2019 PSA Awards

Dr. Robert G. Elkin received a BS in Animal Science from Penn State, a MS in Nonruminant Nutrition, and a PhD in Nutritional Biochemistry from Purdue University. He joined the faculty of the Department of Animal Sciences at Purdue in 1981 as an Assistant Professor, and rose through the ranks to Associate Professor and Professor. In 1999, he was appointed as Head of the Department of Poultry Science at Penn State, and served in that capacity until 2012. In addition to his research and teaching responsibilities, Dr. Elkin serves as Director of the Graduate Program in Animal Science and Coordinator of the Poultry and Avian Science Undergraduate Minor.

Dr. Elkin’s research program has spanned several areas, including avian amino acid nutrition, metabolism, and analysis; utilization of high-tannin grain sorghum by poultry; nutritional/pharmacological reduction of egg cholesterol content; and, most recently, novel dietary approaches to enrich eggs and poultry meat with heart-healthy very long-chain omega-3 fatty acids. He is the author or co-author 68 articles in a total of 23 different journals, 55 published abstracts, 4 book chapters, and 13 conference proceedings papers.

Dr. Elkin has been a member of PSA since 1976, and his most extensive service to the Association has been in the area of journal editing and reviewing. He served as a Co-Section Editor of the Metabolism and Nutrition Section of Poultry Science for 11 years and as a Nutrition Co-Subject Editor of The Journal of Applied Poultry Research for 3 years.Elkin’s leadership since 2000, the Program has provided over $1.3 million for applied poultry research at Penn State.

Richard K. Gast received a BA degree in History, and MS and Ph.D. degrees in Poultry Science from The Ohio State University. He has served as a Research Microbiologist with the Agricultural Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture since 1987 and is currently the Research Leader of the Egg Safety and Quality Research Unit at the U.S. National Poultry Research Center in Athens, Georgia. His USDA research program has focused on preventing, detecting, and controlling infections of chickens with the bacterial pathogen Salmonella Enteritidis. Much of this work utilized experimental infection models to understand Salmonella persistence, transmission, and egg contamination in laying hens. The findings and implications of this research were reported in more than 300 peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, proceedings, patents, or invited talks. Gast was co-editor of two books and co-organizer of an international symposium on food-borne Salmonella in poultry and eggs, and has been a member of the National Poultry Improvement Plan Technical Committee for many years. He has served as an editorial board member and section editor for Poultry Science and also on the editorial boards of The Journal of Applied Poultry Research and Avian Diseases. He has been the recipient of the PSA Research Award and the PSA American Egg Board Research Award (twice), and was named a Distinguished Alumnus of the College of Agriculture, Food, and Environmental Sciences at The Ohio State University.

E. David Peebles has been a continuous member of the Poultry Science Association since his PhD program in 1984. He is also an active member of the Southern Poultry Science Society and the World’s Poultry Science Association. Having earned degrees from the University of South Carolina (BS), College of William and Mary (MA), and North Carolina State University (PhD). Upon receiving his PhD, Peebles received a postdoctoral fellowship with a joint appointment as a research physiologist with USDA-ARS (Southeast Poultry Research Lab; Genetics Unit) and as an adjunct research associate at the University of Georgia. In 1988, he joined the faculty of the Poultry Science Department at Mississippi State University. Peebles is currently a Professor in the Poultry Science Department and with an adjunct appointment in the MSU College of Veterinary Medicine. He served as the coordinator of the Interdisciplinary Genetics Graduate Program and as Interim Head of his Department at MSU.

Throughout his career, he has trained and graduated 26 Masters and 6 PhD students and served on 53 graduate committees. He has published 494 career publications, including 296 abstracts, 173 peer­ reviewed journal articles, one book, one videotape, two book chapters, three bulletins, and 19 popular/miscellaneous articles. Of his peer-reviewed journal articles, 121 were published in Poultry Science and 17 were published in The Journal of Applied Poultry Research.

Sheila E. Purdum 
University of Nebraska

Dr. Sheila E. Purdum is a Professor and Extension Poultry Specialist at the University of Nebraska who conducts applied research on the subjects of laying hen and pullet nutrition. Her paper “Limestone particle size fed to pullets influences subsequent bone integrity of hens” was the particular research paper published in Poultry Science in 2018 for which this award is presented. This was a significant paper as it documented how limestone sources fed to laying hens in cage vs. aviary cages affects long term welfare of the hen and bone integrity. Dr. Purdum has been conducting nutrition studies in laying hens and pullets for over 30 years and has previously received the Poultry Science Helene Cecil Leadership Award, the AFIA Nutrition Research Award and has also served the Poultry Science Association as a Director and as a Journal Section Editor. Dr. Purdum enjoys working with youth in 4-H and new producers as well as advising graduate students for future careers in the Poultry Industry.

Peter R. Ferket 
North Carolina State University

Dr. Peter Ferket earned a BS and a MS in Animal and Poultry Science under the supervision of Ed Moran at the University of Guelph. In 1987, he received a PhD degree in animal nutrition from Iowa State University under the supervision of Jerry Sell. His MS thesis and PhD dissertation were related to the feed formulation and feeding practices of turkey breeders and market turkeys, respectfully. In 1988, Dr. Ferket joined the Department of Poultry Science at North Carolina State University as the Extension Poultry Nutritionist and is now responsible for research, extension education, and teaching related to nutrition and feed manufacturing. He also serves as the Director of the Animal Food and Nutrition Consortium and Associate Head of the Prestage Department of Poultry Science. He has devoted much of his extension and research efforts on nutritional factors that affect growth and health of meat poultry. He is recognized for his work on how pro-nutrient feed additives, feed formulation, feed manufacturing, and co-product feed ingredients affect digestibility and nutrient utilization, skeletal development and immune function, enteric health, and the yield and quality of meat. His teaching activities include on vitamin metabolism, mineral metabolism, poultry nutrition, feed mill management, ingredient quality control, and feed formulation. Dr. Ferket is a frequent conference speaker and has authored over 600 publications and 9 patents and invention disclosures.

Steven C. Ricke 
University of Arkansas

Dr. Ricke received his BS and MS from the University of Illinois, and a PhD from the University of Wisconsin. He became a USDA-ARS postdoctorate in the Microbiology Dept. at North Carolina State University, then joined the Poultry Science Dept. at Texas A&M University as an Assistant Professor (1992), Associate Professor (1998), and Professor (2004) and joined the Graduate Faculties of both Food Science and Technology and Nutrition. In 2005 he became the first holder of the new Donald “Buddy” Wray Endowed Chair in Food Safety and UA Center for Food Safety Director at the University of Arkansas as well as a faculty member of the Dept. of Food Science and the Cellular and Molecular Graduate program.

Overall Dr. Ricke has emphasized foodborne Salmonella ecology from the farm to the processing plant and genetic mechanisms employed by this pathogen to survive these highly variable environments. His group has used this to devise preharvest and postharvest prevention strategies that better anticipate potential survival of Salmonella during food production and processing. Dr. Ricke has also used next generation sequencing approaches to develop a better understanding of the interaction of the microbiome with pathogens in the avian gastrointestinal tract and to evaluate feed additives such as prebiotics. Simultaneously, he is using these sequencing techniques to develop more comprehensive microbial characterization of the poultry processing plant and to introduce the concept of microbiome assessment of microbial population changes occurring during individual steps of poultry processing.

Ming Xie 
Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences

Ming Xie is an associate professor of duck nutrition at the Institute of Animal Sciences of Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences. Xie received his BS degree in broiler nutrition from Northwest A&F University, Yangling, China, in 2000. Xie also earned MS degree in duck nutrition from Northwest A&F University, Yangling, China, in 2003. During this period, he met Shuisheng Hou from Institute of Animal Sciences of Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences who has become his lifelong guide to duck research. In 2003, Xie entered Shuisheng Hou’s laboratory to continue his study in duck nutrition and got PhD degree from Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China, in 2007. Afterwards, He finished his two-year postdoctoral research on duck nutrition as an assistant professor at China Agricultural University, Beijing, China. In 2009, Xie accepted a faculty position as an assistant professor in duck nutrition at the Institute of Animal Sciences of Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China. He was then promoted to associate professor in duck nutrition in 2014. From 2015 to 2016, Xie had successfully completed the Purdue visiting scholar program on poultry (including ducks) nutrition.

Xie’s research interest mainly focused on nutrient requirements and animal production and management of modern White Pekin ducks and he has been engaged in duck research for more than 10 years. Through dose-response trials, he obtained many nutrient requirements for Pekin ducks (including energy, amino acids, vitamins, and minerals) in order to provide a valuable guideline to duck diet formulation and he also successfully developed the low-protein diet of starter and growing Pekin ducks to markedly reduce nitrogen excretion in duck production. In addition, he conducted research on duck production and management (such as stocking density and rearing temperature) in order to improve animal welfare of modern duck production. In the past ten years, he has authored or coauthored about 30 papers on duck nutrition and production in peer-reviewed recognized English journals including including Poultry Science, British Poultry Science, and Animal Feed Science and Technology.

Iksoon Kang 
California Polytechnic State University

Dr. Ike Kang is an associate professor in the Department of Animal Science at California Polytechnic State University. He received his BS from Konkuk University in Seoul, South Korea, his MS from California State University at Fresno, and his PhD from Texas A & M University. Following graduation, Dr. Kang held a postdoctoral fellow position at North Carolina State University and joined Kraft/Oscar Mayer Foods in 2000.

Recently, Dr. Kang developed a proprietary broiler chilling method after testing various subzero chilling temperatures in numerous saline solutions at Cal Poly. This year, after receiving an intensive training course in the 2018 California State University Innovation Corps, Dr. Kang’s research idea and entrepreneurship concept was approved for national competition in 2019. While at Texas A&M University, Dr. Kang compared the effects of electrical stunning and carbon dioxide stunning on animal welfare and broiler carcass quality. The results of his research on bleed-out efficiency, carcass damage, rigor mortis development, and textural quality provided the poultry industry with a stepping-stone for the development of current gas stunning. At North Carolina State University and Kraft/Oscar Mayer Foods, he conducted patent-granted research and significantly improved protein content, product quality, and shelf-life of the mechanically deboned poultry meat by reducing heme, fat, and blood through his unique water-washing/protein-recovering technique. At Michigan State University, Dr. Kang conducted a series of research projects on bacterial attachment, detachment, and quantification on broiler carcasses. Ike is the author/coauthor of 38 peer-reviewed articles, 4 book chapters, and 4 patents, with 45 conference presentations and 32 invited national and international presentations. His research has been recognized with numerous awards including the National Turkey Federation Research Award in 2018 and an ABCD (Above and Beyond the Call of Duty) Award in 2007, Spark Awards (2002, 03, 06), and the Be My Guest Award in 2003 at Oscar Mayer Foods.

Jacqueline P. Jacob 
University of Kentucky

Jacqueline Jacob is a Poultry Extension Project Manager at the University of Kentucky. She is a native of Canada and received her BSc, MS, and PhD degrees from the University of British Columbia. While her PhD is from UBC, she completed her doctoral research at the University of Nairobi in Kenya. After completing her BSc degree, Jacob spent four and a half years working on a poultry project in Mozambique, Africa. After completing her PhD, she completed a joint post-doc with the Universities of British Columbia and Alberta looking at reducing nitrogen and phosphorus excretion from commercial swine and poultry. Jacob then moved to the United States, working first at the University of Florida followed by University of Minnesota. She has been at the University of Kentucky for the last eleven years where she has specialized in small and backyard flocks as well as 4-H youth poultry programming. Jacob is involved with the electronic cooperative extension service, known as e-extension, conducting national extension programming in small and backyard poultry flocks.

Raj Murugesan 
Biomin America Inc.

Raj Murugesan is the Technical Officer of BIOMIN, responsible for research activities, product development, and managing technical services. Raj is a Veterinarian by training, earned an MBA in Marketing, and a PhD in Nutritional Physiology from Iowa State University. He has 18 years of research and technical service experience in the livestock industry worldwide. He has been a panelist, keynote speaker, lecturer, reviewer to several journals, and is the author of numerous publications, technical articles and reports.

Raj was awarded the Maurice-Stein Fellowship in 2013 by the Poultry Science Association and the United Egg Producers of USA, for developing an in-vivo research model to evaluate the energy metabolism in laying hens. His current research primarily focuses on the effects of stressors such as pathogens, endotoxins, and mycotoxins on the intestinal integrity and energy metabolism of food animals.

Jessica B. Wells 
Mississippi State University

Dr. Jessica Wells received her BS and MS degrees in Poultry Science at Mississippi State University in 2006 and 2009, respectively. She joined the faculty of the Poultry Science Department as an Extension Instructor following the completion of her Master’s degree in 2009. She is currently a Teaching/Extension Instructor, and recently completed her doctoral degree in poultry science with focus on poultry-related activities and their effectiveness in recruiting strategies. She is the instructor of record for the introductory course, Commercial Poultry Production. She recently co-developed and co-teaches a General Education course approved for the Social Science & Behavior category entitled, “Animal Agriculture and Society,” designed primarily for non-Ag majors to dispel myths of animal protein production and provide evidence-based accurate information, while allowing open discussion of diverse viewpoints. She serves as the undergraduate advisor for all poultry science majors; and has primary responsibility for all recruiting activities. Together with another faculty member, she co-advises the poultry science club and co-coaches the collegiate judging teams.

Cara Robison 
Michigan State University

Dr. Cara Robison received her BS degree from Truman State University in Biology. Then she attended University of Kentucky and earned her MS in Animal Science under Dr. Laurie Lawrence. In 2000, she was hired as a research technician in the Department of Animal Science at Michigan State University to work primarily with horses. In 2005, she began to work for Dr. Mike Orth and completed her PhD under his guidance while she continued to work full time. In 2008, Cara began working for Dr. Darrin Karcher as his research technician when he began his research program at Michigan State University. In 2010, Cara was awarded the Omega Protein Innovation research award for her PhD research. Cara has assisted with applied research projects focusing on laying hen nutrition, welfare and well-being, egg production, egg quality, and egg safety. She has also worked with duck and turkey gait analysis, and bone health in broilers and turkeys. She is instrumental in creating relational databases for real-time data collection and analysis for all laying hen and broiler projects. She manages the iPads and the database server at the MSU Poultry Farm and is responsible for sample and statistical analysis. She has assisted over 20 graduate students with their research projects and helped design and conduct numerous undergraduate research projects. She has authored 13 and coauthored more than 30 scientific articles.

Sacit F. Bilgili 
Auburn University

Dr. Bilgili became Professor Emeritus at the Department of Poultry Science at Auburn University in 2015 after serving 30 years as a faculty member. He currently serves as the Interim Department Head at his alma mater. His research and extension efforts uniquely bridged the production and processing phases of the broiler production system to include: slaughter and processing technology and efficiency; product wholesomeness and condemnations; meat quality and yield; food safety and HACCP programs; and animal welfare. He has authored or co-authored numerous articles in scientific and trade journals and continues to consult and speak at many national and international venues. Dr. Bilgili served as the President of the Poultry Science Association, Southern Poultry Science Society, and USA Branch of the World’s Poultry Science Association, as a Vice President of the WPSA and as a member of the Board of Directors of the Federation of Animal Science Societies. Sarge’s work was recognized by the Sigma Xi Research Award (1985); Alabama Poultry and Egg Association Distinguished Service (1992) and Appreciation Award (1995); National Broiler Council Broiler Research Award (1996); Pfizer Extension Award (2000); WPSA Education Award (2000); PSA Poultry Products Research Award (2003); and US Poultry Foundation Charles Beard Research Excellence Award (2015). Dr. Bilgili was recognized in 2011 as a Fellow of the PSA.

Hsiao-Ching Liu 
North Carolina State University

Hsiao-Ching Liu is currently a professor in the Department of Animal Science at North Carolina State University. Dr. Liu is a geneticist by training and she received her PhD degree in genetics from Michigan State University. Liu’s research is focused on functional genomics in agricultural animals. Her research emphasis has been on applying genomic and proteomic approaches to define the regulatory mechanisms of growth and development and immunological responses to virus-induced diseases. Liu is one of the leading pioneers in the field of microRNA regulation of development and disease in poultry. With funding support from USDA NIFA AFRI programs, her group studies microRNA-mediated regulation of immunological responses to Marek’s disease virus (MDV) and energy metabolism during the metabolic switch. Her work to uncover the manipulation of host gene expression by MDV and the host’s counter immune response has led to the discovery of novel post-transcriptional regulatory mechanisms of poultry immunity and response to vaccination. Her work in understanding the underlying molecular regulatory mechanisms of the metabolic switch in broilers has unraveled a complex transcriptional and post-transcriptional regulatory system which is triggered by nutritional and physiological cues to facilitate this metabolic transition. With the most recent USDA grants awarded to Liu and her colleagues, they have embarked on identifying the molecular mechanisms underlying physiological responses to heat stress in chickens and are also using cutting edge genomics and proteomics approaches to investigate the molecular basis, including transcription factors and microRNAs, for egg production rates in turkey hens. Liu has served on several USDA and NSF peer review grant panels. She is currently serving as a section editor of Poultry Science. She is the recipient of 2008 PSA Early Achievement Award for Research.