UGA Primed for One Health Research & Impact
BTSI One Health is a core collaborator in UGA’s Precision One Health initiative that conducts research at the intersection of three areas: human, animal, and environmental health. BTSI focuses on two outcomes: (1) what knowledge gained through the study of one of these three areas might inform work in the other areas; and (2) what knowledge might come from a more holistic study that involves two or three of the areas at once.
A good example is zoonotic disease, where the ultimate goal is to develop public health management policies—such as vaccination programs—that protect us from dominant strain(s) of viruses capable of spreading between animals and humans.
The work of One Health informs Precision One Health when the findings are used to guide treatment. A good example is cancer research, where dogs and humans can share clinically analogous forms of the same disease, such as B cell lymphoma, gastric or bladder cancer. Next-generation sequencing techniques can identify genetic and molecular signatures of tumors, whether the patient is a dog or a human, guiding the selection of the most appropriate chemotherapeutic drug.
UGA is especially suited to One Health research as it is one of just 13 universities in the United States with programs studying animal health, environmental health, and human health, a capability soon to be enhanced by the new School of Medicine. The close partnership with Precision Medicine under the umbrella of Precision One Health facilitates the translation of findings into clinical applications.
If you have an idea for a One Health project or are interested in collaborating on a One Health initiative, contact Jon P. Mochel at jpmochel@uga.edu.