Viborg Work Week 3-4: Alanna

Things at work have been going very well over the past two weeks. I’ve had the opportunity to see and learn an array of things pertaining to the dairy field. Jens is working on dairy cattle nutrition and has been researching the effects of specific fatty acids on fat turnover in the liver with a primary focus on the prevention of fatty liver in dairy cows. For the first two weeks of work I was fortunate enough to follow him around and study his work. I’ve been reading an array of journals and publications from both Jens and those of his colleagues. Things in the lab have become less hectic over the week and I have been able to formulate a routine. Every Tuesday I label blood and biopsy tubes and make sure everything is in place for Wednesday’s blood drawing. On Wednesdays I go out to the cattle research center with two of the lab techs and we bleed cows. We try to take the blood from the tail but often times the cows are too restless to bleed. In that case we take the blood from the jugular. I’ve noticed that the Jersey cows are much more restless than the Holsteins. Sometimes it's a pain to get the cows to stay still or even to get them in their proper restraints. I love Wednesdays nonetheless! Starting last week I got to participate in tail bleeding. I’ve never taken blood from a dairy cow before and it proved to be a bit challenging. With the help of the lab technicians, however, the process went smoothly. While we are drawing blood Birthe, the liver biopsy queen as I like to call her, does her thing. She first identifies the region of the liver using just her hands. On the right side of the cow she places her hand on the cow’s hip region. From there she moves her hand forward and measures the distance between the hip and the shoulder region counting three ribs in between. It’s pretty amazing that this method works every time! After finding the liver she shaves the region and injects the cow with a local anesthetic and waits 10 minutes or so for it to set in. We take blood samples while waiting for the anesthesia to set in. Once the cows are ready Birthe takes a scalpel and makes a small incision in which the liver biopsy can be taken out. The most interesting part of this is she uses a biopsy gun that is meant for a human being. It is much smaller than the ones I have seen at UIUC. Jens takes great pride in the fact that they use human instruments because new methods are being created for the benefit of both humans and animals. The one thing that has come up over and over again with this experiment is animal welfare and quality of life. While writing my research paper Jens came over to look at it. Although I mentioned consumer and producer preference I lacked to mention the over health of the animal. I knew that was a very important factor in the trial but it never occurred to me that this study was done mostly to improve the health of the cows which would later prove to be beneficial for both the producer and consumer in the long run. After we have completed both the blood samples and the liver biopsies we take the samples back to the lab and centrifuge them to pipette the plasma layer for analyzing. The plasma is later assessed for metabolites. All this biochemistry is interesting yet very challenging.

Last Friday I got to be part of a top secret experiment. I can't share the details, but I can tell you I learned alot about fat globules in dairy milk and their interactions with enzymes. I learned how fat globules are split and reacted. Also, for the first time I was introduced to Biomek. Biomek is an automatic robot that can quickly pipette, dilute and dispense with the touch of a button. I thought this was the coolest robot ever. It does everything for you, no more pipetting by hand! I met with Torben Larsen, a scientist genius who spends time figuring out parameters for his milk project through a scheme of statistics. Some of the parameters he measures include temperature, time, pH, and catalyst reactions. He described his line of work, photometrics, and its capabilities. Recently, Torben and his group came up with a way to prescreen cows for mastitis. They can predict three days before hand when a cow will get mastitis. That is three days earlier than when ordinary veterinarians can diagnosis mastitis through clinical examination. Their over all goal is to find a way to improve the health and welfare of dairy cattle through the study of their milk. Very interesting work! I am now working with Torben on a project of my own. I am comparing the advantages of pooled sampling versus individual sampling in a herd of dairy cattle. I will be looking for 14 specific parameters to asses the over all health of the cows and their enzyme activity. Today I had a lesson on spectrometry and was taught how to use the autoanalyzer for these 14 parameters. We are testing for an array of metabolites, ions, and enzymes. I look forward this week to comparing my data and getting some results.

The content that I can most likely contribute to the community is my knowledge on pooled sampling. I am in the process of writing a research paper on the effects of pooled sampling versus individual sampling in early lactating cows. Pooled sampling is a method used to cut costs that are associated with blood sampling. This method, however, have created some concerns in the scientific world. I am trying to prove the method’s accuracy and long term cost benefit by comparing analytical data drawn from several metabolites and enzyme activities in a herd of early lactating cows. Hopefully with this knowledge I can better explain why veterinarians and scientist should used the pooled blood sampling method over individual sampling. I am excited to share my results with the group when I get back because there could be some great implications on dairy cattle health and cost management. During my research and idea phase of this project I have learned several important things which I think could benefit not only U.S. farmers but the dairy industry as a whole. I have learned how to view things in a different light while being here. Thinking outside of the box is something Jens is teaching me how to do every day. It’s frustrating at times when I don’t get the results I want. Science isn’t just that simple and I’ve had to come to the realization that it takes time for real results. My patience has been tested and I think that is a good thing. I like this work and I’m ready to see what my results tell me about these cows I am studying.