College News

Research team receives $11.3 million grant to establish infectious disease research center

The National Institutes of Health is awarding a Kansas State University-led team of veterinary researchers with a prestigious five-year, $11.3 million grant under the Centers of Biomedical Research Excellence, or COBRE, program to establish a new Center on Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, or CEZID.

The center will comprise four primary research projects that will bridge areas of excellence in the collective infectious diseases programs at Kansas State University involving the colleges of Veterinary Medicine and Arts and Sciences.

“The overarching goal of the CEZID is to advance our overall understanding of emerging and zoonotic infectious

diseases based on research performed in the state of Kansas,” says Dr. Jürgen Richt, Regents distinguished professor at Kansas State University and a Kansas Bioscience Authority eminent scholar in the College of Veterinary Medicine.

The success and growth of CEZID will be enabled through faculty mentoring, new faculty recruitment, a pilot grant program that will fund smaller projects at universities in the state of Kansas, a regional scientific network that will provide interdisciplinary and interinstitutional collaborations, and training opportunities at universities in the state of Kansas and surrounding states.

Master of Public Health program launches online option for prospective students

K-State’s Master of Public Health (MPH) program, working in conjunction with K-State Online, is offering a new online degree option. The new online program includes faculty from 12 departments in five colleges. This interdisciplinary program is designed for individuals currently employed in or anticipating a career in public health.

Online students can choose from two areas of emphasis. The first is food safety and biosecurity, which focuses on food safety, globalization and how international trade cooperation influences public health. The second area of emphasis is public health nutrition, which examines the role of nutrition in public health and population-based nutrition programs. In addition, students will be expected to complete a public health practice project during the program.

“We’re excited to partner with the MPH program to offer this opportunity to any interested students, regardless of their physical location,” says Katie Linder, executive director at K-State Online. “The COVID-19 pandemic has ushered in a renewed focus on the societal importance of public health professionals, and we’re proud to help lead the effort to prepare the next generation of this industry.”

CVM faculty among top global researchers in recent study

Fourteen researchers connected with the CVM were included on a list of 93 Kansas State University faculty members that were noted as being among the top 2% of researchers in the world, according to a 2020 study done by Stanford University. Some of the cited faculty members are retired/emeritus and not currently on the faculty in 2021.

The study determined the researchers included by most research citings for scientists around the world. The exhaustive list includes 159,683 persons.

Many disciplines are represented by K-State faculty on the list, including veterinary science, toxicology, tropical medicine, physiology and anatomy in the CVM. From the rest of the university, other fields included entomology, food science agronomy and agriculture, marketing, microbiology, family studies, and materials.

“I’m surprised and honored to be named in such an elite list of world researchers,” says Dr. James Roush, interim associate dean for academic programs and student affairs. Dr. Roush is also the Doughman Professor in Small Animal Surgery. “It serves as a challenge to continue to add to the world’s scientific knowledge and to veterinary medicine.”

K-State research among first to analyze safety of industrial hemp as cattle feed

After the 2018 Farm Bill legalized hemp production in the U.S., interest has grown in industrial hemp as an agricultural commodity, including as feed for animals.

A team of K-State researchers received a $200,000 Agriculture and Food Research Initiative Competitive Grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture to establish concentrations of cannabinoids in livestock after exposure to industrial hemp. Industrial hemp is typically grown to produce oil, seed, fiber and medicines. While varieties of hemp may be planted for a single or dual purpose, byproducts consisting of leaves, fodder and residual plant fibers remain after harvest. These byproducts could serve as potential feedstuffs for animals.

While there is interest in the use of hemp for cattle feeds, there are questions about whether the feed can be used safely because of concerns about tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, intoxication and the presence of other bioactive cannabinoids. The hemp used in the studies was grown at K-State’s John C. Pair Horticultural Center near Wichita. K-State researchers involved include Dr. Michael Kleinhenz, Dr. Hans Coetzee, Shawnee Montgomery, Andrew Curtis, Miriam Martin, and Drs. Geraldine Magnin, Zhoumeng Lin, Steve Ensley,

Jason Griffin and Katie E. Kleinhenz. The research team also included Dr. John Goeser and Eva Lynch, Rock River Laboratories.

“We observed that the acidic cannabinoids, such as CBDA and THCA, are more readily absorbed from the rumen than other nonacid cannabinoid forms, such as CBD and CBG,” says Dr. Kleinhenz assistant professor of beef production medicine. “Now that we have found that some cannabinoids are readily absorbed from the rumen, the next steps are to study the tissue and milk residue depletion profiles of these compounds after animal feeding experiments. The effects of cannabinoids on cattle are also unknown.”

The two published studies are “Nutrient concentrations, digestibility, and cannabinoid concentrations of industrial hemp plant components,” which can be found in the journal Applied Animal Science, and “Plasma concentrations of eleven cannabinoids in cattle following oral administration of industrial hemp (Cannabis sativa),” which was published in Scientific Reports.

Dr. Hans Coetzee, left, and Michael Kleinhenz are studying the safety of using industrial hemp in feed for cattle.

Photo by Joe Montgomery.