UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Chad Dechow, associate professor of dairy cattle genetics, is the 2024 recipient of the Research Innovator of the Year Award, given by Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences to recognize faculty and staff who have made notable efforts to commercialize their Penn State research.

He received the award, which includes a stipend, at a celebration of research innovation hosted by the college’s Entrepreneurship and Innovation program May 9 at the Penn Stater Hotel and Conference Center in State College.

The celebration was designed to recognize researchers in the college who recently have submitted an invention disclosure, have been awarded a patent or have received a grant from the college’s Research Applications for INnovation, or RAIN, program for their discoveries.

Dechow was honored for his research program focusing on improving dairy cow health and well-being amidst continuous efforts to breed for higher levels of milk yield and production efficiency. Most notably, his work led to a commercial test to identify animals carrying a gene variant causing a condition known as calf recumbency.

During the presentation, Dechow told attendees that in the autumn of 2020, veterinarians in New York observed an unusual condition affecting Holstein calves on two farms.

“The calves displayed weakness, struggling to stand at birth or shortly after, and unfortunately, most did not survive beyond six weeks of age,” Dechow said. “Despite thorough examination, the vets found no neurologic, infectious or metabolic abnormalities in these young animals, leaving the situation in mystery.”

Dechow’s lab was asked to help unravel the mystery. Using tissue samples from two herds in New York, a herd in Florida and a herd in Pennsylvania, the scientists conducted a genome-wide association using thousands of DNA markers and pedigree analysis to determine if a genetic origin for recumbency was plausible.

To locate the region of DNA triggering the condition, Dechow needed to genotype calves with recumbency and a group of unaffected relatives so that the region of the genome that was different could be determined between the two groups. The careful genetic record-keeping maintained by Holstein breeders internationally aided the research.

Ultimately, Dechow and colleagues determined that the 18 affected calves carried two copies of a 2 million DNA base pair region on chromosome 16, whereas the 26 unaffected calves did not. The research team subsequently looked more deeply at the DNA sequence in that region and discovered a mutation in a calcium channel gene involved with muscle contractions.

Dechow devised a simple genetic test based on that research to identify Holsteins that harbor the mutation. Farmers need only mail the lab a hair, blood or tissue sample to find out if the animal in question is healthy, a carrier of the mutation or afflicted by recumbency. He then pursued a provisional patent and finalized three nonexclusive license agreements, with a fourth pending.

“Dr. Dechow really drove the success of this technology, first through his expertise in bovine genetics and then through his sophisticated understanding of the economics of genotyping for this industry,” said Blair Siegfried, associate dean for research and graduate education and director of the Pennsylvania Agricultural Experiment Station. “From the beginning, Dr. Dechow was a champion for this technology, and his work will result in a distinct improvement in animal welfare, as well as economic benefit for farmers and the University.”

Dechow holds a bachelor’s degree in animal science, with honors, from Cornell University, a master’s degree in animal science from Penn State, and a doctorate in animal science from the University of Tennessee. Before joining Penn State in 2003, he was a student in the Traveling Scholar Program at the University of Wisconsin at Madison and was an instructor in dairy science at SUNY Morrisville in New York.

“There is a lot of tremendous research conducted in the college, so to be recognized in this manner is truly humbling,” Dechow said. “While the lead investigator often gets the most credit, the reality is that this test could not have been developed without the support of the college, Penn State’s Office of Technology Transfer, and most importantly the farmers and the veterinarians who recorded the condition. It is an honor to have worked with them all to develop this test to eradicate the defect.”

More information about the college’s Entrepreneurship and Innovation program is available online.