Problem-solving in animal diseases

University scientist and the Faculty of Veterinary Science’s Associate Dean (Research and Research Training) Professor Glenn Browning has won the 2010 Ian Clunies Ross Memorial Award.

The award, made by the Australian College of Veterinary Scientists, celebrates high academic and research accomplishment in veterinary science.

Professor Browning said the award was the result of work accomplished in collaboration with the faculty’s research team.

He explained that broadly speaking, his team developed solutions to diseases which didn’t rely on antibiotics.

 “Vaccines reduce the prevalence of diseases, and reduce need for treatment of animals with antibiotics,” he says.

“Reduced antibiotic use means reduced selection pressure, which has production benefits for farmers and flow-on effects for human health through the food chain.”

There are economic benefits to Professor Browning’s work as well: vaccines developed at the University are commercialised through Australian companies and marketed internationally. The research team is on the verge of commercialising a vaccine which prevents respiratory disease in pigs.

Professor Browning said he wanted to be a veterinarian from an early age. “I was always interested in animals and biology.

“Studying Veterinary Science provided me with a very good, fundamental understanding of the biology of animals, how they interact with their environment, and how that knowledge is applied to generate practical outcomes.”

Though Professor Browning worked as a clinical veterinarian for one year after he graduated, it was the diagnostic challenge of clinical work which he found most interesting, so he returned to study and completed a PhD at the University of Melbourne.

He has never looked back. “When I got into research, I realised I had the chance to spend my entire career solving problems,” he says.

 “You see and deal with new things all the time, from year-to-year, and in some cases, even from day-to-day.”

Professor Browning also saw an opportunity to make a considerable impact on animal welfare.

 “Veterinary research was an area in which it was easy to see the applications of the work and see each project through to completion,” he says.

Professor Browning’s research approach was heavily influenced by the three years he spent working at the Morden Research Institute in Edinburgh.

At the institute, individual researchers took a holistic approach to their work.

“They didn’t acknowledge traditional boundaries between virology and bacteriology, but rather worked on disease problems,” he explains.

 “It was a very different approach from how many scientists worked. They tended to slot themselves into a box – virologist, immunologist, bacteriologist – and stay there.”

When he returned to the University of Melbourne, Professor Browning was able to continue this approach at the Faculty of Veterinary Science.

“We work as a holistic research team, across the sphere of infectious diseases and the range of species.

“Everything we’ve achieved is a result of this team approach.”

Working in this way means postgraduate research students at the University receive a very broad and deep exposure to veterinary research.

This breadth of training, across a range of animal species and a range of disease problems, means researchers work on many different bacterial and viral pathogens, different viral diseases, and with different animals.

“Veterinary Science research always keeps you thinking,” Professor Browning says.

“What new disease can we apply this approach to? What new understanding can we develop of how infectious organisms cause disease?

“Everything is interlinked, and the diversity of our work continues to excite me.”