CattleAnnie
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News Article
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Alberta invests $38 million in prion research
by Pete Hisey on 3/2/05 for Meatingplace.com
Aiming to bolster consumer confidence in Alberta beef, the province of is spending $38 million (Canadian) to fund advanced research into the ultimate cause of bovine spongiform encephalopathy — how otherwise healthy prions become misfolded, leading to the disease in cattle.
According to the Edmonton Journal, the research will also study the genetics, diagnosis and treatment of prion-related diseases, which include variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans and scrapie in sheep.
"The Alberta Prion Science Initiative will demonstrate to our trading partners that we are serious about BSE," said Alan Hall, managing director of the Alberta Agricultural Research Institute.
Hall said that among the possible results of the research are a more accurate and affordable test for BSE that can be conducted on live cattle, treatments that may produce a BSE-resistant animal and insights that may eventually lead to a cure for vCJD or Alzheimer's disease.
A director for the project is being sought, and it should be up and running by September. Teams of researchers at various Canadian universities will coordinate activities under the initiative, which is in addition to the previously announced Centre for Prions and Protein Folding Diseases at the University of Alberta.
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Take care.
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Alberta invests $38 million in prion research
by Pete Hisey on 3/2/05 for Meatingplace.com
Aiming to bolster consumer confidence in Alberta beef, the province of is spending $38 million (Canadian) to fund advanced research into the ultimate cause of bovine spongiform encephalopathy — how otherwise healthy prions become misfolded, leading to the disease in cattle.
According to the Edmonton Journal, the research will also study the genetics, diagnosis and treatment of prion-related diseases, which include variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans and scrapie in sheep.
"The Alberta Prion Science Initiative will demonstrate to our trading partners that we are serious about BSE," said Alan Hall, managing director of the Alberta Agricultural Research Institute.
Hall said that among the possible results of the research are a more accurate and affordable test for BSE that can be conducted on live cattle, treatments that may produce a BSE-resistant animal and insights that may eventually lead to a cure for vCJD or Alzheimer's disease.
A director for the project is being sought, and it should be up and running by September. Teams of researchers at various Canadian universities will coordinate activities under the initiative, which is in addition to the previously announced Centre for Prions and Protein Folding Diseases at the University of Alberta.
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Take care.
This is very good news. It would even be better if they left out the part about testing for BSE. Every capitalist man and his dog are looking at testing, as that is where the money is. What we need is more research into what causes a NORMALLY OCCURRING Prion to misfold! :?
