Turkey industry research award given

The award, given every other year, recognizes Velleman’s outstanding record of turkey-related research. A poultry expert with a primary interest in muscle development, Velleman is senior author or co-author of 23 full-length peer-reviewed papers on turkeys and has eight turkey gene sequences published in the GenBank of the National Institutes of Health.

“Sandy is a superb fundamental scientist who has been very successful in her scholarly endeavors,” said Jim Kinder, chairman of the Department of Animal Sciences within Ohio State’s College of Food, Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.

“The National Turkey Federation Award is an honor that exemplifies the manner in which Sandy’s contributions are valued by the turkey industry,” Kinder said.

Among many other accomplishments, Velleman has established the parameters for the extracellular matrix (ECM) spacing and muscle fiber size in a commercial turkey sire line and the experimental F and RBC2 turkey lines at both the embryonic and post-hatch stages of growth.

During these and other studies, her research has demonstrated that, 16 weeks after hatching, breast muscle morphology was strongly influenced by maternal inheritance and there was muscle damage in growth-selected lines. This finding is expected to have a tremendous impact on the selection of dam lines for the production of commercial turkeys.

“This award indicates the value of my research to the turkey industry,” Velleman said. “To have the turkey industry place such a high value on …my research…is of high significance to me.”

OARDC is the research arm of Ohio State’s College of Food, Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.