Identification of biomarkers associated with the onset & progression of major metabolic and infectious diseases of transition dairy cows

Dairy cows are commonly afflicted with a variety of debilitating conditions such as mastitis (udder infection), metritis (uterine infection), laminitis, infertility,
ketosis, milk fever, downer cow syndrome, and displaced abomasum. These diseases are often difficult to detect by conventional methods and by the time they are detected it is often too late.

Date of Submission:	July 15, 2010
Total Budget:	$729,800
Total Amount Requested from Genome Alberta/ALMA (less than $500k):	$499,800
Project Duration:	3 years

Project Leader(s)	Burim N. Ametaj University of Alberta 4-10F Agriculture/ Forestry Centre Edmonton, AB T6G 2P5	David Wishart University of Alberta 3-41 Athabasca Hall, Edmonton, AB T6G 2E8,

Project Summary
The overall goal of this research proposal is to identify molecular biomarkers that are associated with the early prediction, diagnosis, and monitoring of major metabolic and infectious diseases of dairy cattle. Dairy cows are commonly afflicted with a variety of debilitating conditions such as mastitis (udder infection), metritis (uterine infection), laminitis, infertility, ketosis, milk fever, downer cow syndrome, and displaced abomasum. These diseases are often difficult to detect by conventional methods and by the time they are detected it is often too late.

Four conditions in particular (mastistis, metritis, laminitis and infertility) accounted for almost 60% of the 160,000 cows culled in Canada in 2008. This early culling costs the dairy industry more than $200 million a year. If these diseases or conditions could be detected early enough, effective and inexpensive treatments could be started and tens of thousands of dairy cattle could be saved. Currently there are no simple tests to diagnose these conditions at their earliest stages or to predict if a dairy cow is likely to develop these diseases. Recently, the development of new metabolomics and proteomics technologies involving highly sensitive analytical instruments such as NMR, GC-MS, HPLC and LC-MS have made it possible to search for novel predictive and diagnostic biomarkers for many diseases in both humans and animals.

For this project, we will use quantitative MS and NMR-based metabolomics techniques to detect potentially predictive or diagnostic metabolites in dairy cows. We intend to monitor a number of dairy cows for an extended period of time and will collect blood and urine throughout this period in anticipation that certain cows will develop one or more of these conditions. This will allow us to get metabolomic data prior to and during the development of these diseases. To complement this metabolomic work we will also use quantitative immunoassays to identify potentially predictive or diagnostic protein biomarkers associated with these diseases. Because this will be the first time that these diseases will have been rigorously scrutinized by these powerful new “omics” technologies, we anticipate that a number of never-before-seen
biomarkers will be identified. If these biomarkers can be validated, it may be possible to develop rapid, inexpensive tests that could be used by dairy farmers or veterinarians to screen cow herds for these conditions. The development of effective, early-diagnostic tests could save the dairy industry $100ʼs of millions a year.