University of Maine (UM) animal and veterinary science researchers are receiving nearly $500,000 to establish a unique research, testing, and education center that promises to substantially advance the diagnosis, treatment, and understanding of particularly problematic animal diseases including equine strangles.

Strangles in horses, which is similar to strep throat in people, is a debilitating disease that causes serious complications in 20 percent of cases and is fatal in 8 percent. Carriers often do not show clinical signs, which leads to undetected infection through water troughs, fences, tack, feeding buckets, farm tools, and direct horse-to-horse contact.

The UM project, funded by a $497,392 Maine Technology Asset Fund grant, will enable field testing to establish credibility for Maine biomedical companies to commercialize newly developed, inexpensive diagnostic kits. The first diagnostic kit to be field tested is one that detects Streptoccoccus equi, the cause of strangles, within hours as opposed to days required to complete conventional strangles laboratory testing.

Nationally, quicker diagnosis and timely animal isolation could save the equine industry millions of dollars if the new diagnostic protocols are effective in preventing strangles in even 1 percent of the nation's estimated 10 million horses, says principal investigator Robert Causey, DVM, PhD, associate professor in the UM Department of Animal and Veterinary Sciences. The sales potential could be worth $3.5 million if only 1 percent of the nation's horses are tested each year, he adds