Two awards for swine innovation in research and one for swine innovation in education were presented at the Midwest Section meeting of the American Society of Animal Science (ASAS) in Des Moines recently.

Jared S. Bates, a Ph.D. student at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, received a swine innovation in research award for his work in determining the importance of genetic and environmental effects on the incidence of porcine circovirus-associated disease in pigs.

The second swine innovation in research award went to Guowu Xu, a Ph.D. student at the University of Minnesota. Xu’s research focuses on evaluating the effects of feeding dried distiller’s grains with solubles (DDGS) on growth performance and pork quality in grow-finish pigs. Xu’s project examines the effect of corn-soybean diets with 10% DDGS on pork fat quality.

The swine innovation award in education was presented to Tim Safranski of the University of Missouri-Columbia. Safranski has served as a state swine-breeding specialist since 1996. At Missouri, he works in Extension and research in genetics and reproductive management. He also teaches the senior level capstone class in swine production. His award was for a project on Characteristics of U.S. Boar Studs.

The Pork Checkoff in conjunction with the ASAS sponsored the awards.