Home
Mission
Faculty
Undergraduate
Graduate
Research
Extension
News
History
Affiliated Centers
January 2003
College of Ag 2003 AnSci Faculty Awards
Dr. James M. Reecy, Assistant Professor in Animal Science, received the 2003 COA Early Achievement in Research Award. Dr. Reecy and his research group study the growth and development of skeletal and cardiac muscles. In order to improve livestock production in the future, it is imperative that animal scientists discover the genetic and biochemical mechanisms that control skeletal muscle growth and development. Moreover, knowledge of growth is essential for improved health of humans. Dr. Reecy shows great promise for a long and productive career of scientific discovery. A major focus of Dr. Reecy's laboratory is to understand in Dr. Reecy's work is funded in part by competitive grants of USDA-NRI, Elanco, American Angus Association, Cargill, National Science Foundation, and the American Heart Association. More
molecular detail the mechanisms controlling skeletal and cardiac muscle growth and development. An over arching hypothesis of his laboratory is that different models of enhanced skeletal muscle growth involve common intracellular signaling pathways. Toward this end, his lab works not only with work overload hypertrophy but also double-muscling in cattle and b-agonists.Dr. Reecy has adopted new technologies in his laboratory, such as microarray analysis of gene expression. As an example, Dr. Reecy's laboratory recently used Affymetrix GeneChips® technology to identify genes that were differentially expressed in work overloaded- and sham-operated skeletal muscle (Carson et al., 2001). This was significant for several reasons. First, it is the only published paper describing the global changes in gene expression in response to increase workload. Second, at the time it was the first reported use of false discovery rate to statistically identify differentially expressed genes. Subsequently, several other research groups have utilized false discovery rate analysis. Lastly, this work has demonstrated that global analysis of gene expression could provide insights into the molecular mechanisms underlying the phenotypic responses in work overloaded skeletal muscle, such as protein synthesis, cell proliferation, transcription, immune response, and metabolism. Currently, a CDNA microarray is being designed to evaluate gene expression in cattle.The COA Early Achievement in Research Award recognizes a faculty member who has demonstrated outstanding accomplishments in research unusually early in his/her professional career. Recipients receive a $500 one-time stipend.