N.C. State Researcher Discovers Link Between Chicken Feathers, Mad Cow Disease

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N.C. State Researcher Discovers Link Between Chicken Feathers, Mad Cow

Disease

Feathers Can Be Broken Down Into Plastic, Livestock Feed

Kamal Wallace, Staff Writer

February 11, 2002

RALEIGH, N.C. -- A researcher at N.C. State may have stumbled onto something

big. He may have discovered a link between chicken feathers and mad cow

disease.

A researcher at N.C. State University may have accidentally discovered a

cure for mad cow disease in another barnyard animal.

Shih, a professor from N.C. State University, was working on a machine

that processes poultry waste when his research took a strange twist.

" One time, a chicken got out of cages and was delivered into the digester

and the chicken disappeared, " he said.

Even the feathers, which usually decompose slowly, were destroyed.

" The feathers are like your hair or your fingernails. They are very tough

proteins and are not digestible, " Shih said.

Shih spent two years trying to isolate the bacteria that wiped out the

feathers. His research produced an enzyme that could break down complex

proteins like feathers.

" It's produced by the bacteria, but the bacteria just produced so much for

their own need so we genetically engineered it, " he said.

The engineered bacteria could produce 10 times the enzymes. The poultry

industry currently produces about 1,000,000 tons of feathers a year in the

United States. Once broken down by the enzymes, they can be made into

plastic or be used as an efficient livestock feed.

" It turns out the chicks grow five to 10 times better and faster, " he said.

" [it could] save our poultry industry about $400 million a year. "

The enzymes can also take a bite out of mad cow disease, which is caused by

tough proteins. The proteins are so tough that they cannot be destroyed by

most sterilization methods, but not tough enough for the newly discovered

enzymes.

Shih's son, Giles, is now marketing the discovery through a biotechnology

company on N.C. State's Centennial Campus.

Reporter: Dan Wilkinson

OnLine Producer: Kamal Wallace