ISSUE 2018-2

Genetics news from Neogen, a leader in food and animal safety and genomic solutions

Neogen hosted 40 customer representatives at the fifth annual Breed Council Forum, a gathering of cattle breed association leaders, for product and service training.

The two-day event featured tours of Neogen’s Lincoln, Nebraska-based genomics operation, training in the use of laboratory information management systems, product line updates, innovation seminars on genotyping and customer appreciation events.

Workshops about information system trainings were well attended. Included was a basic-level course for new staff and breed associations recently contracting with Neogen, and a high-level course for experienced users.

Visitors from the breed associations took advantage of the opportunity to unite and share ideas collaboratively in a mutually beneficial way. In one major roundtable, several associations described their initiatives to genotype tens of thousands of cows and encourage producers to collect phenotype data on cow performance.

Other sessions covered the innovations of genotyping embryos, new ways to manage DNA tissue collection, updates on Neogen’s Genomic Profile products, and new insights on the global growth and leadership of Neogen in animal genomics.

The first evening of the forum involved a dinner with guest speaker Tori Lienemann, whose family hosted the Nebraska Cattle Association’s Cattlemen’s Ball, an event that raised over $900,000 for the University of Nebraska cancer research program. Lienemann described the challenges of preparing a farm for 5,000 visitors, with meals, music and fundraising. In a heartfelt speech, she described the impact of cancer in her own life, and how these values were shared by those in the cattle industry.

Cattle breed associations visit Neogen during fifth annual Breed Council ForumThe second evening was more low-key, with visitors networking at a tailgate barbeque hosted by Allflex and Neogen. Afterwards, the group enjoyed a minor league baseball game. Many of Neogen’s staff attended, mingling with customers who they normally don’t see in person but interact with frequently via phone or email.

Several key association executives extended their stay to conduct meetings on new products, information technology programs and educational meetings.

“This meeting is very important to maintaining the loyalty of these key customer organizations. Our partners appreciate the opportunity to interact and share success stories,” said Tom Schultz, Neogen’s director of sales and marketing for genomics.

“Some of them made their first trip to the lab, and that is always an impressive experience. These customers enjoyed the opportunity to learn and also the chance to share constructive ideas with us.”

Neogen Genomics • genomics.neogen.comUSA/Canada: 877-443-6489 | gscustomersupport@neogen.com

Europe: +44 (0) 1292 526 094 | contact_genomics@neogeneurope.com

Australia: +61 7 5460 1960 | gaa@neogen.com

Brazil: +55 19 3935.3727 | info@neogendobrasil.com@neogencorp

Neogen On the RoadEAAP 2018 The European genomics team travelled to Dubrovnik, Croatia on August 27 to sponsor the 69th Annual Meeting of the European Federation of Animal Science (EAAP). The five-day event hosts scientists and experts from the field of animal science. The EAAP Congress provides insights into the latest research results from many areas of animal science.

UK Dairy DayAt UK Dairy Day on September 12, Neogen sponsored the Best Presented Lines. UK Dairy Day is a dedicated annual event for the dairy industry held at the International Centre in Telford, Shropshire at a key time of the year when plans and decisions are being made for the winter.

Animal Science Days

Neogen was a proud sponsor of this year’s Animal Science Days held on September 26 in Piestany, Slovakia. The three-day event allows academics from countries such as Austria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Italy, Slovakia and Slovenia to work together on various animal science-related projects. Neogen also presented the GGP and Igenity product ranges in more detail in the plenary session.

NEW GGP Equine Plus ChipNeogen’s new equine genotyping solution is a comprehensive solution for genome-wide geno-typing. This upgraded product features 71,947 evenly distributed SNPs, which can be made available to either EquCab 2.0 or 3.0 mapping positions.

With approximately 10K of additional SNP content compared to the first version of Neogen’s GGP Equine chip, this improves coverage of the equine genome and increases average minor allele frequency to 0.2603.

The GGP Equine Plus chip is a powerful tool for:

• Developing genomic predictions and enhanced breeding values

• Enabling identification of genes and polymorphisms that contribute to traits of interest in all major horse breeds

For more information on the GGP Equine Plus Chip, contact our team today.

Neogen acquires Livestock Genetic ServicesNeogen has acquired the assets of Livestock Genetic Services, LLC, a Virginia-based company that specializes in genetic evaluations and data management for cattle breeding organizations.

The acquisition of Livestock Genetic Services (LGS) enhances Neogen’s in-house genetic evaluation capabilities and complements the company’s unparalleled global network of animal genomics laboratories. LGS has been a long-time strategic partner of Neogen’s genomics business.

“One value of Neogen’s genomic services is our ability to translate genomic information into timely, accurate animal trait information for cattle pro-ducers,” said Dr. Stewart Bauck, Neogen’s vice president of agrigenomics. “Adding Livestock Genetic Services, and its owner John Genho, will help Neogen accelerate the adoption of genomics world-wide by helping customers easily and quickly utilize genomic information in their commercial operations. This new capability will position Neogen as the only global agrigenomics business with a full end-to-end solution.”

“After years of collaboration with Neogen, I am very pleased to be part of the much larger, very capable team of genomic professionals,” said Genho. “Our business has grown to the point that becoming part of a world-leading provider of animal genomic services will provide my customers with the best possible services and support.”

Get social: Neogen is also on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and Instagram.

EAAP 2018

UK Dairy Day

Career opportunities at NeogenNeogen continues to grow as a global leader in food safety and animal safety technologies

Lab Technician – DNA and Processing The Lab Technician performs laboratory tests and services to support customer data generation within platforms specific to the processing lab through a variety of scientific techniques, instrumentation and disciplines. This person will gain and maintain the ability to operate all electronic and robotic equipment essential to primary platform processing, maintain accurate record keeping. They may assist in the training of new technicians. This person should have a proficiency in a variety of molecular biological techniques, and generates and analyzes initial data from a variety of laboratory techniques and analytical instrumentation. See careers.neogen.com for more information.

Sample Reception and Customer Service SupervisorThe hired individual manages the day-to-day activities of the Sample Reception and Customer Service groups, including planning and scheduling projects, training staff, hiring within the groups and ensuring a positive work environment. This person will be responsible for the management of each group’s supervisors, day-to-day activities and ensuring employees complete assigned tasks. They will oversee training of new staff, and manage each group’s respective workload and performance. This position also involves overseeing any necessary R&D for process improvements, and ensuring all samples received are properly placed within tracking systems. See careers.neogen.com for more information.

Commercial beef producers will get more traits and selection index tools in the upgraded Igenity® Beef profile.

The Igenity Beef Profile will offer 16 traits for $29, replacing Neogen’s 13-trait Igenity Gold ($40) and 6-trait Igenity Silver ($25) tests. The upgrade includes new predictions for weaning weight, yearling weight and hot carcass weight for a total of 16 traits scored on a 1–10 scale, plus two new selection indexes.

“Our customers will be getting a powerful new profile at even greater value,” said Dr. Stewart Bauck, vice president of agrigenomics at Neo-gen. “The Igenity profile was designed and validated for crossbred or straightbred cattle with backgrounds of Angus, Red Angus, Simmen-tal, Hereford, Limousin and Gelbvieh.

“Most DNA profiles are breed-specific,” Bauck continued. “The novel design of Igenity Beef allows for the accurate prediction of perfor-mance in both crossbred or straightbred cattle among the target breeds. This lets cow-calf producers use a DNA profile to select the best replacements from their crossbred heifers as well as their straightbred heifers.”

Neogen launches upgraded Igenity® Beef ProfileUsing DNA testing in a crossbreeding program helps producers lever-age the advantages of both practices. “The practices are complemen-tary and can have a positive impact on the bottom line,” he said.

“The Igenity Beef Profile offers a more complete set of traits and tools for traditional weaned-calf marketing, retained feeder production or quality-grid programs,” Bauck said. “Producers also have a greater ability to customize the criteria they use to select the replacement heifers that will fit their marketing system,” he added.

For many producers, a key economic driver is cow-replacement rate. “Igenity offers stayability predictions, which reflect the likelihood that a heifer’s offspring will calve over six seasons. A one-point increase in Igenity stayability score for a 250-cow herd represents an expected 48 fewer replacement heifers and gross savings of up to $96,000 over six years,” he said.

American Angus ConventionNovember 2–5 • Columbus, OH

www.angusconvention.com

International Plant & Animal GenomeJanuary 12–16 • San Diego, CA

www.intlpag.org/2019

National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA)

January 30 – February 1 New Orleans, LA

www.beefusa.org/events.aspx

Visit Neogen at these upcoming conventions

© Neogen Corporation, 2018. Neogen markets a complete line of food and animal safety solutions, and is a publicly-owned company listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market under the symbol NEOG.

From the desk of Dr. Stewart BauckOver the past few editions of Genomic SNPettes, I have written about international expansion, most notably last year’s acquisition of the Animal Genetics Laboratory of the University of Queensland in Gatton (just outside Brisbane), Australia. That operation has been nearly fully integrated into Neogen and our focus has shifted to expanding the services offered to customers in both Australia and New Zealand.

Well, we are ready to move on and I am pleased to report two activities of particular satisfaction for me that have taken place over the past 12 months, and that we are still working on. The first of these is the acquisition of Livestock Genetic Services (LGS), the business started and built over 10 years ago by John Genho. Following his graduation from the Animal Genetics and Breeding program at Cornell University, John went into business for himself, identifying and serving a market need for genetic evaluations. He focused on large commercial ranches and a few smaller breed associations — particularly the American breeds of Brangus, Beef-master, Santa Gertrudis and Brahman.

As Neogen looked to expand its global reach and meet demands of sophis-ticated protein production enterprises in North America, it was evident we needed to broaden our portfolio. We saw the opportunity to partner with a small but dynamic team in LGS. In markets outside of the U.S., the most frequent limitation to the implementation of genomic technology is the lack of a classic genetic evaluation framework to which we can add our genomic technology, and LGS fits that need.

The second item of note is the launch of a genomic facility in China, through our existing Neogen China business located in Shanghai. Following the ac-quisition of a food safety distributor in the Chinese market, Neogen had labo-ratory facilities to provide diagnostic testing for food safety and has for some years had agrigenomics sales representatives in the country, selling the GGP portfolio of chips and services.

After years of genotyping for Chinese customers through our Lincoln, Ne-braska-based laboratory, it’s time for us to migrate our services toward addressing the market on a local basis. As we have done elsewhere, the process begins with implementation of DNA extraction and order upload in to the Laboratory Information Management System, followed by shipment to Lincoln. Once that process is set and we are confident of the quality, the next step will be setting up genotyping facilities in China, with end-to-end processing conducted locally.

These important new projects have led to an exciting past few months and we are looking forward to expanding our products and services globally, as we continue to focus on our three pillars of success: high quality data, rapid turnaround and fair pricing — wherever our customers are!

Donna Merrylees started her ca-reer in a virology lab, and probably would never have guessed that within a few years, she’d be in-volved in establishing a brand-new lab in a completely different field of science: genomics.

“Funnily enough,” she said, “I didn’t study any genomics specifically during my time as student. My first proper introduction to genomics

was through Neogen, and I’ve been really lucky to be able to ex-plore this new field through my day-to-day work.”

Merrylees studied Virology in Glasgow, Scotland, spending her ear-ly professional days working in cell culture. In 2013, a job opened in her home county: Ayrshire. This job was with Neogen, and Mer-rylees returned to where she grew up for the new opportunity.

Initially, Merrylees belonged to Neogen’s Food Safety laboratory team, where she eventually became a Team Leader.

“In March 2015 I first heard about some new genomics work that would be coming to Ayr, and was asked to be a part of that,” she said. “What started off as some extra work on the side of my exist-ing role quickly grew into something much more.”

Merrylees made the overseas journey to Neogen’s genomics lab in Lincoln, Nebraska to learn all there was to know about working in a genomics lab.

“I had never been involved in setting up a new lab before, so it was a new challenge for me, but I learned so much in this time,” Merrylees said. “I was happy to be building new working relationships with other scientists across the pond, and I know that we were functioning as one global team.”

Within six months, a genomics facility was established at Neogen’s Ayr location. During the three years that have passed since then, the team has continued to grow, and Merrylees is now a Lab Manager.

“It feels great to be a part of such growth and to see all of the changes that have occurred in the three years we’ve been process-ing samples,” she said. “There’s never a dull moment, as there’s always a new customer to bring on, new equipment to implement or a new challenge to overcome. There’s a lot of scope for what the Ayr lab can do next — both in additional testing platforms and new areas of the market — and I look forward to being a part of that.”

We are Neogen Donna MerryleesAyr, Scotland, United Kingdom

For the latest food safety, animal safety and life science news, Neogen announcements and useful

information, check out the Neogen blog at www.neogen.com/blog

Neogen Genomics • genomics.neogen.comUSA/Canada: 877-443-6489 | gscustomersupport@neogen.com

Europe: +44 (0) 1292 526 094 | contact_genomics@neogeneurope.com

Australia: +61 7 5460 1960 | gaa@neogen.com

Brazil: +55 19 3935.3727 | info@neogendobrasil.com