Food Animal Biotechnology

Introduction to Animal Biotechnology and to FAB

Food Animal Biotechnology 2014

Concept

• Food Animal Biotechnology (FAB) expands knowledge of basic animal physiology and biotechnology and applies it to the production of healthy and sustainable animal-derived foods (ADF)

• FAB is relevant to food security, food product quality and the health of the animal and the consumer

• FAB focuses on mammary/milk and muscle/meat but also covers other ADF as well as the use of transgenic animals as pharmaceutical bioreactors

Example: Milk

How is milk made?

Lactation physiology

etc Environmental physiology

Endocrine physiology

Nutrition physiology

How can we use biotechnology to

improve this?

Biotechnology has made the world a different place. Biotechnology has made it possible…

…to identify the genetic causes behind many inherited diseases

…for people to survive to much greater population density by providing more food per acre

So what is biotechnology?

Example: Milk

How is milk made?

Lactation physiology

etc Environmental physiology

Endocrine physiology

Nutrition physiology

How can we use biotechnology to

improve this?

rBST ATryn

Food Animal Biotechnology

The use of biological technologies that are based on knowledge of animal physiology to improve..

• Healthy productivity of food animals and hence

achieve greater food security

• Food product quality, and hence improve the health of the consumer

• Environmental impact, and hence sustainability

What’s possible, what’s “good”, what’s not?

Some ”biotech” words

• Recombinant DNA

• Transgenic

• Clone

• Genetically modified (GM)

• Mutant

• Stem cell (ESC, iPSC)

• High genetic merit

• Epigenetic

• The ”omics”:

• Genomics

• Transcriptomics

• Proteomics

• Metabolomics

• Functional Genomics

Levels of biological organisation

• Molecular

• Subcellular

• Cellular

• Tissue

• Organ

• Organ System

• Animal

• Systematic

Issues

Genotype and Phenotype

FAB Focus

• The food animal:

• How food animals work

• How we can improve the way they work..

• …to benefit us and them

The ADF progression

Blo

ck 4

B

lock 1

B

lock 2

B

lock 3

Food Animal Biotechnology

SLEK10287U

7.5 ECTS A

Meat and Milk Production

SLEK10189U 7.5 ECTS A

Meat as a Raw Material

NFOK13001U 7.5 ECTS A

Meat Processing

NFOK13005U 7.5 ECTS A

Animal

Production unit

Raw product

Processed product

FAB Structure

• 6 units

• Unit 1: Global Food Security (running unit)

• Unit 2: Muscle and Meat (miniproject)

• Unit 3: Mammary Gland and Milk

• Unit 4: Biotechnology in Practice

• Unit 5: Product Quality

• Unit 6: Animal Health and Welfare (miniproject)

FAB Structure

• Each Unit includes lectures and group learning exercises

• Some of the Units also include a mini project that continues into the next week

• The Pensum comprises lecture notes and a collection of scientific articles collected into a Course Manual

• The exam has 6 sections, one for each Unit, and you must answer 4 of the sections

• Each exam section has 5 multiple choice questions and one short essay ques

FAB Manual

Use it!

FAB on the web

Use it!