During a tour of Caliber Biotherapeutics’s facility in Bryan, Dr. Barry Holtz explains to AVM members how the company is growing plants to serve as materials for developing vaccines more quickly and less expensively.

TVMDL played host to a national symposium on techniques in veterinary microbiology on May 2-4.

Fifty-three professionals from across the United States attended the 37^th symposium of Association of Veterinary Microbiologists held at Texas A&M University’s Memorial Student Center in College Station.

The association is a not-for-profit organization that provides expertise, support and mentoring to bench-level scientists and technicians who work in bacteriology, virology, serology and molecular diagnostics.

Sonia Lingsweiler, TVMDL’s assistant section head for bacteriology, served as the organization’s president in 2013.

Over the two-day symposium, the participants listened to presentations on various aspects of their fields. They then took part in roundtable discussions on the challenges they face in virology and bacteriology.

Among the presenters, TVMDL was represented by Dr. Konrad Eugster, director emeritus, and Dr. Amy K. Swinford, branch chief for microbiology at the College Station lab.

TVMDL produced a booth in the symposium’s exhibit area, providing participants with general information about the lab’s mission and services.

The lab also took the microbiologists on tours of Caliber Biotherapeutics, a Bryan biotechnology company that develops and commercializes protein-based therapeutics, the Messina Hof Winery and Resort, a Texas vineyard established in Bryan in 1977, and TVMDL’s College Station facility.

The bacteriology round table offered AVM members to discuss common challenges in the lab  and to share solutions. A second round table was held for virologists.

They will each begin their veterinary education this fall.

Both Janke and Dolan are graduating seniors majoring in biomedical sciences. Janke works in our College Station drug-testing lab while Dolan serves in the bacteriology section.

They are Andy Stokes, our agency’s information technology manager, and Kyle Phillips, diagnostic lab supervisor for serology at our College Station lab.

This annual four-day program introduces participants to the complexities of leading project teams and work groups at Texas A&M.

TVDML’s goal is to achieve accreditation from A2LA by early spring of 2014. This would be the laboratory’s second accreditation.  In 2012, the American Association of Veterinary Laboratory Diagnosticians (AAVLD) renewed TVMDL’s accreditation for an additional five years, which includes its drug-testing lab.

The A2LA accreditation program is designed to meet the guidelines of the Association of Racing Commissioners International and the Association of Official Racing Chemists (AORC). TVMDL is an AORC member.

ISO 17025 is an international standard for the competence of testing and calibration laboratories. In addition to ISO 17025 accreditation, the A2LA program includes accreditation that is designed specifically for competition animal drug-testing laboratories

“Applying for ISO 17025 accreditation from A2LA is an extensive and demanding process,” TVMDL Director Dr. Tammy Beckham said. “After carefully considering this option, we decided that securing ISO 17025 accreditation is the next important step in our agency’s commitment to serving the Texas horse racing industry.”

Under the Texas Racing Act of 1989, TVMDL’s College Station facility serves as the primary provider of drug-testing services to the state’s pari-mutuel horse racing and greyhound racing industries. Pari-mutuel horse racing events at Texas racetracks generated more than $369 million in total wagers during 2012, an increase of almost 4 percent from 2011, according to the Texas Racing Commission.

Texas A&M University System Chancellor John Sharp said, “The team at TVMDL does an outstanding job of leading in the science of veterinary diagnostics and this a great example of how they positively impact the state and its constituents.”

News coverage:

• TheHorse.com

The new B4 Panel may be especially useful for export testing and herd health screening.

We have developed and are now offering a real-time or quantitative PCR (qPCR) panel for bovine herpesvirus 1 (IBR), bovine leukosis, bluetongue virus and bovine viral diarrhea virus.

This bovine panel offers a higher sensitivity than other tests for these diseases.

The panel may be especially useful for export testing and herd health screening.  It can be run on nasal swabs, semen, whole blood treated with EDTA, milk, and even tissues that have not been exposed to formalin.

Turnaround time is three business days from the time the specimen arrives at our lab. The cost of the panel for Texas clients is $40, which is significantly less than running all of the tests individually.

This panel is available at our full-service labs in College Station and Amarillo. To order, write “B4 PCR” on your submission form.

TVMDL offers the bovine panel for easier test selection, broader detection of differential diseases and co-infection, and relative cost savings to our clients. For example, an individual PCR test for the bluetongue virus costs $30, but the bovine panel (which includes the bluetongue test) is just $40.

Dr. Trybus joined the Amarillo lab in 2007 as a veterinary pathologist and became section head in 2009. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Old Dominion University (1998) and earned his doctorate in veterinary medicine from the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine in 2004. He is a diplomate with the American College of Veterinary Pathologists.

With Dr. Trybus, we have five TVMDL professionals who serve as AAVLD auditors.

The other four are Dr. Amy Swinford, branch chief for microbiology; Terry Dobrovolsky, our agency’s manager for quality assurance and safety; Jordan Brod, agency operations manager; and Dr. Catherine Barr, our quality and assurance manager in College Station.

In addition, Dr. Barr is the current president of the AAVLD.

“All of this is evidence of our staff’s commitment to quality assurance and to the accreditation process as a whole,” TVMDL Director Dr. Tammy Beckham says. “I am proud of their ongoing efforts to improve our profession.”

Developed by TVMDL’s Diagnostic Development Section, this panel detects the presence of bordetella, adenovirus type 2, distemper, herpesvirus 1, influenza, parainfluenza and respiratory coronavirus.

The test requires a dry swab taken from the trachea or the pharynx.

For this test, we use a real-time or quantitative PCR (qPCR) technique with an enhanced sensitivity that helps assure we can detect genetic material from agents that may cause these diseases.

Turnaround time is three business days from the time the specimen arrives at our lab. The panel costs $80 for Texas clients, which is much less than the cost of running all the tests individually.

This panel is available only at our College Station lab. To order, write “Canine Infectious Respiratory Disease Panel” on your submission form.

Dr. Ferro has a long history with TVMDL. She joined our lab in 1991 as a technical assistant and rose to diagnostic laboratory supervisor in 1998.

She left in 2002 to join the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service office at Texas A&M University, but returned to the College Station lab in 2004.

Meanwhile, she earned a bachelor’s degree from Texas A&M in 1995, a master’s degree in veterinary microbiology in 2001, and a doctorate in veterinary microbiology in 2010.

Over the last decade, we have shared her laboratory skills with Texas A&M’s College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. Dr. Ferro served as our assistant section head for virology from May 2012 until her recent promotion.

“I am pleased that Dr. Ferro is now with our lab full-time,” TVMDL Director Dr. Tammy Beckham says. “Her understanding of our procedures and her ability to easily communicate with our clients will make her a natural success in her new role as a section head.”

Dr. Mangkey Bounpheng

We have launched a new section for diagnostic development at our College Station lab.

Dr. Mangkey Bounpheng leads this new section.

“Dr. Bounpheng has proved successful at attracting research funds and making tangible progress toward developing new assays for TVMDL to offer our clients,” TVMDL Director Dr. Tammy Beckham said.  “It was a natural step to ask her to lead these efforts full-time.”

Joining Dr. Bounpheng in this section are Dr. Megan Schroeder, associate research scientist, and Carly Ginter, technician.

“Creation of this section fulfills a major goal I have had since becoming TVMDL’s director,” Dr. Beckham said. “I am excited to see it become a reality. The test methods developed by this section will greatly benefit TVMDL clients by providing more options for rapid, accurate and affordable testing.”

If you have any suggestion for tests or panels that we should develop at TVMDL, please call Diagnostic Services at our College Station lab: (979) 845-3414. You can also reach us by email at diagnostic@tvmdl.tamu.edu.

Diagnostic Lab Supervisor Stephanie Weaver (left) and assistant Dawn Herron load slides into the histopathology section’s new staining instruments.

TVMDL’s College Station lab recently upgraded the technology it uses to stain microscope slides for pathologists to examine for evidence of scrapie, chronic wasting disease and other pathogens.

The lab has added two new instruments – known as immunohistochemistry stainers – that can process 30 slides in about two and a half hours.

The stainers support TVMDL’s role in a U.S. Department of Agriculture program to identify cases of scrapie and chronic wasting disease.

“Without these instruments, we couldn’t stay in the program,” said Stephanie Weaver, diagnostic lab supervisor in the histopathology section.

The instruments can can stain more slides in less time than technicians can process by hand.

Scrapie is a fatal, degenerative disease affecting the central nervous system of sheep and goats. Chronic wasting disease affects white-tailed deer, moose and mule deer in a similar way.

In July 2012, TVMDL pathologists diagnosed the first cases of chronic wasting disease in Texas deer from samples taken from two mule deer in far West Texas. The National Veterinary Services Laboratory in Ames, Iowa, confirmed the diagnosis.

Built by Ventana Medical Systems, Inc., of Tucson, Ariz., the stainers replace four smaller instruments that were outdated and difficult to maintain.

“The new instruments cost $75,000 each,” Weaver said.  “That’s a good deal for us. They usually go for more than $100,000.”

The automated stainers pay for themselves in labor costs, she said. They can stain more slides in less time than technicians can process by hand.

“The instruments are also more accurate,” Weaver said. “They eliminate human error and give us high quality slides more consistently.”