Automated Assessment of Broiler Flocks to Safeguard Animal Well-being and Food Supply Chain, led by Yang Zhao of Animal Science; funded by USDA-AFRI

The U.S. broiler industry provides an affordable crucial protein supply to consumers. For the state of Tennessee, the annual direct and indirect economic impact of the poultry industry exceeds $9.9 billion, provides 42,000 jobs and is growing rapidly. At the same time, the broiler industry is not without challenges. These challenges include the ever-growing supply demand, shortage of skilled labor, drive for more efficient flock management and resource utilization, societal concerns over animal welfare, and resiliency to adverse conditions such as disease outbreaks or pandemic disruptions. Led by Yang Zhao in the Department of Animal Science, a team of UT faculty in the Departments of Animal Science, Biosystems Engineering and Soil Science, and Electrical Engineering and Computer Science are working collectively on an innovative USDA-AFRI funded project to enhance the automation and efficiency of broiler production to address these challenges. Specifically, the $1 million integrated project aims to develop a high-tech yet practical computer vision and artificial intelligence-based system to automatically and continuously monitor welfare and health status of the commercial broiler flocks. The system will provide an early warning about potential health issues of the birds to alert the producers who will in turn make timely intervention or management decisions. The automation also helps alleviate the need or degree of intensive human labor and potential disruptions to the food supply chain. Ultimately, innovation of this nature will lead to healthier animals, more efficient use of natural resources and hence lower carbon footprint, more secure food supply for consumers, less dependence on human and physical labor, and enhanced profitability for the farmers. This project represents an example of the recently launched UT Precision Livestock Farming initiative.

Vector Borne Diseases, Led by Sultana and Neelakanta

Hameeda Sultana is an associate professor within the Department of Biomedical and Diagnostic Sciences. Sultana’s lab is interested in the identification and characterization of novel therapeutic agents or targets to treat pan-flaviviral infections in humans and animals, which include mosquito-borne West Nile virus, Zika virus, Dengue viruses (Serotypes 1-4), and Tick-borne Langat and Powassan viruses that are related to tick-borne encephalitis viruses. She and her laboratory members focus on understanding the molecular mechanisms and signaling cascades that occur at the interface of pathogen-vector-vertebrate host interactions. Sultana identifies her lab’s immediate goal as identifying the arthropod exosomal proteins that facilitate flaviviral transmission and vector molecules that play important roles at the pathogen-vector-host interface. Sultana’s research is funded through an NIH R01 award.

Girish Neelakanta is an associate professor within the Department of Biomedical and Diagnostic Sciences. Neelakanta’ s lab studies human and animal tick-borne infectious diseases such as human anaplasmosis, Lyme disease, relapsing fever and Rocky Mountain spotted fever. He and his laboratory members use multidisciplinary approaches to characterize tri-partite interactions involving vector-host-pathogens at the molecular level. His lab has already characterized some interesting tick and bacterial molecules that could potentially be implemented in the development of vaccines against tick-borne diseases. The immediate goal of his lab is to test vaccine efficacy of these molecules in animal models. Neelakanta’s research is funded through an NIH R01 award.

Counteracting Excess Fat Accretion in Chicks and in Children through the Maternal Diet, Led by Brynn Voy, Department of Animal Science; funded by USDA-AFRI

Modern broiler chickens are incredibly efficient, but they still accumulate more fat than is physiologically necessary due to inadvertent consequences of selection for rapid growth. Even a modest misallocation of feed, the most expensive component of production, is a significant economic concern for the industry due to the scale of broiler production in the U.S. This waste will become even more significant as broiler production increases to meet the protein demands of a surging global population (fao.org). For very different reasons, accretion of excess adipose tissue early in life is a critical concern for humans. Approximately 27 percent of children in the U.S. and more than 30 percent in Tennessee are overweight or obese by age five (cdc.gov), making them approximately five times more likely to be obese as adults, and to suffer cardiovascular disease, diabetes and a myriad of other co-morbid conditions that impose profound health, economic and societal costs. Finding new ways to intervene and disrupt the trajectory toward early life obesity is a critical need for Tennessee, the U.S. and the growing list of other countries in which obesity is becoming epidemic. With funding support from USDA-AFRI, Brynn Voy of the Department of Animal Science leads a team from UT, the University of Georgia and Uppsala University that focuses on the maternal diet, whether in hens or humans, as a way to program adipose tissue development in ways that counteract the tendency for obesity. This research integrates genomics, metabolomics, nutrition and physiology to identify control points in the molecular pathways that control adipose development, and how they can be manipulated through the early life diet to prevent excess fat deposition in both chicks and children.

Scientific Discovery Solving Major Agricultural Problems, led by Tarek Hewezi, Department of Plant Sciences

The SCN projects are supported by funds for Tennessee Soybean Promotion Board and by Agriculture and Food Research Initiative competitive grant no. 2018-67013-27822 from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

The Southern root-knot nematode project is supported by funds from California League of Food Producers and The UT Research Foundation Maturation Grant.

Soybean is a major agricultural crop in Tennessee and in the United States with 85.4 million acres harvested in 2021. Soybean is the number one cash crop in Tennessee, with more than 1.8 million acres planted in 2021, producing more than 76 million bushels, valued at approximately $1 billion according to USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service. Millions of people rely on soybean as a feed for livestock, a source of protein and a biofuel source. Thus, continued economical sustainability of soybean production in the United States is of ultimate importance, particularly with increasing global demand for soybean ingredients. While many efforts have been made to optimize and improve soybean yield, significant yield losses are frequently observed in almost all soybean growing regions due to infection by a tiny worm, called cyst nematode. Since the first report in the United States in 1955, soybean cyst nematode (SCN) has spread to nearly every soybean producing county, causing annual yield losses estimated at $1.5 billion. Using nematode resistant cultivars is the primary approach to control nematode infestation. However, all commercial soybean cultivars grown in the United States and considered resistant became gradually more susceptible to cyst nematode. To solve this growing and costly resistance problem, Tarek Hewezi in the Department of Plant Sciences discovered more than 10 novel soybean genes that confer extreme resistance to SCN. Experimental data confirmed the function of these novel genes against the most virulent races of SCN. The discovery of these novel genes represents a breakthrough for soybean variety development with broad-spectrum SCN resistance using transgenics, genome editing or traditional breeding. The use of these novel resistance genes individually or in combination is expected to provide high level of protection against SCN for decades. Hewezi’s lab and the UT Research Foundation (UTRF) are collaborating with seed company GDM to bring new cultivars with SCN resistance to the market in the next few years.

Another nematode species with major economic significance is the southern root-knot nematode, which infects more than 2,000 plant species and causes worldwide annual yield loss of more than $170 billion. This pest poses a real threat to agricultural production as it infects almost all vegetable and crop plants together with the absence of reliable genetic resistance. This pest injects a cocktail of pathogenicity factors into plant root cells. Once inside plant cells, these nematode pathogenicity factors interact with plant proteins, alter their functions and cause disease. To identify novel sources of genetic resistance to southern root-knot nematode, the Hewezi lab used nematode pathogenicity factors as probes to identify tomato susceptibility genes. His team identified more than 100 tomato susceptibility genes targeted by nematode pathogenicity factors. In a breakthrough discovery, his team found that partial inactivation of some of these genes not only enhanced tomato resistant to this devastating parasite but also increased plant growth and development. Currently, the Hewezi lab is working towards producing stable genome-edited tomato lines in which these genes are stably inactivated. This will provide opportunities to integrate nematode resistance into susceptible elite tomato cultivars. This is important for Tennessee, which ranks third nationally for tomato production behind only California and Florida. Because of the ability of southern root-knot nematode to infect more than 2,000 plant species, the tomato susceptibility genes are more than likely conserved across plant species. Therefore, homologous genes can be used to engineer resistance to this damaging soilborne pest in vegetable, crop and ornamental plants, making this discovery of broader impact on agriculture.