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Wisconsin Ag News Headlines |
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UWP Student Researches Cure for Johne's Disease
Wisconsin Ag Connection - 03/31/2008
Johne's disease cost Wisconsin approximately $100 million in cattle losses every year. That's why Brooke Schmitz, a sophomore in animal science with emphases in science and dairy science at the University
of Wisconsin-Platteville, is doing something about it. Schmitz is working with Esther Ofulue, professor of biology, to find a cure for the disease.
"I work on a dairy so I see the effects of it on farmers. It's especially devastating to small farms. I wanted to be a part of helping stop this disease," said Schmitz.
Johne's is a bacterial disease of the intestinal tract that most commonly affects ruminant animals. Symptoms are diarrhea and rapid weight loss. Despite having a healthy appetite, the animals become emaciated
because nutrients can not be absorbed. Johne's can be transferred through the placenta at birth, through feces and milk. Currently, there is no cure or treatment for the disease, but there is a vaccine that is
given to one month old calves. The problem with the vaccine is the calves may already have been exposed to the disease before receiving the vaccine.
Schmitz is seeking a cure for the disease by creating Johne's resistant embryos. To do this, Schmitz takes unfertilized eggs from the ovaries of slaughtered cows. The eggs are then placed in a petri dish and
fertilized with commercial semen to produce an embryo. The Johne's vaccine is then given to early stage embryo.
Upon approval and receipt of a PURF grant, Schmitz will implant a vaccinated embryo into a cow that she will keep and care for at her home. A licensed vet will monitor the progress of the pregnancy. Once
the calf is born, Schmitz will expose it to Johne's. If the calf does not contract the disease, the project will be successful. Upon the project's success, Schmitz plans to publish the findings in agriculture journals
and make vaccinated embryos available to producers. Since the cattle would be resistant to Johne's for life, the cycle of the disease in the herd can be stopped. The benefit of this is that producers do not have
to continuously purchase vaccinated embryos. They only have to implant embryos until the disease is eradicated in the herd.
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