Featured Research
The College undertakes vibrant and successful research with more than 80% of its academic staff contributing directly to the College’s strategic research objective, which is to establish and enhance research activity of international quality in focused areas of practical relevance within the broad disciplines that comprise veterinary and biomedical science.
Our research strategy is delivered through research groups led by world-class scientists. Four established groups deliver high quality basic and clinically-related research:
- Musculoskeletal Biology (MSK);
- Reproduction, Genes and Development (RGD);
- Cardiovascular and Inflammation Biology (CVIB);
- Infection and Immunity (I&I).
Much of our research is aimed at improving animal welfare. The establishment of a Centre for Animal Welfare at the College in 2005 has ensured Animal Welfare remains high on the agenda of in each of our research groups. Professor Christopher Wathes provides academic leadership for all Animal Welfare activities at the College and he identifies programmes of research within each group that tackle particular welfare issues and utilise expertise and facilities within the Centre for Animal Welfare. Examples where such integration with established research groups has been achieved include two programme grants in the areas of Musculoskeletal and Developmental Biology (Fetal programming: pre-hatch environmental influences on subsequent musculoskeletal health of chickens) and Infectious diseases (The award in 2007 of a £2.4M multidisciplinary programme grant application on PMWS by BBSRC’s Combating Endemic Diseases of Farmed Animals for Sustainability (CEDFAS) Initiative to a team led by Professors Werling, CM Wathes and Pfeiffer).
Research on the clinical caseload is important to ensure we utilise this unique and rich resource. The College has invested heavily in infrastructure to facilitate disciplined study of the clinical caseload and is the first European Veterinary School to establish a Phase II Clinical Trials Unit within our Clinical Investigation Centre. A major strategic goal is to ensure research in our four focused areas addresses scientific questions from the molecule to the clinical patient or population of animals, integrating basic and clinical research wherever appropriate. These measures will ensure continued growth in clinical research that truly informs veterinary clinical practice, and where the opportunities arise to use this resource to address research questions of human medical importance, we expect this research to inform human medical practice as well.
Recent innovations and future initiatives include:
We have continued to develop a comparative animal biomechanics team within the MSK group delivering world-class fundamental interdisciplinary research. The locomotion barn (736m2 gait analysis laboratory) was completed in early 2007 and is fully equipped with state-of-the-art tools for biomechanics research (funded by a BBSRC Research Equipment Initiative grant). This facility is attracting visiting scientists from across the world.
Reproductive physiology has been an area of strength in research at the College for many years. Maintaining world-class leadership and future direction in fundamental comparative male reproduction research and its application to ecology is assured by new recruit, Professor Eduardo Roldan (from CSIC, Madrid). Prof Roldan, a recipient of the Royal Society Wolfson Merit Award, adds a new dimension to the group’s excellent research into the science underpinning artificial breeding technologies.
Building capacity and developing leadership in veterinary epidemiology and public health to underpin high quality clinically-related research, particularly in infectious diseases, is an important part of our research strategy. Professor Katharina Stärk (recruited in 2007 from the Swiss Federal Veterinary Office) is co-ordinator of the Infection & Immunity Research group. Control of infectious diseases requires a multi-disciplinary approach to understand the pathogens, the host response to these organisms and the way infections behave in different populations of animals. Experts in all these disciplines work together within this group to address questions of global importance affecting animal and human health. Infection and Immunity Research at the RVC will become increasingly focused within a new £4M facility due to open in February 2009, the Centre for Emerging, Endemic and Exotic Diseases (CEEED).
This facility has been designed to optimise integration between epidemiologists, microbiologists, immunologists and clinicians supported by excellent pathology services to facilitate multi-disciplinary programmes of research. Teams of researchers currently work to devise practical measures to control endemic diseases. Future emphasis will be placed on tackling the problems of emerging zoonotic infectious diseases in partnership with human medicine addressing the issues of changing environments brought about by globalisation and rapid movement of people and animals and expanding host and vector ranges brought about by climate change.