Veterinary Microbiology and Pathology

Over the past two decades, Dr. Troy Bankhead has dedicated his career to unlocking the secrets of the bacterial species that cause Lyme disease and Relapsing fever.

Troy Bankhead will use the funding to study how the bacteria that causes Lyme disease evades its host’s immune system and establishes a persistent infection.

Veterinary medicine researchers received an $800,000 grant to develop a safer, more effective vaccine to combat a tick-borne pathogen plaguing the cattle industry.

Discovery of novel treponeme bacteria

Elis Fisk is pursuing a doctorate in the WSU College of Veterinary Medicine’s Combined anatomic pathology residency and PhD program as he investigates a phenomenon called acquired tick resistance in the lab of Dr. Dana Shaw in the Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Pathology.

The funding will help identify and track respiratory pathogens in the Pacific Northwest, including avian influenza virus.

Cameron Coyle is pursuing a PhD in Immunology and Infectious Diseases as she explores innate immune memory in the American deer tick, which is of major public health concern as it transmits Borrelia burgdorferi (the causative agent of Lyme disease) and Anaplasma phagocytophilum (the causative agent of human granulocytic anaplasmosis). She is being mentored by Dr. Dana Shaw, an assistant professor in the Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Pathology.

Dr. Kyle Taylor’s extensive research portfolio includes studies on elk hoof disease, moose mortality, bighorn sheep pneumonia, and diseases affecting bile-farmed Asiatic black bears.

Dr. Chris Akinsulie is pursuing a PhD in Immunology and Infectious Diseases under the mentorship of Dr. Susan Noh in the College of Veterinary Medicine. His research could help to identify vaccine candidates to protect cattle from Anaplasma marginale, a common tick-borne bacteria that can cause disease and death in herds.

Moose populations have been dwindling for years across the country due to many factors, but new WSU research has found the impact of the arterial worm has likely been underestimated.