50-gram increase in weight for a 42-day-old bird or market bird every year.

                                      This is quite an amazing challenge as well. With the genetic potential of these birds, it’s actually more difficult to understand how to feed and to meet the nutritional requirements for that rapidly growing animal.

Tom:                            Do you attribute this to genetic science? 

Peter:                          Yes. We have learned a lot about not only selecting and understanding variability and selecting animals for certain growth, but now, because of the genetic science and being able to understand the gene and blueprints that are associated with it, being able to measure certain traits and select for those, this is still a natural selection kind of science.

                                       But because we have the tools, we can rapidly meet those needs and get traits that are desirable for not only the welfare of the animal, but their growth performance, meat quality, et cetera.

Tom:                            What’s the difference between genetics and epigenetics?

Peter:                          Epigenetics is the expression of the genes. So, genes are like the blueprint. Epigenetics is like taking a part of that gene or that blueprint and actually creating something, like going to work and building a house. You start with a blueprint, but the “carpenters” go to work and take that blueprint and begin to produce a product.

                                       Epigenetics takes a certain part of that gene and now says, “Okay. I need to express that part and turn it into proteins, turn it into something that can now create what you’re really meaning to create.” It’s the phenotypic type of response. What we call “phenotype” is creating what the bird looks like, behaves like and grows like.

Tom:                            Does the genetic technology CRISPR come into play?

Peter:                          That is a technique of trying to now modify that gene and how that expresses. So, we’re still starting to learn how to do that with animals. We’re using it with lots of plants now. This is a very new technique that allows us to now modify the gene. So, you’re not actually doing a gene modification. The CRISPR just says, “Let’s take out a piece that’s not functioning well and make it work better.”

Tom:                            Interesting. What kind of impact can nutrition have especially in the early life of a bird?

Peter:                          You’ve heard the saying, “You are what your mama ate.” And very often, when we are young — it doesn’t matter if it’s a human, a chicken or even a plant as it’s just beginning to grow — we need to sense what the environment is like and then adapt by epigenetic responses to the environment so that we’re adapted to the life we’re going to be in.

                                    With early nutrition, we can do certain things like provide nutrients at critical periods of time so the genes are expressed in a way that we’d like — more adapted to the environment that that animal is going to grow in.

                                      For example, if we want — I’m talking physiological kinds of response — if we want an animal to be more adapted to hot weather, you expose it to hot weather for a short period of time when it’s young. If we want to now create something where an animal is more efficient in a specific nutrient, we can actually reduce the nutrient, make that animal work a little bit harder for that, and it up-regulates parts of its genome or its gene expression and machinery so that it’s more efficient to get those nutrients, and that very often lasts for the rest of their life.

                                      So, with early nutrition, we have an opportunity to manipulate the nutrition, the physiology and those kinds of things in a way that they are better adapted for life later.

Tom:                            I want to get to something that I mentioned in the introduction. Can we begin getting that bird off to a good start even before it hatches?

Peter:                          Yes. That’s the amazing thing that we’ve been working on for the past almost 10 years. What we first found out is that the chicken’s first meal is not its first mouthful of food when it hatched. Like all of us when we’re embryos, we’re surrounded by amniotic fluid. It’s that fluid that surrounds that embryo. The chick, as well as humans and others, swallow that amniotic food just before they’re either hatched or born. That amniotic fluid contains nutrients that the mother or the dam provides. But, sometimes it’s deficient in certain things or doesn’t have the certain trace minerals or nutrients required to turn on the “machinery” so that the animal develops well. So, we now supplement that first meal — the amniotic fluid. When that chick consumes it, it gets a better complement of the nutrients that it needs to grow.

Tom:                            What is the outcome? What is the difference that you see?

Peter:                          We use nutrigenomics to test metabolism, and we found that if we want an animal to have better immunity, we know there are certain kinds of components that we can put in the diet — or in that amniotic in ovo feed, as we call it — that would up-regulate some aspects and balance nutrition or immunity. We got development to be better.

                                      We can add in certain nutrients that will help the growth of those enterocytes — the gut cells. Or if we want better breast muscle development, or better behavior in some ways, or have animals be more alert, there are certain critical nutrients that we know that play an important role in the metabolism that influences those traits.

Tom:                            What is nutritional imprinting, and what kind of an impact does that have on the bird?

Peter:                          Nutritional imprinting is much like the epigenetics story. Imprinting is an adaptive conditioning using nutrition to allow it to adapt to what we would like. So, for example, I would like to imprint an animal that’s more efficient in phosphorus utilization. That’s a good thing because dietary phosphorus is expensive. If you can improve phosphorus utilization, you have less going into the environment.

                                       Imprinting would be for a short period of time when they’re very young. You feed a diet that is very low in phosphorus, and that allows the animal’s system to say, “I need more phosphorus. I’m going to up-regulate my systems to be more efficient for phosphorus utilization.” That imprints them for the rest of their life.

                                       Imprinting is something that’s biologically very conserved in nature — like imprinting, let’s say, a child on a mother. That occurs very young. Same thing whether it’s imprinting to some sort of an environmental temperature. We can do the same thing with nutrition. We can imprint animals for certain nutritional things that we would like to make things more efficient later in life.

Tom:                            How do these genetic and nutritional technologies affect the average consumer’s dinner table?

Peter:                          I think people are, first of all, concerned that we’re manipulating genes. No, these are just natural genes that you and I all have.

                                    But now we’re starting to understand what turns on a gene for the good and what turns on a gene for the bad. By doing that, we can feed an animal in a way that they will be better adapted for the life that they’re going to be in. That’s good because you can now make sure that the animal has better welfare, that the food, for instance, would be healthier and that the animal is more resistant to diseases.

                                       There are a number of things that, in the end, turn out being very good for the consumer. A big active part of my work is trying to find techniques and ways to enhance the animal’s resistance to enteropathogens so that we don’t have to put antibiotics in feed. We can use natural compounds in the diet together with the animal’s own system to be able to maintain health without having to rely on things like we have in the past, like antibiotics and drugs.

Tom:                            It sounds like really interesting work. What do you enjoy most about it?

Peter:                          You know, the most enjoyable thing is the research. Yes, those are exciting things. But the most exciting thing about my work is that I’m a teacher. I’m a professor. It’s about instilling dreams into our students’ minds, the creativity, what’s possible, taking something that we know in science and letting them loose to create an opportunity. I think that’s the thing that just makes me go to work every day with tremendous joy. I can see my students and those around me use some of the information that we learn in science to create and do better things. I always tell my students, “Take this and go save the world.”

Tom:                            Dr. Peter Ferket, professor of nutrition and biotechnology in the department of poultry science at North Carolina State University. Thank you so much for joining us.

Peter:                          You’re welcome, Tom.

Dr. Peter Ferket spoke at ONE: The Alltech Ideas Conference (ONE17). To hear more talks from the conference, sign up for the  Alltech Idea Lab.

The following is an edited transcript of Tom Martin’s interview with Dr. Karina Horgan, associate research director for Alltech Life Sciences in Dunboyne, Ireland.

Tom:                        Editing genes to produce designer chickens. We’re talking about it with Dr. Karina Horgan, head of Alltech Life Sciences research in Europe, based in Dunboyne, Ireland. Thank you for being with us.

Karina:                       It’s a pleasure to be here.

Tom:                          Dr. Horgan, we’re going to be talking about CRISPR chicken. And to be clear for our listeners, not “crispy” chicken, but the new technology that enables us to create better chickens genetically. Give us some background on this gene-editing technology that’s making a mark in agriculture and poultry, in particular.

Karina:                       To begin with, we in molecular biology seem to like our acronyms. CRISPR means “clustered regular interspaced short palindromic repeats.” That doesn’t really make it any clearer for anybody, but this technology was discovered initially in bacteria. When viruses invaded bacteria, scientists took some of the DNA that the viruses shot into the bacterial cells, incorporated it into their genome in these short repeat sequences and then they store it as a memory. So, when the same virus attacks the bacteria again, they had to produce what they call guide RNAs, which directed a protein that cuts DNA to the invading viral DNA and just literally chopped it up.

I think in 2013, scientists began to use this in mammalian cells to edit genomes and create mutations within cells. It’s only been recently — I think last year (2016) — that the first publication of using CRISPR in poultry was actually published by a group in Japan.

Tom:                          Would you say the implications of this technology for agriculture are profound?

Karina:                       Absolutely, but it has its challenges as well, and people’s perception of genetically modified organisms or plants hasn’t been very good in the past. It’s on us, the ag scientists, to create more awareness of what we’re doing. In some jurisdictions, the perception of GMs or GMOs is that they’re only considered GMOs if you’re taking DNA from one species and putting it into a different species. Whereas if you’re creating a mutation within a species or taking DNA from that species into the same species, they’re not considered GMs or GMOs. In fact, the USDA has recently approved the use of CRISPR — they don’t consider it to be a GMO in non-browning mushrooms.

Tom:                          What changes are brought about by these genetic modifications?

Karina:                       They can vary vastly. You can create just a single mutation to stop a gene being expressed.  I think this is probably significant for the beef industry in that they’ll be able to change the expression level of a particular gene that stops increases in muscle mass. The other area — which I think is fascinating in terms of safer food and reducing infection in animals — you’ll be able to introduce a CRISPR system into poultry so that, for example with the bird flu virus, this CRISPR complex will be able to recognize the DNA from this virus and destroy it before it infects the bird. So, if you think in terms of the impact that bird flu is having on the poultry industry, to be able to deal with that almost straightaway will have a huge effect in terms of profitability for poultry producers.

Tom:                          Of course, there’s a great deal of concern these days about antibiotics. Does it have an implication there?

Karina:                       It potentially does in that if you have a bird that’s more resistant to disease, particularly salmonella or an E. coli infection, you won’t need to use antibiotics to treat those types of diseases. So, yes, definitely it would.

Tom:                          What would be the benefits to producers?

Karina:                       To producers, you would have healthier birds that wouldn’t be susceptible to disease.

 The other area that I find fascinating in this is the concept of using hens as bioreactors. Hens produce something like 300 eggs per year. I think there are 4 grams of egg white in every egg. Because there are so few proteins in the egg white, it’s easy to purify genetically modified protein in there. So, if you think in terms of the costs of some of the immunotherapies that people need at the moment, if you can get a hen to produce potentially 300 grams of this every year, the cost savings for humans and the medical industry is quite dramatic.  

Tom:                          Taking this from the coop to the kitchen table, what are the implications for human consumption?

Karina:                       Potentially, you’re looking at less fatty, healthier meat. Reducing issues with food safety in terms of the impact of Salmonella or Campylobacter. So, there’s less risk of food poisoning for people.

 If you’re able to produce a bird with less input — less water, less feed — you potentially have 10 percent more meat protein for people. Jack Bobo spoke about 9 million people dying annually from starvation. So, by increasing production or increasing chicken protein by 10 percent, that means 900,000 people who, potentially, wouldn’t starve.

Tom:                          A reduction in the waste of water is also critical, right? How has this CRISPR technology impacted the field of biology?

Karina:                       In terms of publication and the amount of funding that is going into CRISPR technology, it has risen dramatically in the last 12 to 24 months. What I see as exciting is that currently a lot of the animal models used to test drugs are mice-based. Mice are genetically quite different from humans. If you could create a model animal that was more similar to humans, where you could test new drug developments on diseases like Alzheimer’s, models that were more humanized, the success rate for development of new drugs should increase. At the moment, I don’t think there is any successful treatment for Alzheimer’s disease on the market, so these types of technologies and development of better disease models would help drug manufacturers to develop a more successful drug more quickly.

Tom:                          Fascinating. What kinds of market disruptions can we anticipate?

Karina:                       Another area I think is fascinating is the treatment of malaria and HIV. The hope with this technology is that you’d be able to alter immune cells so they wouldn’t be infected by HIV virus. If you think about the number of people who are killed every year by malaria, could we engineer a mosquito that doesn’t produce malaria or that doesn’t infect people with malaria? And in terms of illness of people in a population, that will be quite a shift in terms of how an insect, mosquitoes as one example, would affect that whole population. 

Tom:                          Those are some incredibly important diseases. What is the likelihood of reaching that level?

Karina:                       I think it’s very, very likely. From the reading and research I’ve done, the most difficult of the animals to engineer were actually the avian genome. A lot of the work has been done with insects in the past, and Drosophila, the fruit fly, would have been one of the model organisms for a lot of the genetic engineering. So, I think it’s definitely a strong possibility. 

Tom:                          Are you working with this technology in your labs in Dunboyne?

Karina:                       No. We don’t use it in Dunboyne. I guess the ethos of Alltech is “Alltech, naturally.” So, we try to steer clear of genetic modification of organisms, but it’s very important for us to keep abreast of what technology is out there and what’s happening in the poultry industry in particular. Why are we interested in CRISPR, then? Birds may be less resistant to disease, but they’ll still have to reach a market weight so that there is profitability for producers. That’s the nutrition aspect, and what Alltech specializes in, and it will still be important.

Tom:                          What ag-tech trends most excite you these days?

Karina:                       A lot of the work I do is looking at gut health in animals, and a lot of those are impacted by diseases like salmonella, E. coli, Campylobactersand some viruses.

Two years ago, a group here in the U.S. had developed a pig that was resistant to the PRRSV (porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome) virus. I find it fascinating that they have done that much work with immunology to be able to identify what exactly is being affected by the viruses, what genes and tissues they target and whether you can alter the genome of the pig so that it doesn’t get infected by it. I think it’s absolutely fascinating.

Tom:                          It is fascinating. What about your work do you enjoy most?

Karina:                       No two days are the same. That’s the beauty of research and in working at Alltech, too — you’ve heard (Alltech president and founder) Dr. Pearse Lyons say they move fast with everything they do. At the moment, I’m working on gut health, but I also do some work with yeast. I’m also starting a project with nematodes. It’s quite diverse. You never get to sit still with any one project — it’s constantly moving. That’s one of the beauties of working in Alltech for sure.

Tom:                          Dr. Karina Horgan, head of Alltech Life Sciences research in Europe. Thank you so much.

Karina:                       Oh, you’re very welcome. It’s a pleasure.

Dr. Karina Horgan spoke at ONE: The Alltech Ideas Conference (ONE17). To hear more talks from the conference, sign up for the  Alltech Idea Lab.