In late June international animal and food safety giant Neogen Corporation announced an expansion of the company’s Lexington Ky.-based division. Neogen’s Kentucky roots date back 20 years to when the company became interested in technology developed by the University of Kentucky (UK) and one of the school’s first successful spinoff companies, WTT. Neogen would later set up an animal safety division in Lexington, buy WTT, and license the technology that has returned $2.2 million in royalties to UK.

WTT was established in 1988 and named by its founders, David Watt, PhD, professor of cellular and molecular biochemistry in the College of Medicine; Hsin-Hsiung "Daniel" Tai, PhD, professor in the College of Pharmacy’s Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences; and Thomas Tobin, PhD, MRCVS, Dipl. ABT, professor of veterinary science and in the graduate center for toxicology at the College of Agriculture’s Gluck Equine Research Center.

The Kentucky Equine Drug Research Council and the Kentucky State Racing Commission had approached Tobin three years earlier to try to solve the opiate abuse problem plaguing the racing industry. He proposed developing a panel of highly sensitive immunoassay tests for these high potency drugs, which were difficult to detect at that time.

Tobin enlisted the help of Tai, who had developed numerous ELISA (enzyme-linked) immunoassay tests for prostaglandins, steroids, and other drugs. "I was confident that similar strategies could be applied to the development of ELISA tests for abused drugs in racehorses," Tai said