Pettinger joins Advantage Accelerator
The OSU Advantage Accelerator is pleased to announce the addition of Katie Pettinger to our staff as Commercialization Catalyst. Pettinger is focused on supporting OSU researchers (both faculty and students), helping to advance research with commercialization potential and also helping to launch OSU spinoff companies. Contact Pettinger at [email protected] if you are a researcher that would like to discuss technology commercialization.
Egna given scientific excellence award
The Board for International Food and Agricultural Development (BIFAD) has selected Hillary Egna, Director of the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Aquaculture & Fisheries at Oregon State University, and a team of her research collaborators as recipients of the 2018 BIFAD Award for Scientific Excellence in a Feed the Future Innovation Lab.
The award recognizes the team for its work to address the critical production constraint of feed costs in aquaculture enterprises. The AquaFish Innovation Lab team has focused on finding low-cost alternatives to fishmeal in aquaculture diets for both small-scale and medium-scale fish farmers.
One project the team worked on was the development of alternative-protein-formulated pelleted feeds for snakehead fish in the Mekong Delta. The feed was adopted by 90 % of the commercial feed mills in the region, resulting in higher profits for farmers. More than ten of the largest commercial feed industry mills adopted the formulation and subsequently changed the way these fish are fed and grown in much of southeast Asia. The work also influenced the lifting of a decade-old ban on snakehead production in Cambodia.
The research team has also conducted trainings on sustainable feed technologies for more than 3,500 farmers, managers, and policy-makers in 11 countries.
