Elizabeth Bobeck receives PSA Early Achievement Award for Research

This award recognizes the achievements of PSA members in the early stages of their career in poultry research. It is given every other year.

Dr. Elizabeth Bobeck completed her PhD at UW-Madison under the supervision of Dr. Mark Cook in 2012, followed by two post-doctoral positions in nutrition and immunology. Dr. Bobeck joined the Iowa State University Animal Science Faculty in January 2016. Since 2016, Dr. Bobeck has mentored four MS students, two PhD students, and over 20 undergraduate students in her lab. Dr. Bobeck’s research and teaching efforts focus on the poultry industry from different angles with the same intent, to use nutrition to improve poultry health, productivity, and welfare. Her lab employs cell culture, ex vivo cells and tissues, and whole animal models to answer questions related to bioactive components of feedstuffs, growth, performance, disease resistance, microbiome, and the immune system. To understand genetic links to the immune response and how to best support poultry at different production stages, she also investigates basic metabolic questions such as fuel preference in isolated primary immune cells. Related projects involve close work with industry to understand feedstuff digestibility and nutrition to enhance performance. Another research emphasis is to improve poultry welfare, meat quality, and sustainability through occupational enrichment. She strives to solve current industry issues and anticipate future industry needs using unique approaches. Dr. Bobeck has 41 refereed publications and 34 abstracts and has raised over $2.5 million dollars to support her laboratory research and teaching goals.