USDA Opens New Lab to Study Stress Indicators in Livestock

August, 2004 - The Agricultural Research Service (ARS) opened on June 3, 2004, a new 2,300-square foot Farm Animal Behavior and Well-Being Laboratory in West Lafayette, Ind., for the study of stress indicators in livestock.

Researchers at the new laboratory are also studying the relationship between stress and the ability of pathogenic bacteria to establish themselves in animals.

The new facility adjoins a 10,000-square-foot laboratory built in 1997 to house ARS' Livestock Behavior Research Unit, which conducts behavioral studies of swine, cattle and poultry.

Purdue University animal scientists work alongside ARS scientists on the Purdue campus and at the Purdue Animal Science Farm located about 15 miles north of the main campus.

ARS Acting Administrator Edward B. Knipling says the new ARS lab will complement the behavioral studies under way in the animal lab to find possible objective measures of animal stress.

"Stress in livestock can lower productivity and possibly increase the risk of contamination from Salmonella and other bacterial pathogens," Knipling says.

ARS is USDA's chief scientific research agency.

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