Life at OSU

In just six months, donors to Oregon State University committed $13.8 million to establish 15 new endowed faculty position funds to advance research, teaching and engagement, university leaders recently announced.

Dr. Kurt Williams, a veterinary pathologist at Michigan State University, has been named director of the Oregon Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory at Oregon State University, at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of the lab and its testing capabilities.

Three grants from the National Animal Health Laboratory Network will allow the Oregon Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory housed at Oregon State University to continue to expand its role in responding to large disease outbreaks in the Pacific Northwest.

A recent study from Oregon State University’s veterinary college found that planting hedgerows in pasture-raised chicken farms may reduce heat stress to help certain chicken breeds grow faster and increase their immune response to better enable them to fight off pathogens.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Research funding at Oregon State University has topped $380 million for the fifth straight fiscal year, and research expenditures by the university, a key measure of research output, rose despite the pandemic for the seventh consecutive year, increasing by 5%.

Genetic sequencing of COVID-19 samples done by Oregon State University’s Center for Genome Research and Biocomputing has detected multiple variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 in samples from around the state, including the highly contagious U.K. strain in one sample from Bend, Oregon.

Researchers at Oregon State University have found that a few organisms in the gut microbiome play a key role in type 2 diabetes, opening the door to possible probiotic treatments for a serious metabolic disease affecting roughly one in 10 Americans.