PEOPLE ▶▶▶
Diamond V Diamond V recently wel- comed Dr Derek Petry (pictured), who joined the company as director, swine research & technical sup- port. The company’s re- search team also recently welcomed Dr Bucky Gwartney, who joined as director, protein food safety research. Diamond V also added two new people to its IMEA team. Faith Wakibia, MSc will be technical services manager (poultry & pig production); Jared Serem, DVM, PhD will be manager – animal health and food safety, swine and poultry.
AFBI The Northern Irish Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute (AFBI) appointed Dr Stanley McDowell as CEO, as from 3 September 2018. He used to be director of AFBI’s Veterinary Sciences Division.
PigChamp US-based data company PigChamp welcomed Jess Manthe to the team as marketing and commu- nications specialist. She is a recent graduate of Iowa State University, with a double major in agricultural business and marketing.
APRIL The Australasian Pork Research Institute Ltd appointed Dr Tony Peacock as an independent director. Dr Peacock is a for- mer managing director of the Pig Research and Development Corporation and was CEO of a successful CRC for a decade.
Tonisity Jesko Wilk (pictured) has joined Tonisity to be sales manager for Germany, Aus- tria, Netherlands and Scandi- navia. He will start on August 1. The company also added Kyle Montgomery and Brad Carson to its US team. Mr Montgomery will be direc- tor of customer success. Mr Carson will be manager for Min- nesota and surrounding states at the customer success team.
Vion Group Vion has appointed Binne Visser, as its new group HR di- rector and member of the executive committee with effect from 3 September. He comes from Kramp Groep.
32 ▶ PIG PROGRESS | Volume 34, No. 6, 2018
NEWS ▶▶▶ Zinc: Important for boar fertility
Zinc plays a key role in promoting fertility in males – this applies to pigs as well as humans and other species. That conclusion was reached by re- searchers of the University of Missouri, USA and published recently in the journal Nature Communications. In a press release, the university stated that it is “a discovery that has implica- tions for improved in vitro fertilisation and artificial insemination in livestock, and for human infertility diagnostics and therapies.” Scientists have long struggled to un- derstand what regulates sperm ‘capaci- tation’, the vital physiological process sperm must undergo to become capa- ble of fertilising an egg cell. Prof Su- tovsky and doctoral student Karl Kerns
used image-based flow cytometer to monitor zinc localisation during various stages of capacitation in sperm cells. They found that zinc ions (Zn2+
) exert
significant control over capacitation beyond merely enabling the process, in that the ion can prevent and even re- verse the capacitation process in some cases. This also occurs when an egg has already been fertilised and must defend against another fertilisation. Another product of the research was the ability to quickly and accurately evaluate the fertility of swine, other livestock or humans by analysing their sperm cells with the flow cytometer. This allows for more informed deci- sion-making at in vitro fertilisation and artificial insemination.
PHOTO: HENK RISWICK
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