The University of Kentucky's Gluck Equine Research Foundation Board of Directors met Nov. 1 and reviewed the wide array of research advancements and developments made by its members throughout the year, among other topics.

Gluck Center director Mats Troedsson DVM, PhD, Dipl. ACT, ECAR, presented the board with a few of the major developments that members of the foundation worked on thus far in 2010.

Udeni B.R. Balasuriya, BVSc, MS, PhD; Thomas Chambers, PhD; and colleagues conducted a study through which they developed a new form of diagnostic test for equine influenza based on reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction. The new test is the most sensitive assay developed to date.

In another study R. Frank Cook, PhD, and Charles M. Issel, DVM, PhD, developed a new polymerase chain reaction test that can detect the equine infectious anemia (EIA) virus weeks and even months earlier than a traditional Coggins test. They performed this research in conjunction with European and South American scientists in response to EIA outbreaks this year in Europe