Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station, University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture
Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences

A newsletter for faculty, staff and students

July-August 2004 • Vol. 30, No. 4

People and Events

Departments, Centers, Branch Stations, other units and individuals may submit items to Amalie Holland, AGCS, AGRI 110 (ahollan@uark.edu). Eligible items include recent unit events, coming events, invited presentations, awards, foreign trips, election to leadership positions, new faculty and staff, retirements, etc. Include jpg photos @72 dpi.

Agricultural and Extension Education

Projects produced by Agricultural Communication Services received four first place awards and a total of eight awards at the National Agricultural Alumni and Development Association (NAADA) awards banquet June 14 in Mobile, Ala. Winning projects were produced by Judy Howard, Karen Eskew, Howell Medders and Fred Miller in AGCS; Development directors Chuck Culver and Mark Power; and a number of partners in other units including the Cooperative Extension Service Communications Division.

First place awards were for the Division of Agriculture 2003 annual report in the Development Projects, Annual Report category; the Center of Excellence for Poultry Science Web Page in the Student Recruitment and Placement category; the Arkansas Land and Life magazine in the category of Alumni and Donor Publications; and the Poultry Science Scholarship Golf Tournament brochure in the category for Development Projects, Donor Event Materials.

Second place awards were for the King Foundation Stewardship Report in the Development Projects, Stewardship Materials category, and the Cotton Branch Station Facilities Enhancement Gift Proposal in the Development Projects, Solicitation Materials category.

Third place awards were for the Center of Excellence for Poultry Science 2003 annual report in the Development Projects Annual Report category, and the Endowed Chair for Hospitality and Restaurant Management prospectus in the Development Projects, Solicitations Materials category.

Animal Science

Charles Maxwell was presented the prestigious Medal of Excellence award in May before an audience of 1,300 international delegates representing the global animal feed industry at the 20th International Feed Industry Symposium in Lexington, Ky. Dr. Maxwell received the award for his contributions to nutritional strategies for animal health and performance.

Dr. T. Pearse Lyons, left, Alltech president, presents the 2004 Alltech Medal of Excellence to Dr. Charles Maxwell at the 20th International Feed Industry Symposium.

Dr. Maxwell gave a keynote presentation on his research in nutrition strategies and other factors that affect the overall health of nursery pigs.

Research by Dr. Maxwell and doctoral graduate student Ellen Davis documented biological mechanisms that impact the immune system associated with the use of Bio-Mos®, which is a yeast product produced by Alltech. They found that Bio-Mos® provided health and performance benefits in sows and nursery pigs, including improved weaning weight, improved pre-weaning mortality and improved nursery weight.

Biological and Agricultural Engineering

Indrajeet Chaubey and Vijay Garg presented a research paper titled “Water quality modeling using hyperspectral remote sensing” on April 30 at the Twelfth Annual Arkansas Space Grant Symposium, Lyon College, Batesville. V. Garg and Dr. Chaubey coauthored a research paper titled “Hyperspectral remote sensing of chlorophyll-a for Beaver Reservoir, Arkansas” that was presented at the ASPRS Annual Conference May 23-28 in Denver.

Crop, Soil, and Environmental Sciences

David Longer was appointed by Provost Bob Smith to be co-director of the Wally Cordes Teaching and Faculty Support Center for three years beginning Aug. 16. Dr. Longer will split time between an office at the Center and his office in the Plant Sciences building. The Center provides a variety of services to improve teaching skills and the learning environment on campus. Other co-directors are Daniel Levine and Inza Fort.

Magnolia Ariza-Nieto, a doctoral candidate working with Vibha Srivastava, was presented the Wilton R. Earle Award for best research abstract at the 2004 annual conference of the Society of In-Vitro Biology in San Francisco. She made an invited oral presentation on her research work at the conference and was awarded a travel grant by the society.

Chuck West, along with Mike Richardson from Horticulture and Charles Rosenkrans from Animal Sciences, hosted the Fifth International Symposium on Neotyphodium/Grass Interactions on May 23-26 at the UA Center for Continuing Education in Fayetteville. Seven volunteer papers were presented by them, as well as by Wayne Coblentz and Stacey Gunter from Animal Sciences, John Jennings from the Extension Service, and students Margaret Secks and Rachel Carson. (See UA shows non-toxic endophyte at international symposium.)

Chuck West describes pasture management for ArkPlus tall fescue infected with a non-toxic endophyte, on a farm tour hosted by John Spain, during the Fifth International Symposium on Neotyphodium/Grass Interactions.

Two CSES students were among four that were invited to make oral presentations at a symposium sponsored by the Cell and Molecular Biology Program May 11 in Fayetteville. Each student received a $100 prize for being selected as a speaker. Mustafa Morsy presented a talk at the symposium titled "Identification and characterization of cold responsive genes in rice," co-authored by J. McD. Stewart and B.G. de los Reyes. Bill Hendrix presented the paper, "The role of fungal cell wall degrading enzymes in plant fungal resistance," also co-authored by Dr. Stewart.

Dr. Morsy was invited to give a presentation to the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences June 17 in Beijing. The title of his presentation was “Analysis of cold stress-induced gene expression in rice.” Dr. Morsy also received a travel award to present a poster, “Characterization of OsLti6, stress-regulated rice genes, encoding low molecular weight membrane protein” at the Gordon Research Conference for Salt and Water Stress in Plants in Hong Kong June 13-17. Drs. Stewart and de los Reyes were co-authors.

Wesner Antoine presented a poster titled, “OsSlt1 and OsSlt2: Rice orthologs of the slt gene family, a new heat shock protein family specific to plants” at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Meeting on “Chaperones and Heat Shock,” May 5-9 in Cold Springs Harbor, Mass. The presentation was co-authored by J. McD. Stewart and B.G. de los Reyes.

Food Science

Dr. Proctor

Andrew Proctor gave an invited presentation at a symposium, Renewable Resources and Energy, at the University of Natural Resources and Applied Life Sciences in Vienna June 4. The presentation was titled “The Potential for Renewable Materials From Rice Hulls in USA, with Specific Reference to Arkansas.” The meeting was sponsored by the Austrian Department of Agriculture, The Austrian Chemical Society and Austrian Biotechnology Society.

Dr. Proctor, Rahul Gangidi, Henry Lam and Mamun Monsoor gave presentations at the 2004 Annual Meeting of the American Oil Chemists Society (AOCS) in Cincinnati May 9th-12th. Mr. Gangidi, a graduate student, also received the 2004 AOCS Honor Student Award and was recognized by the AOCS Health and Nutrition Division as the 2004 recipient of their Student Excellence Award.

Susan Cannon and Luke Howard presented a Food Science in the Classroom workshop to high school teachers across the state. Michael Johnson, Cindi Brownmiller, Tonya Priesmeyer and Jean Anne assisted the teachers in conducting experiments.

Terry Siebenmorgen accepted an invitation to serve on the Oklahoma State University Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering Department Advisory Committee. The committee convened for its annual meeting on April 29-30 in Stillwater to review educational programs and establish future direction of the department.

Dr. Morris, Supreme Knight

Justin Morris was honored as a Supreme Knight of the National Brotherhood of the Knights of the Vine at the inaugural meeting of the Arkansas chapter in Altus.

The Department of Food Science honored faculty and students at the 3rd annual recognitions luncheon on April 29. Award recipients included: Greg Siragusa, Outstanding Alumnus; Navam Hettiarachchy, Outstanding Teaching; Justin Morris, Outstanding Research; Chris Petre, Outstanding Support; and Cathy Hamilton, special recognition.

The University of Arkansas Rice Processing Program held its Annual Industry Alliance Meeting on May 27-28 in Fayetteville. More than 70 industry and academic representatives from around the United States and the world convened to discuss recent advances in rice processing research. (See Rice growers, millers, users focus on quality at UA conference.)

Terry Siebenmorgen, left, coordinator of the University of Arkansas Rice Processing Program, and USDA scientist Michael Eustrom discuss rice quality research at the Industry Alliance Meeting.

The meeting, which was open to members of companies and organizations that support the program, consisted of representatives from 18 equipment and processing companies who attended technical sessions on pre-harvest property characterization, drying, storage, milling, sensory analysis and end-use processing.

Unique to this year's meeting was the addition of industry speakers Dr. Gary Hanning of Anheuser Busch and Mr. Don McCaskill of Riceland Foods, and keynote speaker Dr. Melissa Fitzgerald from the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in the Philippines.

Nora Watson, Linfeng Wang, Rusty Bautista, Canchun Jia, Derek Schluterman, Woo-Kyung Chung, Amy Matsler, Devon Cameron, Mohammed Saleh, Jean-François Meullenet, Dennis Gardisser, Andy Mauromoustakos, and Terry Siebenmorgen all made presentations at the meeting.

Horticulture

Dr. Clark

John R. Clark presented the talk “Breeding Southern Highbush Blueberries at the University of Arkansas, USA” at the 8th International Vaccinium Symposium May 1-5 in Lisbon, Portugal. He also visited fruit production and nurseries in southern Spain during his travel.

Dr. Karcher

Doug Karcher participated as an instructor in turfgrass schools for golf course superintendents and turf industry representatives in Hamburg, Germany, Konstanz, Germany and Bad Hall, Austria in May. While there, Dr. Karcher visited Richter Rasen, one of the largest sod operations in Europe. Dr. Karcher also spoke in Albany, Oregon at field days sponsored by turfgrass seed companies, Turf Merchants, Inc. and Seed Research. He presented information on evaluating turf varieties for drought tolerance.

Mike Richardson gave two formal presentations at the SERA-IEG Turf Meeting hosted by the University of Florida at the Milton experiment station near Pensacola. At the meeting Drs. Richardson and Karcher participated in an information exchange group consisting of turfgrass scientists from throughout the southern states. Dr. Richardson also presented a research summary at the Southeastern Conference Sports Turf Managers meeting in Athens, Ga.

Human Environmental Sciences

Mary Warnock served as chair of the International Division of The American Association of Family and Consumer Sciences at the association’s recent annual conference in San Diego. The International Division is promoting International Year of the Family activities and a project to identify and recognize deceased and living home economists who have served or are serving in the armed forces. Anyone with information about retired or deceased home economists who were veterans can contact Dr. Warnock in the School of Human Environmental Sciences, 479-575-4305.

Plant Pathology

Dr. Yang

Yinong Yang gave invited seminars on "Genetic and molecular dissection of defense signaling network in rice" at Temasek Life Sciences Laboratory, National University of Singapore May 6 and at the Department of Plant Protection, China Agricultural University in Beijing May 14. Dr. Yang also attended the 15th International Congress of Plant Protection while in Beijing May 11-16. He chaired the symposium session on "Functional genomics of host resistance" and presented an invited talk on "Defense signal interaction in disease resistance and abiotic stress tolerance."

Dr. Milus

Gene Milus hosted the annual meeting of NCR-184, Management of Small Grain Diseases, on campus May 12-14. Eighteen plant pathologists from 13 states participated. In addition to presentations and discussions, the group toured field plots at the University Farm.

Poultry Science

Walter Bottje gave an invited presentation, “Unraveling Feed Efficiency: A mitochondrial perspective,” at the Breeders Roundtable May 5-6 in St. Louis.

David Chapman was the key speaker at the European Coccidiosis Discussion Group Meeting in Weybridge, United Kingdom, on June 21st.

Cindy Cisar, post-doc with the Poultry Production & Product Safety Research Unit, has accepted an assistant professor position in the biology department at Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, OK. Cisar will be conducting research on microbial source tracking; the identification of sources of fecal pollution in water.

Jana Cornelison was one of only six students chosen nationally to participate in the first hatchery short course offered by Aviagen for students. It was a three-day intensive training program held in Talledega, Ala.

Ann Donoghue gave an invited talk on "Bacteriophage and Probiotics: Their role in the control of Salmonella in poultry" at the Fifth Asian Pacific Poultry Health Conference, Surfers Paradise, Australia, April 21-23. Co-authors were Bill Huff, Billy Hargis, Memo Tellez and Dan Donoghue. Ann Donoghue also presented an overview of the ARS research programs ongoing within the Center of Excellence for Poultry Science at the Breeders Roundtable Annual Meeting in St. Louis in May. She presenting ongoing research to the National Turkey Federation at their Leadership Conference in Washington D.C. in July.

Dan Donoghue gave an invited talk on "Competitive exclusion as a means of controlling Campylobacter in poultry" at the Fifth Asian Pacific Poultry Health Conference. Co-authors were Billy Hargis, Memo Tellez and Ann Donoghue. Dan Donoghue also gave an invited talk on "Risks and Benefits of Using Veterinary Drugs in Poultry" at the Seminario Internacional AMEVEA Peru in Lima, Peru, April 14-16th.

Gisela Erf gave an invited presentation in Istanbul, Turkey, on June 8th titled: “Anti flammatory and Immunoregulatory Effects of Vitamin E in Poultry.” This paper was presented during a pre-symposium at the World Poultry Congress sponsored by DSM Nutritional Products.

Karen Eskew received two first place awards and a third place for communication projects at the National Agricultural Alumni and Development Association (NAADA) awards banquet June 14 in Mobile, Ala. First place awards were for the Center of Excellence for Poultry Science Web Page in the Student Recruitment and Placement category, and the Poultry Science Scholarship Golf Tournament brochure in the category for Development Projects, Donor Event Materials. Third place was for the Center of Excellence for Poultry Science 2003 annual report in the Development Projects Annual Report category.

Brian Haggard conducted a rainfall simulation and water quality sampling for children at the Jones Center for Families in Springdale on June 30th. This event was part of an educational field day that Haggard has conducted for the past few summers.

Nahed Kotrola (Auburn University) and John Marcy conducted a sanitation workshop at Auburn University for Meat and Poultry Processors with Ecolab. Marcy, Rong Murphy and Laura Fenton - Director of Food Safety for Advance Foods, Enid, Okla., conducted two Food Safety Workshops in the People's Republic of China in Beijing and for the largest meat company in China, The Shineway Group in Luohe. Marcy also gave a presentation on Operation Food Safety at the University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension 21st Century Family Conference in Little Rock. Dale Fredell of Ecolab and Marcy conducted the first of two Principles and Applications of Cleaning and Sanitation workshops scheduled for 2004.

The United Egg Producers (UEP) has named Philip Moore to a scientific panel of experts with experience in air emissions from layer facilities and/or environmental policy/regulatory background. The panel’s mission will be to: a) assist the industry in defining the environmental issues it faces, b) serve as a clearinghouse for the industry regarding conducted research on the subject matter, and c) assist the industry in finding solutions to air emissions from layer operations in the future.

Casey Owens was an invited speaker at the American Meat Science Association’s 57th Reciprocal Meat Conference June 20-23 in Lexington, Ky. Owens’ presentation was titled “Tenderness Evaluation in Poultry Meat.”

Susan Watkins was an invited speaker for the Poultry Litter and Renewable Resource Seminar sponsored by the EPA Region 6 in Fayetteville on May 5th. Watkins also was an invited speaker at the North Atlantic Poultry Health and Management Conference in Harrisburg, Penn., May 11-12 and at the Propane Education and Research Council Meeting in Naples, FL. June 10-11, and at the AG Forte Grower’s Meeting in Sioux Falls, South Dakota June 29. Additionally, Watkins served on the U.S. Poultry and Egg Production and Health Planning Committee; helped coordinate the River Valley Poultry Symposium on May 27th; and served as the director of the National Egg Quality School May 17-20 in Atlanta, where 52 participants attended from around the world.