New Grants Awarded to Vet Med faculty - Drs. Khattar, Nelson, Samal & Zhu

December 20, 2017

The new year will be off to a fantastic start as several of our faculty received good news this week on the funding front.

Dr. Daniel Nelson receives a new USDA/NIFA grant with collaborator Dr. Kasey Moyes in the Department of Avian and Animal Sciences titled "PlyC: Use of a Recombinant Bacteriophage Endolyson as a Mastitis Therapeutic in Lactacting Dairy Cows" ($485,000).

Dr. Siba Samal and Dr. Sunil Khattar receive a new USDA grant ($500,000) to develop a structure-based vaccine bovine respiratory syncytial virus (BRSV). BRSV is a major cause of respiratory disease in cattle in the USA. Currently available vaccines for BRSV are not satisfactory. Dr. Samal and Dr. Khattar will use Newcastle Disease virus vector to develop a novel vaccine against BRSV, which will benefit the cattle industry in the USA.

Dr. Xiaoping Zhu receives a new NIH R21 exploratory research grant ($418,000) to understand how human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) evades functions of MHC class I-related molecules. HCMV is the leading viral cause of congenital birth defects and cause severe diseases in the immunocompromised patients and organ transplanted recipients. Understanding of the molecular mechanisms by which HCMV impairs functions of MHC class-related molecules may discover a novel mechanism of virus immune evasion, add new knowledge on viral parthenogenesis, and develop novel strategies on immunotherapy, passive immunization, and vaccine development.