K-State's Animal and Veterinary Innovation Center will focus on livestock pain management

Mike Apley and Eduarda Bortoluzzi, researchers in Kansas State University's College of Veterinary Medicine, are leading a new, FDA-sponsored Animal and Veterinary Innovation Center to develop approaches to better support animal health and veterinary interventions. | Download this photo.

By Joe Montgomery
College of Veterinary Medicine Communications Marketing and Communications

Monday, March 3, 2025

 

MANHATTAN — Kansas State University has been identified by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Veterinary Medicine as one of four Animal and Veterinary Innovation Centers that will receive funding for work for advancing regulatory science and further developing innovative products and approaches to better support animal health and veterinary interventions.

While there are three areas of concentration for the innovation centers, K-State’s center was identified for its efforts to develop models that reliably and consistently evaluate the efficacy of analgesics in food animals in support of new drug approvals. This work specifically supports pain relief in pigs, goats and cattle for painful diseases or surgical pain.

Mike Apley, professor of clinical pharmacology and interim head of the Department of Anatomy and Physiology, is one of the principal investigators and project leaders at K-State. He is joined by Eduarda Bortoluzzi, assistant professor of animal welfare. Hans Coetzee, K-State's interim vice president of research, is a collaborator due to his expertise in animal welfare and pain reliefs studies.

Co-investigators include Raghavendra Amachawadi, associate professor of food animal therapeutics, and Emily Reppert, associate professor of large animal medicine. College of Veterinary Medicine staff members Misty Bear and Mikaela Weeder were also instrumental in putting the grant together.

“This grant was a true team effort to prepare, relying on the expertise of the animal welfare team which Dr. Coetzee has been instrumental in assembling,” Apley said. “It consists of nine studies at Kansas State University and two studies at North Carolina State University over five years of the cooperative agreement. The specific objective of this proposal is to develop models which reliably and consistently evaluate the efficacy of analgesics in food animals in support of new drug approvals.”

The FDA’s innovation center partnerships were chosen through a competitive cooperative agreement process to address critical animal, human or environmental health needs in one or more priority areas. Funding is renewable up to four years pending suitable progress and availability of funds.

More information is available at the FDA's website.

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