SUMMER / FALL 2002
Volume 3
Number 3

Curing What Ails Kentuckians

By Randy Weckman

In the United States Kentucky ranks:

• 8th in the prevalence of diabetes
• 4th in death rates for cancer
• 7th in death rates for heart disease, stroke, and other cardiovascular diseases

We have met the enemy and he is us.

That line from Walt Kelly’s Pogo comic strip tells us a great deal about the health of many of us in Kentucky. We are indeed our own worst enemies when it comes to doing the right things for our well-being. You might say that many of us in Kentucky are killing ourselves slowly.

On many, way too many, measures, Kentuckians are among those at the top of the list of death due to’s—due to heart attack, stroke, diabetes, and some cancers. A new initiative will help us lower Kentucky’s standing in the death due to’s by modifying our lifestyles.

The intent of the Kentucky Health Education Extension Leadership (HEEL) program is to help us live better and longer. Funded through an $800,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, a partnership between UK’s College of Agriculture and the Kentucky School of Public Health will educate Kentuckians on how to improve their health by changing the behaviors that adversely affect health—like smoking and eating too much of the wrong things. Sen. Mitch McConnell led the effort to secure the grant.

In the partnership, the Kentucky School of Public Health will provide the latest, science-based strategies and technologies for county Extension agents to use in educating Kentuckians about healthy lifestyles that help prevent diseases.

“County Extension agents have a long and successful history of providing people with information they need to make their lives better. The infrastructure of having Extension offices in each county, coupled with the dedication of Extension agents to teaching good ideas to people, will assure that information on living longer, healthier lives will be brought to the people of Kentucky.” said Bonnie Tanner, assistant director for Family and Consumer Sciences.
It was Tanner, along with Doug Scutchfield, M.D., director of the Kentucky School of Public Health, who had the idea to link the Cooperative Extension Service and the Kentucky School of Public Health to make Kentuckians a healthier lot.

“We in Extension have both the infrastructure and the know-how to bring new information to people where they live,” Tanner said. And the school of public health has the technical expertise of working with people to help them make vital health-care decisions. Together, we will help Kentuckians learn to take better care of themselves.”

Healthy Choices
The program, which will begin in July 2002, will work like this:
three health specialists—two headquartered in the Kentucky School of Public Health and one at Kentucky State University—and 10 health educators will work with Extension agents to put educational programs together to bring health information to the citizens of Kentucky.

Because lifestyle choices can a be touchy subject—it’s hard for people to listen to lectures about eating way too much for their own good or not exercising enough—the program will involve the expertise of UK sociologist Richard Clayton to teach agents how to talk with people about changing what sometimes is a lifetime of unhealthful habits.
“For most of us, it’s okay for someone to talk generally about lifestyle changes, but when it is about us, personally, it becomes meddling. Furthermore, it’s one thing to know that you need to change your behavior for your own good, butquite another to implement those changes on a continuing basis,” Clayton said. He also said that making better lifestyle choices can be tough for many reasons, including our own past.

“Genetically, we have the accumulation of thousands of years working against us. The truth is the selection of genes during those millennia has yielded a makeup that works great if you are chasing your food through the plains every day, but not well at all if you get your daily rations presented to you supersized,” he said.
Clayton sees his role as advising Extension agents on strategies to make an impact on individuals and ultimately on the health rates of the entire state.

“We can tell people at risk for diabetes, for example, to monitor their diets and activity levels, but unless we give them really basic methods such as how to keep records of their activities, they are likely to remain non-compliant. If we provide them with the recipe for success in fighting diabetes and other diseases, they are much more likely to make the lifestyle changes they need to be healthy,” he said.

High Rates, High Cost
Kentucky stands eighth in the United States in prevalence of diabetes. It also ranks fourth in the United States and Washington, D.C. in cancer death rates, with a third more cancer deaths than the national average. Just last year, 21,000 Kentuckians were diagnosed with cancer.
Kentucky ranks seventh in the nation in death rates due to heart disease, stroke, and other cardiovascular diseases. Each day, 43 Kentuckians die from cardiovascular disease.
Why?

Kentucky ranks among the leaders in the nation in the rates for smoking, obesity, poor nutrition, and inadequate exercise. Each of these behaviors is related to diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and cancer.
One estimate is that diabetes alone costs Kentuckians about $1.7 billion each year in medical care costs and loss of productivity. The most prevalent type of diabetes—Type 2, formerly known as adult onset diabetes—accounts for between 90 and 95 percent of cases and can generally be prevented, and often controlled, through healthy lifestyle choices. About 180,000 Kentucky adults (roughly six percent) have been diagnosed with diabetes; another 89,000 have diabetes but haven’t been diagnosed.
With an increased prevalence of obesity among youngsters, Type 2 diabetes is now being seen increasingly in children.

Type 2 diabetes is generally caused by a cluster of factors linked to obesity. A healthful diet coupled with a more active lifestyle can help prevent Type 2 diabetes—and sometimes even control it. The cost of treatment for one diabetic for one year is about $1,300 in insulin costs alone.
“The cost of preventing many of the diseases common in Kentucky is so much less than caring for people who develop them,” said Dr. Scutchfield. “If we were to take the cost of just diabetes alone in Kentucky and average it across all Kentuckians, each of us would pay more than $500 per year for it,” he said.
If 10 percent of the current number of Type 2 diabetics were able to avoid developing the disease—or were able to control it—through exercise and diet, the savings in medical costs would be many times (212 times) the cost of the entire program.

“Kentuckians cannot afford not to take better care of themselves,” Tanner said.

The Kentucky Uglies

But the HEEL program isn’t just about cost effectiveness in health care; HEEL involves wrestling and whipping what UK President Lee Todd calls the Kentucky Uglies. Pretty much since he became leader of the University, President Todd has been talking about marshaling the university’s talents toward fighting the Kentucky Uglies (including poverty, poor health care, and illiteracy). Collectively, these keep many Kentucky families at the low end of the social spectrum. This program focuses on one of those Kentucky Uglies: poor health, which affects the others in the Ugly family.
The Kentucky Uglies are an interrelated constellation of factors. People who don’t feel well often have poor work records. Poor work records manifest themselves in lower incomes, which in turn affect the ability to seek and pay for medical care. The cycle is vicious, if not pernicious.
“We can help people live healthier, more productive lives. And if we can do that, maybe can start to eliminate all of the Kentucky Uglies,” Tanner said.

The three specialists who will lead the Health Education Extension Leadership program (HEEL) come to the project with solid experience in both community health and education.
Two of them—Zaida R. Belendez and Linda A. Jackson Jouridine—will fill permanently-funded joint faculty positions in the UK College of Agriculture and the UK College of Medicine. The joint appointment signals a groundbreaking collaboration between the two colleges to help Kentuckians improve their health.
A third specialist, Vivian Lasley-Bibbs, will work out of the Cooperative Extension Program at Kentucky State University as KSU’s arm in the statewide project.

Belendez earned her bachelor’s degree from the University of Oregon and her doctorate in nursing from Case Western Reserve University.

Most recently Belendez was assistant professor in the UK College of Medicine’s Department of Preventive Medicine and Environmental Health and served as assistant director of Migrant Outreach Programs for UK’s Southeast Center for Agricultural Health and Injury Prevention. In that capacity she developed programs in health access for the Kentucky Children’s Health Insurance Program and outreach to disabled farm workers. Before holding that faculty position, Belendez was in the Kentucky’s Department for Public Health as a nurse consultant to First Steps, Kentucky’s early childhood intervention system.

Her current professional interests include developing a way to monitor injuries to farm workers and a recent application to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation for a grant to develop language services in Central Kentucky.
Jouridine was most recently in the Texas A&M University System as assistant professor and Extension health specialist for the Texas Agricultural Extension Service.

In that capacity she led in development of Extension educational programs on health and wellness with emphasis on maternal-child and adolescent health. She provided support to county Extension personnel in developing programs in areas including infant health, parent education, at-risk youth, maternal and child health, indoor air quality, and prevention of drug use.

Jouridine earned, from James Madison University, her bachelor’s degree in psychology and a master’s degree in counselor education. She earned her doctorate in counselor education from the University of Virginia. She has been a postdoctoral fellow in cardiovascular epidemiology at Howard University.
Vivian Lasley-Bibbs serves as the state Extension specialist for health at Kentucky State University, serving as a resource for county Extension offices. She is currently working with the Black Community Church Health Project, which is assessing how Kentucky compares to national figures that show a disparity in the health care provided to minorities compared to the general population.

Lasley-Bibbs earned a bachelor’s degree at Kentucky State University and a master’s degree in public health from the University of Michigan. She is also a graduate of the physician’s assistants program in the UK College of Allied Health.
She has worked as an epidemiologist for the Department of the U.S. Army at Walter Reed Army Institute of Research and at UK’s Markey Cancer Center in the Department of Pathology.

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The Value-Added Food Processing Incubator...

Where the Sage Meets the Sausage

Okay. You’ve got this really terrific idea. It’s for a new food product— something that could be even bigger than Kentucky Fried Chicken. (And get this, you’re the next Colonel Sanders.) But ... how do you put wings on an idea to let it fly?

if it’s food, if it’s a new concept, call Benjy Mikel.
Mikel, an animal scientist at the University of Kentucky Value-Added Food Processing Incubator, has developed a place where food entrepreneurs can get solid advice on bringing their new ideas to the marketplace.

What started in 1997 as a couple of Extension workshops for meat processors has grown since then—and it’s growing faster now—into a full-fledged, one-stop shop for budding food entrepreneurs. There they can try out their ideas to see if they really have the potential for moneymaking before they put their life savings into them.

The experts at the incubator work with people and their ideas. First, they eyeball the idea to see if it has merit for further scrutiny. If it’s worthy of proceeding, then they consider the cost of manufacturing the product, the marketing costs associated with bringing it to the marketplace, the per-item basis when the production lines are up and running, and whether the market niche is sufficient to support the product’s manufacture.

“We let our clients know at every step of the way what we believe needs to be done to get the product to the consumer. We act as consultants; we advise, but the clients make the decisions,” said Mikel. Mikel is a muscle foods specialist in the food science group within the Department of Animal Sciences whose own brainchild is the food science incubator program.

The Ultimate Test: Taste
The team at the incubator even puts new food products through the litmus test for foods: taste testing.
“If it doesn’t meet favorably with the consumer palate, you might as well go home. Consumers are more sophisticated than ever in their desire for foods. Not only do they want convenience, they want taste,” Mikel said.
Actually, new products go through a two-stage testing procedure for palatability: first with scientists whose training lends them some sense of what consumers want, then with real-life consumers.

“At the first stage, our scientists evaluate the product to see if a little tweaking here and there with spices or other ingredients would enhance its chances to make it in the marketplace,” Mikel said.
After tweaking—and usually several slightly different formulations come out of that process—the new food formulations are ready for the real test: consumers.

“We have our taste panels provide detailed information about each of the formulations of the product,” Mikel said.
If the product comes out of taste tasting with high marks, the team then considers packaging and labeling.
“Packaging includes how much product to put in each unit, which is usually determined by whether the product will be sold for the wholesale or retail trade, and how to package it for shelf life and storage ease,” Mikel said.
Labeling, he said, is pretty much driven by the federal laws pertaining to food commerce.
“We make sure that the package label meets federal guidelines, which can be complicated,” he said.

The Land-Grant Philosophy at Work
In its brief life, the incubator has worked with all types of clients, from Fortune 500 companies to mom-and-pop operations with hopes of becoming Fortune 500 companies (or at least enticing the Fortune 500 companies to do business with them).

“Each of our clients has different needs. Small businesses need expertise at all levels, and we give it to them. They use the whole panoply of our services—including help from our agricultural economists, packaging experts, processing people, you name it. The big firms use our services to help them with product formulation, which often involves making a quality product with least-cost ingredients,” Mikel said.

Mikel said that the incubator project embodies the land-grant university philosophy to a T.
“We provide the research and development to the little guys so they can compete with the big guys. And we are affordable,” he said.

So far, the services of the incubator remain free to all who ask for help, although Mikel said that the incubator has benefitted from grateful clients. “We started this with a $150,000 pot of seed money that Dr. Scott Smith provided (he was then associate dean for research; he’s now dean of the College). From there, clients have been very generous and we hope that remains the case so we can grow and become bigger and better. Clients who’ve used our services have donated a great deal of expensive equipment to help us improve our services,” he said.

The incubator program recently became one of the first projects in the state to be awarded a $75,000 grant through the Kentucky Innovation Act of 2000, which is designed to help Kentucky businesses create marketable products from cutting-edge research. The grant will be used to assist local processors and entrepreneurs in developing innovative food products.

The Taste of Success
Mikel is enthusiastic about the entire program, which not only helps Kentucky farmers and consumers, but helps students in the food sciences program have real-life experience in food technology as undergraduates. And that can help them when they seek employment upon graduation.

“The experiences the students have prepare them very well to take on responsibilities in industry upon graduation. They know firsthand how things operate,” Mikel said.

The accomplishments of the program for Kentucky food processors and farmers are impressive. Several new products already in the marketplace or close to being in the marketplace, include:

Fried Green Tomatoes—Most Southerners relish fried green tomatoes, but enjoying them is still a late summer treat for home gardeners. This project links a tomato producer, who produces both field and hothouse tomatoes, with a major food restaurant chain that features Southern cuisine.

The Value-Added Food Processing Incubator has worked with the grower to bread and freeze the green tomatoes for wholesaling to restaurant chains that feature comfort food cuisine. Three coating formulations—traditional, hot and spicy, and cornmeal—have been tested at a restaurant. The outcome is that hot and spicy appeals to younger diners, while the other two coatings appeal to middle age and older diners. If the small entrepreneur can secure capital, entrance into the market is expected within the next year.

Ham Jerky— A small Kentucky pork producer, Foothills Country Meats in Monticello, wanted to increase the value of pork hams. Working with the incubator program, the experts suggested ham jerky, a dried meat product that has long shelf life and a market niche.

Natural Connection—The college’s Food Science program continues to work with businesses like SMG Inc., which recently purchased Fischer Packing Company in Louisville. At left is Troy Wilkerson, (UK class of ‘85, animal sciences), now SMG’s vice president for food safety, who worked with faculty members Benjy Mikel and Melissa Newman before they traveled to Field Packing (also an SMG company) in Owensboro to review its food safety plan. Through its incubator project, the Food Science program also helped Fischer improve its natural casing bratwurst.

Did You Know?

Food manufacturing is one of the state’s largest manufacturing sub-sectors. n Food manufacturing accounts for more than 37,000 jobs in Kentucky, with a payroll in excess of $11 billion annually.

Because of Kentucky’s geographic location (within a day’s drive of a substantial portion of the nation’s consumers) the state’s industry has the potential to grow rapidly. n The College of Agriculture’s Food Science program, a four-year B.S. degree program, educates students for positions in the value-added food manufacturing industry. n Starting salaries for last year’s crop of graduates were in the $39,000 range, with hiring demand exceeding the supply.

Taste testing is an important part of what the Value-Added Food Processing Incubator does. Scientists on the incubator team do the first taste testing of the products. Then, after tweaking, real-life consumers try them out.

Taking Care of a Sticky Problem

Blend Pak, a dry blending and packaging plant in Bloomfield, Kentucky, needed help with a sticky situation. Its breading mixture, used by a meat packer to coat pork fritters sold at fast food restaurants, wasn’t sticking to some of the meat fritters (which are made from whole pork loins). It stuck fast on some, but on others the breading fell off before cooking.

The incubator faculty tackled the problem by first finding out why the breading only stuck to some pork loin fritters. They found that the pH of the meats the meat processor used was quite variable, which accounted for why the breading did the job well for some, but not others.

“We worked with the pork fritter processing company, so they started using better quality pork loins, which had a more consistent pH. In addition, we took the advice from the value-added incubator faculty and modified our coating recipe to include a soybean product that would increase the breading’s adhesiveness,” said Dan Sutherland, owner and chief executive officer of the 25-employee firm.

“We will continue to depend on UK’s incubator to help us with cutting-edge science research in the future. UK’s expertise is just what small food processing firms like ours need to grow,” Sutherland said.

Putting the Snap Back into Bratwurst

Bratwurst aficionados who remember the old-style brats love the newest addition to the Fischer Meats line of delicatessen products: natural casing brats.

Until the middle of the 20th century, brats were made with natural casing (gut) surrounding the ground pork—spiced with ingredients such as ginger, nutmeg, and coriander—that constituted the middle of the sausage.
With modern technology—and an industry dominated by large corporations that could out-compete smaller firms through speed and efficiency—the natural gut casing became largely a historical culinary curiosity replaced by synthetic casing.

But many fans of brats believed that the synthetic casing caused the brats to lose their snap when they bit into the sausages.

When the Fischer Meats marketing department saw a market niche for a natural casing bratwurst, it needed help.
Garry Bork, director of technical services for Fischer Packing in Louisville, asked Benjy Mikel if the Value-Added Food Processing Incubator could help “redevelop” the natural casing bratwurst to bring back the snap and flavor.
“At the incubator, we ground and spiced the pork and stuffed the natural casings with the mixture. Benjy brought meat sciences students to help and observe. After we had the uncooked brats stuffed, we used the ‘smokehouse’ in the facility to cook the brats,” Bork said.

Because the natural casings add a distinctive flavor to the brats, the spice mixture was blended in differentcombinations. Brats from the different combinations of spices were taste tested to find the right combinations for consumers, he said.

“As a result of the incubator’s expertise, we now have a natural casing bratwurst product the meets consumer expectations. We most likely will use the expertise of the facility when our sales department suggests we add another product to our delicatessen line,” Bork said.
Fischer’s natural casing product can be purchased at major grocery stores throughout Kentucky, Ohio, Tennessee, and West Virginia.

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The Transformation of the Ag Library

Where Have All
the Journals Gone?

By Randy Weckman

First of all, it isn’t on the first floor of Scovell Hall, where it resided from the early part of the 20th century until 1964; that’s when it moved to the newly-built Agricultural Science Building (commonly called Ag North). Forget the library paste. There isn’t a pot of it anywhere. And perhaps even more perplexing—or even vexing—is the fact that it has no books—well, hardly any. Things are so mightily strange that the library is now called the Agricultural Information Center (although the sign painter hasn’t yet stopped by to change the name over the door).

“Our new Agricultural Information Center provides faculty, students, and staff with most of the same services they’ve always enjoyed. Now, however, we have the room wired with computer terminals for searches with databases and electronic journals that are more accessible than hard bound journals ever were,” said Toni (Powell) Greider, agricultural librarian for the past 29 years.

Where are the books? Journals? The other symbols of a library?
“On June 18, 1998, moving van after moving van backed up to Ag North and carted away our 125,000 volumes—give or take a few thousand. They are now housed in the new W.T. Young Library, where they can be used just as always,” Greider said.
In their place are the 40-some computers that allow for on-line searches that are light years faster and more thorough than the old card catalog. Because these computers take so much less space than 125,000 volumes of books and journals, the information center has meeting rooms and even a small video room where patrons can view educational films. “We’ve used every bit of space judiciously,” Greider said.

Technology at Your Service

The technology of electronic publishing allows users sitting at a computer in the Agricultural Information Center to tap into a computer at some other location and find and use current journal articles.
“This new library is not like any I ever grew up with. I was really worried about whether I’d be able to use it and find the information I needed. But the GEN 100 class, required of all first-year students in the college, introduced me to this new way of doing library research. And now I wouldn’t go back for anything,” said Jason Headrick, a 2002 graduate in agricultural communications.

The work of the librarian has changed, too. In addition to collecting, sorting, and storing important material, the agricultural librarians help students learn to use the new technology to make their information searches more fruitful. Greider and five staff members constitute the library team in the new information center. Their titles reflect the skills demanded by the new technology, such as electronic support and those of a webmaster.

And it isn’t just the students who need help to take advantage of the new information environment; faculty also need help in using the new technology. Faculty members, too, learned to use a library before it was an electronic palace; so, along with the students, they needed training to make the transition to keyboards and monitors from card catalogues and floor-to-ceiling shelves of books.

Have Suitcase, Will Teach
And when faculty members have need—as many Extension faculty members do—they can check out a suitcase classroom. The suitcase is a small soft-sided carrying case that contains a laptop computer, projection system, VCR, sound system, and lots of accessories, including a wireless mouse. With suitcase in hand and a telephone line for Internet access, any classroom becomes “wired” to the rest of the world.
“These suitcases let faculty and staff members have a 21st century classroom wherever there is electricity,” Greider said.

Perhaps one of the biggest changes in the old ag library is that you don’t have to physically step foot in the building to use its services.
“We have built our Web site so that people off campus can use the services of the information center. Click on Information Center in the left-hand column of the College of Agriculture’s home page and go directly to our site,” Greider said.

Everyone is welcome to use the Ag Information Center—students, faculty members, staff, alumni, and
visitors. A click on the College’s home page on the Web will take you there.

If there were really librarians from the past who visit their favorite haunts, the new Ag Library might put them in a nervous state. Grace Snodgrass, for instance, who served the Ag Library long and well for more than 40 years, would find it utterly unrecognizable.

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The Division of Regulatory Services: Protecting and Serving the Commonwealth

By Randy Weckman

If you’re buying pet food for Fido, fertilizer for your lawn, or seeds for your garden, then your purchases are protected by the Division of Regulatory Services. You can sleep better at night knowing that regulatory inspectors and chemists are doing their job to keep the citizens of the commonwealth healthy.

Secluded—almost sequestered—on the extreme south side of the University of Kentucky campus, a small, squarish building houses one of the most important services for the well-being of Kentuckians. The College of Agriculture’s Division of Regulatory Services assures the citizens of the commonwealth that many of the agricultural and consumer products they buy are as they are represented on the label.

In fact, regulatory functions that began more than a century ago were the primary reason for the College’s rise to prominence. They also provided most of its financial resources in those early years.
It was in the early days of the Progressive Era (Grover Cleveland was president) that the unit started with only one man—called the agricultural chemist—performing the important job of analyzing fertilizers to make sure that they contained what their labels purported. The state legislature in 1886 had passed the “fertilizer law,” as it was commonly called then and as it is today. Its real name perhaps provides both the goal and substance of the bill: “An Act to regulate the sale of fertilizers in this Commonwealth, and to protect the agriculturist in the purchase and use of the same.” In that act, the director of the Kentucky Agricultural Experiment Station, established a year earlier at University of Kentucky, would handle the chores of analyzing fertilizer samples and enforcing the law pertaining to their labeling.
You see, the 1880s were rife with fraud in a great many things. Milk routinely was adulterated with embalming fluid to keep it from souring so quickly; animal feeds contained sawdust to increase their weight, and bags of seed were “stove piped” to increase profits for the sellers (this involved putting a stove pipe in the middle of the sack, filling the stove pipe with chaff, with seed only around the stove pipe prior to the pipe being pulled out). Fertilizers sometimes contained mostly inert ingredients.

Today, the division’s 62 employees not only monitor fertilizers sold in Kentucky, they also check animal feeds (for both livestock and pets) for accurate labeling, test seeds sold in the commonwealth for germination quality, analyze soils for farmers to help them know how much and what types of fertilizers would increase yields, and test raw farm milk to make sure that it is marketed accurately. It is because of the division’s work that consumers are so well protected today.

Eli Miller, director of Regulatory Services, said about the division’s work: “We don’t find too many bad actors these days. Perhaps our continuous monitoring for fraud dissuades potential bad actors from trying to hoodwink the public. Today, violations occur usually because vendors didn’t understand the laws pertaining to their commodity. The vast majority of businesses that we regulate are extremely ethical and try to sell quality products. To help them, we do a great deal of vendor education.”

Monitoring Fertilizer Content
Now, more than a century after the first Kentucky fertilizer act, chemists in the Division of Regulatory Services annually analyze nearly 3,500 samples of fertilizer submitted from some 950,000 tons of fertilizer sold in Kentucky. These samples are analyzed to ensure the fertilizer contains what the vendor guarantees on the label, usually in terms of nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, and sometimes chloride levels, and less frequently, secondary and micro-nutrient composition.

Today’s fertilizer analyses are far more comprehensive, accurate, and speedy than those in the early days. In the 1880s, the agricultural chemist generally analyzed samples sent to Lexington by farmers in the state. Each analysis in those early times took several days to complete. Now, samples are collected by 10 inspectors throughout Kentucky—usually from manufacturers or mixers of fertilizers—and are analyzed by sophisticated laboratory equipment in a matter of minutes. And now, fertilizer can be checked for more than the big three (nitrogen, phosphorus, and potash); certain samples are monitored for their guarantee of secondary and micro-nutrients and 10 elements.

The division also inspects specialty (non-farm) fertilizers—those manufactured for home lawns, gardens, and golf courses, among others—for proper labeling and guaranteed nutrients. Samples are analyzed to help assure that consumers get what they pay for.

“Only about 12 percent of the samples we analyze are found to be less than their guaranteed analysis. In those cases, we issue a ‘stop sale’ order, which means that the fertilizer cannot be sold in Kentucky until it is re-labeled to reflect its true composition,” said David Terry, coordinator of the fertilizer regulatory program.
The division may impose penalties on manufacturers of mislabeled fertilizer. The penalties are paid to its purchasers, if they are known. Otherwise, the money is used by the division to maintain its operation, Terry said.
“Generally, the seller isn’t trying to defraud anyone. Simply, they made a mistake, and they can fix that by re-labeling their product to reflect the accurate analysis,” Terry said.

He noted that to help fertilizer mixers and manufacturers avoid problems, the fertilizer group in the division holds periodic educational meetings about how to blend quality fertilizers and remain in compliance with Kentucky’s laws.

Livestock and Pet Feeds

Because of the early and profound successes of the fertilizer law, in 1906 the Kentucky legislature added the protection of the state’s livestock and poultry producers to the mission of the Agricultural Experiment Station.
The Kentucky Commercial Feed Law regulates materials offered for sale as feed or mixing in feed, with exemptions for unprocessed grain, hay, and silage. In reality, any commercial animal feed offered for sale in Kentucky must be inspected. Inspection today covers much more than analysis for the standard nutrients. It includes checking for antibiotics, ensuring that no prohibited animal proteins are fed to ruminant animals as a means of preventing Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (Mad Cow Disease), checking that toxins produced by natural molds are not at harmful levels, and ensuring that feeds are produced in licensed facilities and are free from chemical contaminations.
“We are on the cusp of a new era in regulation of animal feeds. I suspect that we in the regulation industry will be called upon to provide third party certification in the very near future,” said Steve Traylor, coordinator of the animal feed program. Third party certification refers to tracing the animal from the farm to the consumer, including the feed the animal ate.

Already, certain large fast food entities are requiring a “history” for all animal products that they use in their foods. By history, they want to make sure that the animals made into hamburger, for example, have not been exposed to illegal proteins and antibiotics and other potential residues.

In the 1930s, the Kentucky Legislature broadened the scope of the Feed Act to include the monitoring of pet foods for nutrient content and safety, probably because an estimated 25 percent of the canned dog food sold in the United States was consumed by humans, perhaps as an outcome of financial difficulties associated with the Great Depression. The law, still in effect today, assures pet owners that the food they feed to their pets contains what the label says it contains. Zoos, too, can be assured of the composition of the feed for their inhabitants.

Milk Inspection Program
It was the appalling dairy situation in the 1890s that led to revision of the Kentucky Pure Food Act of 1898, which mandated that the Agricultural Experiment Station monitor foods for being pure and unadulterated. The impetus for that law was that much of what consumers bought was either adulterated or misrepresented, and sometimes was even unhealthful. Milk was commonly “fortified” to keep it from clabbering, “cider” was made from corn and burnt sugar, “maple” syrup was adulterated with glucose, oleomargarine was sold as butter, and flour sometimes contained as much as 25 percent cornmeal. In addition, neutral spirits were colored and flavored and sold as aged straight whiskey (see related story). The Experiment Station’s regulatory services unit vigorously enforced the law so that the consumers were infinitely better protected than ever before.

With the reorganization of the Kentucky Board of Health in 1918, the pure food aspect of the Experiment Station was transferred to that board, with the Experiment Station still conducting the analytical, chemical, and bacteriological examinations for the Board of Health. At the same time, the Kentucky Legislature added to the Experiment Station the role of monitoring the weighing and testing of milk and cream, which was to ensure that farmers were paid accurately for the amount of milk they sold to manufacturers. (Testing involved determining the amount of butterfat in each lot of milk a farmer sold; milk with a high butterfat content was worth more than an equal weight with less butterfat.) In fulfilling this mission, the division became responsible for licensing milk handlers, laboratories, transfer stations, butterfat testers, and haulers.

“Our group maintains integrity in the system from the farm to the processor. We protect all parties involved in the milk production process,” said Chris Thompson, coordinator of the milk regulatory program.

Seed Inspection Program

Farmers and home gardeners alike have great hopes when they plant seeds in the ground. They hope that the seeds germinate into plants and that the seeds have little or no weed seed accompanying them.
The Seed Inspection Program randomly selects seed to test—for both farmers and gardeners—to make sure that the label information is correct concerning germination, pure seed, and estimated amount of weed seed. The seed laboratory operated by the division also checks to see how much chaff, dirt, and debris is in the seed, because that affects the measurement when consumers buy the seed. If the label isn’t correct, the wholesaler or retailer will need to make modifications on the label.

“We also publish yearly a list of seed vendors whose samples we’ve tested, and the results of those tests. Consumers can be assured that what they purchase—whether it is for their corn field or sweet corn patch—is what the label indicates,” said David Buckingham, coordinator of the program.

Last year, more than 2,700 samples were taken from seed dealers and consumer retail outlets, and the seeds were germinated for testing. Sometimes the composition of the seed package is way off.
“We’ve had lawn mixes that indicate the package is 80 percent bluegrass and 20 percent fescue; upon analysis, we’ve found only 40 percent bluegrass and 60 percent a mixture of other kinds of seed. Weed seed content is also an occasional problem,” Buckingham said.

Soil Testing

If county Extension agents are known for any one particular piece of advice it might be this: Get a soil test.
Soil tests—chemical analyses of soils—provide farmers with precise information about how much nitrogen, potassium, and phosphorus are available to their crops. If the soil is lower in soil nutrients than is necessary to grow the best crop possible, the farmer can elect to add nitrogen, potassium, or phosphorus. Soil tests also provide information about soil pH and micro-nutrients that are used by plants, including calcium, magnesium, and zinc.

“Soil test results take some of the guess work out of crop production. It means that farmers can add to their fields the right blend of fertilizer they need,” said Frank Sikora, coordinator of the soil testing program.
Soil testing laboratories in Lexington and at the Research and Education Center at Princeton annually process about 50,000 samples submitted from across the state.

The soil testing laboratories also analyze animal waste that can be used to supply nutrients to crops. This service is increasing as more and more farmers realize animal manure can be an asset to the farm rather than a liability.

The Future

Director Miller foresees the consumer protection and service roles provided by the division as becoming increasinglyimportant and necessary.
“Food safety and environmental protection especially are becoming larger issues. Prevention of antibiotic residues and other potential microbial and chemical contaminants that could be introduced from feeds will be increasingly expected of us. Maintaining consumer confidence in the wholesomeness and safety of milk, meat, and eggs will be a vital part of our program,” Miller said.

In addition, public concern with the environmental impact of fertilizers will mean that the division will become more involved with the interface between fertilizers and soil testing. The seed program will increase its monitoring of seed for genetic purity and bioengineering, he said.
“Long term, the division will continue to build on the established programs and services but take on new activities associated with food safety, environmental protection, and genetic engineering,” Miller said. u

How the Dean of Agriculture Made Kentucky Whiskey Famous

When the National Pure Food Law enacted in 1906 was before Congress, Representative A.O. Stanley of Kentucky (later governor of Kentucky) gave an impassioned, colorful speech describing how grain alcohol was made inappropriately into a sort of whiskey by adding burnt sugar and a couple of flavorings. Railing against such so-called whiskey, he said, “It is this sort, made out of this new alcohol, that will eat the very vitals out of a coyote; it will make a howling dervish out of an anchorite; it will make a rabbit walk right up and spit in a bull dog’s eye.”

Because the act as passed provided an ambiguous definition of whiskey, it was left to Theodore Roosevelt’s attorney general to divine the true meaning of the term whiskey. Roosevelt’s counsel followed the Kentucky definition of whiskey—the real stuff and not just colored and flavored neutral spirits. But because politics then as now can be quite fickle, at best, the next president, William Howard Taft, reversed course and allowed the colored and flavored alcohol to be sold as whiskey. It is assumed that the manufacturers of the colored and flavored stuff—commonly called the rectifiers—had made entreaties with Mr. Taft.

Now, Kentuckians, being wily then, too, knew that federal jurisdiction on the Pure Food Act did not pertain to intrastate commerce. Precisely because of this, College of Agriculture Dean Melville Amasa Scovell was the man to make the decision on what would and what would not be whiskey in the state of Kentucky. Scovell took a narrow-gauged definition— that whiskey manufactured and sold in Kentucky would be only that which is “the properly distilled spirit from the properly prepared and properly fermented mash of sound grain... as distinguished from commercial alcohol, refined alcohol and neutral spirits.” Scovell’s definition was subsequently published in the Washington Times, and it is said that because of Scovell’s definition, the quality of Kentucky whiskey became world renowned.
Alas, Scovell’s definition became moot after 1920 with the beginning of Prohibition provided by the 18th amendment; nonetheless Kentucky’s reputation for quality whiskey remains unparalleled to this day.

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2001 Research Annual Report

Kentucky Agricultural Experiment Station

In 1885, the Kentucky Agricultural Experiment Station began as a place where scientists showed farmers the best way to grow crops and animals. It was a big step forward from advice picked up at the local feed mill or over a neighbor’s fence.

But today, the Kentucky Agricultural Experiment Station is not so much a physical place as gathering place for scientists and their ideas. These scientists work at the Lexington campus, the Research and Education Center in Princeton, and at Robinson Forest and Robinson station in southeastern Kentucky.
Some of our scientists come up with answers to Kentucky’s immediate needs. Others are making discoveries that may have impact only well into the 21st century— including those that will lead to future start-up businesses and become a boon to the commonwealth’s economy.

This report will show you the breadth of our work, including the human dimension that is most evident through the social sciences. It makes clear that our scientists, whether they work in a lab, in a farm field, or in a community meeting room, are committed to serving Kentucky and its people.

Areas of Emphasis in 2001 include:

• Discovering new enterprises to support a transition from a tobacco-based farming economy
• Encouraging new life science businesses that grow out of scientific discoveries about how plant and animal genes function
• Conducting an in-house research program that determined that the eastern tent caterpillar is the probable source of Mare Reproductive Loss Syndrome, which caused mares to lose pregnancies during 2001 and 2002
• Improving the ability of livestock producers to create value-added products
• Strengthening partnerships with state agencies that promote Kentucky agriculture
  

Experiment Station Highlights for 2001:

Generation of outside funding was more than $14 million— more than $10.5 million in College-wide research grants and contracts and more than $3.8 million in gifts and endowments (which is a 5.8 percent increase over gifts and endowments in 2000). That means that the College generated almost one dollar for each dollar the state contributed. This is significant not only as income, but because all these sources of outside funding enable us to leverage the state’s investment for maximum impact in Kentucky. Other highlights:

• Approximately $5.3 million in federal funds
• A 22.5 percent increase in doctoral and master’s degrees awarded over the previous year
• Faculty publication of 209 original refereed research papers, 38 books and book chapters, and 166 other articles
• Creation of a forage animal production unit in partnership with the USDA-Agricultural Research Service
• Issuing of two patents by Experiment Station scientists that will result in new business start-ups in Kentucky
• Forging of a partnership of the Kentucky Horticulture Council, UK’s New Crop Opportunities Center, and the Kentucky Agricultural Development Board to discover new opportunities to diversify the small-to-midsize farm enterprise
• Securing of federal, state, and private funding to develop new linkages between local beef producers and their markets
• Discovery of new opportunities in high-technology agriculture, including biotechnology, for agribusiness operations of small and midsize farms

Nancy M. Cox, Associate Director
Kentucky Agricultural Experiment Station
S-107 Agricultural Science Center
University of Kentucky
Lexington, Kentucky 40546-0091
E-mail: ncox@uky.edu

TOTAL
RESEARCH SUPPORT
2001 federal fiscal year
(October 1, 2000 through September 30, 2001)

State—$24.2 million

Grants & contracts—$10.5 million

Gifts & endowment income— $3.8 million

USDA—$5.3 million

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From Coal to Cattle

In Perry County, not so long ago, you could look out on what is now a green and productive cattle enterprise—D & D Ranch—and see the land being mined for coal. The ranch is now home to the East Kentucky Heifer Development Center, which has become a magnet for beef cattle producers who want to improve cattle quality and increase their profits.

“This was the site for the largest beef cattle research project on reclaimed mine land in the country,” said UK’s David Ditsch, the project’s agronomy advisor.

The center, along with its benefits for beef cattle producers, is the result of a five-year study to determine what level of cattle production is sustainable on mined land—the maximum number of cattle that can be grazed with the land still able to replenish itself. The answer may have implications for the nearly 1 million acres of reclaimed mine land potentially available in the eastern part of the state. If all that land were put to pasture and hay land, it could return nearly $50 million annually to Eastern Kentucky beef cattle producers.

The heifer development project began in 1994, when members of two beef cattle associations decided they wanted to improve forage quality and herd genetics and find innovative ways to market their cattle. They formed the East Kentucky Beef Cattle Council and looked to UK agronomists and animal scientists to help them in their efforts.
The need was clear. “Typically we’ve not had good marketing opportunities in Eastern Kentucky,” Ditsch says. He says cattle from this part of the state didn’t have a good reputation for quality. When that happens, he says, “it’s difficult to get good local prices, and it doesn’t attract outside buyers to come in.”

A windfall came in the form of 360 acres of reclaimed land from the Pine Branch Coal Company, leased for an extended period of time.The project, which was funded in its first five years by the E.O. Robinson Trust, initially focused on research, training, and marketing.

Mike Collins, UK livestock forage researcher, regularly collected soil and plant tissue samples and used geographic positioning and information systems to create what Ditsch calls “revealing maps.” These maps told researchers that if they stocked at the rate of one cow and her calf for every six acres, the land’s forage quality and animal performance could be sustained.

Workshops were held for producers on how to increase herd quality. Topics included herd management and artificial insemination techniques. As a result of the project, the number of producers coming together to learn how to manage their heifers and sell their cattle began to grow.

Working with project leaders, producers began to use new marketing methods, including a satellite sale that allowed buyers to see videos of Eastern Kentucky cattle before placing their long-distance orders.
The heifer development project began in 1998. Producers began bringing their heifers to the ranch for an 11-month period, where the animals are developed to sufficient quality and then bred to high-quality sires. Heifers have to meet certain guidelines to enter and stay in the program, but when they “graduate,” they go with a guarantee of quality, whether they are being sold or going back to the farm.

In 2000, the East Kentucky Beef Cattle Council, by then four associations strong, applied for and received nearly $135,000 in tobacco settlement money from Kentucky’s Agricultural Development Board to expand the program.
Ditsch says the return on investment has so far been greater than most producers had previously.

Raising the Curtain on Convenience

In Kentucky and elsewhere, tobacco was traditionally seeded using a simple, time-honored method: placing seeds in a seed bed, waiting for germination, and then transplanting to the field. More recently, seeds have been placed in plastic foam trays, with the trays floating on water to provide moisture, then waiting for nature to add sun and fresh air. Originally the trays were floated in the seedbed with simple covers such as tarps or plastic, but soon the tobacco greenhouse was invented to streamline the process and reduce the vagaries of nature. These greenhouses have roll-up plastic curtains on greenhouse sidewalls that are cranked up or down to regulate moisture and temperature inside.
This method has been used for the past decade or so. It requires the farmer to keep a steady eye on the sky and a constant ear to the weather report so the curtain can be opened or closed when necessary. Otherwise, the plants can get too hot or cold and fail to thrive. And, if too much moisture condenses on the greenhouse roof, it can cause a drip that washes away the seeds—and potential profits.

Rich Gates and George Duncan in UK’s Department of Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering have developed a system that controls the curtains in the greenhouse automatically. The technology, developed in part with funds from the Council on Burley Tobacco, uses a computerized motor that closes the curtain when it gets too cold, opens it when it gets too hot, and lowers the greenhouse temperature even more at night during certain growth periods to save energy.

Researchers at UK and the University of New Hampshire are cooperating to take the automated sidewall curtain technology beyond growing tobacco to potted nursery plants during winter storage. Because this technique uses natural ventilation, it has the potential for big savings in energy costs, and it could have implications for Kentucky’s own thriving nursery industry.

Salad for Swine

Antibiotics not only make people well, they keep animals healthy. They have been a boon to the U.S. animal meat industry since the 1950s, resulting in healthier animals, shorter time to market, and less expensive meat for the consumer.

But the use of antibiotics in livestock production has a downside—the bacteria in the gastrointestinal tract of the animals can become resistant to the antibiotics. There is concern by some people that bacterial resistance in animals can be transferred to humans, just as we can build up resistance from taking too many antibiotic medicines. Any resistance—no matter what the source—could mean drugs wouldn’t work as well for us in the future.
Melissa Newman and Gary Cromwell in UK’s Department of Animal Sciences are exploring ways to eliminate or reduce antibiotic-resistant bacteria in swine.

Newman has firsthand evidence of how difficult it is to reverse antibiotic resistance once it is established in a livestock population. For research purposes, UK’s swine herd at Princeton has not been fed antibiotics for almost 30 years. Several generations later, bacterial resistance to the antibiotics used in the distant past still exist in the herd.
Newman began exploring natural compounds and discovered that certain plant phytochemicals were able to reverse the resistance found in some bacteria, sort of a salad mix for swine that could reduce the presence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. “Some of them are very promising,” Newman says. If these compounds work, we could reduce the presence of the resistant bacteria in swine, and it would help to calm fears about antibiotic resistance in humans.

Putting the Future on Paper

Some Kentucky counties believe the time has come to manage change instead have it manage them. They have been spurred on by Lori Garkovich in UK’s Department of Sociology with a process called community visioning.
It began in 1996, when people in Johnson County decided they needed a better sense of where the county was going. They also wanted to expand the number of people involved in community life.
Seven years later, about 15 other communities have also undertaken a process to explore their future, put their dreams on paper, and figure out how to make those dreams happen.
“It’s about civic engagement, democracy in action,” Garkovich says.

First, a local coordinating group identifies every organization imaginable in the community, from 4-H clubs to book groups to service groups like Rotary. Every one of those groups is then contacted and asked if its members want to take part in creating the community vision. If they say yes, they’re asked to send someone to training on how to lead the group through the visioning effort.

The process boils down to responding to questions on heritage, change, vision, and action. There are only four questions, but the impact of the answers can be enormous.
The questions help local visionaries carry what should be cherished from the past while moving steadily—and with a game plan—into the future.

To get as many people as possible to take part in the visioning, communities have outdone themselves. One group set up a tent at the county fair, offering lemonade and shade. All fair-goers had to do was sit down and answer a few questions.

Another group set up posters at a soccer match and encouraged people to scribble their comments while waiting in line at the concession stand. One county’s local radio station had a regular call-in show. The show’s host posed a question a day to listeners over several days, who responded by calling in their opinions.
“The point is to get as many people as possible talking about the same four questions at the same time,” Garkovich says.

Despite the hundreds of people taking part in the process in any community, common themes do emerge, Garkovich says. A major portion of the report is the recording of every single response by every community member who participates in the process. “There’s power in that,” Garkovich says. “There’s magic about seeing your own words written down.”

These reports are not being tucked away in a drawer somewhere: several communities have reshaped their land use policies as a result of the visioning. Garkovich isn’t overly concerned about how many Kentucky counties decide to envision their future. “You’re either ready or you’re not,” she says. But once the decision is made, a process to assist communities is available.

Fighting the Bug from Siberia

In 2000, the soybean aphid was discovered in Kentucky at only three sites, and in small numbers. This aphid, naturally found from Siberia to Iran, had made its way across the Pacific and North America and onto some of Kentucky’s farms. There, if unchecked, it could injure a good portion of the state’s soybean crop.
UK entomologist Grayson Brown already knew the soybean aphid can be a killer. It stunts plant growth by sucking plant sap or, as a carrier of viruses, kills off the beans. Asian farmers at times have lost half their soybean crop to this tiny insect. The soybean aphid can double its population in about three days, creating swarms so large they have shut down a major league baseball game.

Brown got to work. By January of 2001, he and his colleagues had obtained a USDA grant to devise a regional plan to manage the insect. (At that time, Kentucky was the only state in the Southeast that had spotted the aphid.) The objective was to come up with an environmentally and economically sound approach.
The project has been a joint one with the University of Arkansas, where research on the only disease affecting this aphid is being done.

Meanwhile, the soybean aphid kept up its migration. By the 2001 growing season, a survey of Kentucky soybean fields indicated that, while the aphid was not yet rampant in the state, it was spreading.
This year, the entomologists are ready. The plan is in place, and they are already training crop advisors, ag agents, and farmers in how to use it. This integrated management plan enables farmers to give environmentally friendly biological controls (including a type of ladybug, an aphid-killing disease, and stinging wasps) as much time as possible to work. It also has guidelines for counting aphid numbers and noting other field conditions that help to signal if and when costly insecticides are necessary.

Shunning the Sun

Everybody knows that it’s a good idea to use sunscreen if you’re at the beach, out on the farm, or on the ski slope. But sunscreen for wood?

Absolutely. So much so that in Jackson at the Department of Forestry’s Wood Utilization Center, researchers are giving various woods a yearlong suntan, testing about 20 different protective wood coatings. The project is being carried out in cooperation with the Forest Products Laboratory at Mississippi State to find out which formulations work best.

The protective coatings, which are for wood used on building exteriors, were developed by various U.S. manufacturers. They are being compared to products available on the market today.
Kentucky is one of only three sites on the continent where the testing is being done, says Carroll Fackler, superintendent of the Wood Utilization Center. It’s ideal because the state has extreme weather conditions, including humidity and heat. It’s also a good site for the fungicide testing of the wood samples that’s also going on. Moisture causes mildew and mold damage to wood, and, because of its location next to the North Fork of the Kentucky River, the center gets plenty of both.

In another project, the center continues to monitor emissions from dry kilns in Kentucky, which are used to draw moisture out of newly cut wood before it is treated, processed, and manufactured.
About 500 kilns are at work in Kentucky, making it a substantial industry in the state.
Recently, as a result of evidence from the kiln study, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency chose to exempt those kilns from standards put in place for air quality. Evidence from the study had shown that emissions from the kilns were not harmful.

Making Precise Decisions

Precision agriculture offers the prospect of detailed field data for cutting costs and increasing yield and profits. What’s not to like? Maybe the price tag on the equipment.

“Currently, it’s not an inexpensive technology to purchase,” says Carl Dillon of UK’s Department of Agricultural Economics. Dillon and collaborators Jean-Marc Gandonou in Agricultural Economics and Scott Shearer and Tim Stombaugh in Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering have come up with a way to help producers know if they should buy or “custom hire” precision agriculture equipment. (Custom hiring includes not only equipment rental but the skill to operate the equipment’s hardware and software.)

This “tool,” as it’s called in ag economics lingo, gives producers a way to decide, based on their farm acreage, whether they should buy or custom hire the equipment needed for precision agriculture.
Using the break-even acreage value, they can know which way to go. Based on whether a farm is larger or smaller than that acreage level, the “tool” will help determine whether to purchase or custom hire in order to operate in the least expensive way.

To come up with this tool, the researchers did a partial budget to estimate the effect of precision agriculture on profits and incorporated data on equipment ownership, operating expenses, and current custom hire rates. Then they came up with a mathematical formula that resulted in a break-even point.

A farmer who wanted to do field mapping, grid soil sampling, and apply one fertilizer, for example, would have a break-even point of about 1,000 acres. Farmers with considerably less acreage would likely want to custom hire since they have less acreage from which to recoup the fixed cost. Those with more acreage would likely want to buy the equipment since they have more acreage over which to spread the fixed cost. Those close to the mark would probably need to do more analysis.

The break-even point was figured for other sets of precision ag components as well as for the “package” of field mapping, grid soil sampling, and application of one fertilizer.
Dillon thinks more farmers should consider custom hiring as an option. “Precision agriculture won’t make a good manager out of an average manager,” he says, “but it has the potential for increased profits.”

An Enemy Becomes a Friend

Fungal pathogens are a scourge for plants, causing many devastating diseases. Currently, chemical fungicides provide the most effective means of control, so the need for biological control, which would be less costly and more environmentally friendly, would be a breakthrough.

Said Ghabrial and his research group in UK’s Department of Plant Pathology have discovered an unlikely ally in the battle against these deadly pathogens—viruses. Focusing on the plant disease Victoria blight of oats as a model system, the researchers have shown that the fungal causal agent of the disease can be weakened to the point that it no longer damages the plant.

These UK plant pathologists have discovered that a virus follows a particular path to infection: it creates multiple copies of a particular protein. When the expression of this protein is activated, it reduces the strength of the fungal pathogens so they lose their power to destroy plants—if the fungal pathogens were Superman, the protein would be Kryptonite.

The researchers predict that if the expression of this protein can be activated in the Victoria blight fungus and similar proteins can be activated in other plant pathogenic fungi, this novel approach can be used to fight fungal infections even when a virus is not present.

They also have discovered that virus-infected isolates of the Victoria blight fungus secrete an antifungal protein, which has been shown to be effective against a wide range of fungal pathogens. The researchers have been able to isolate the gene that codes for the antifungal protein and believe that plants modified to include this gene will have resistance to a broad range of fungal pathogens.

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