Environmental Science

Center of Excellence for Poultry Science

The University of Arkansas is known as a leader in animal science and technology. In fact, in 2004 the university's combined Animal/Poultry departments were ranked third in the nation by Meat & Poultry magazine and consistently rank in the top five departments in the country every year. The highlight of the animal science program, is the 112,000-square-foot John W. Tyson Center of Excellence for Poultry Science, the largest teaching and research facility on the University of Arkansas campus. The Center of Excellence for Poultry Science building was made possible by $20 million in federal grants, state wide bond program, and private donations. This all combines to make the center the most prestigious of its kind in the nation. Highlights of the Center's facilities include:

• Processing Plant - The 10,000-square-foot pilot processing plant is used for teaching processing techniques and for on-going food safety research projects. The primary and further processing areas allow commercial groups and students access to all areas of modern poultry processing.
• Research Farm - The research farm facilities include the hatchery, genetics unit, pullet rearing facility, battery brooder, caged layer house, broiler breeder houses and turkey houses.
• Applied Broiler Research Unit (SAVOY) - These four full-sized broiler houses are equipped with computerized environmental control and data collections systems capable of commercial-type production research.
• Feed Mill - The state-of-the-art feed mill has the ability to make research-specific diets from small bags to large bulk capacity. A feed truck makes bulk delivery an important part of the feed mill operation.
• John Kirkpatrick Skeeles Poultry Health Laboratory - The 12,000-square-foot Poultry Health Laboratory is capable of the highest bio-safety rating (P3) of any university laboratory dedicated to poultry research.

Poultry Science Equipment

Within the Center of Excellence for Poultry Science are various facilities and equipment for food processing and evaluation. The Poultry Pilot Processing Plant is a 12,000 square-foot facility with equipment to process poultry through slaughter and evisceration, with deboning capability. The plant has equipment for product injection, vacuum marination, batter/breader application, frying, smoking, and controlled humidity cooking. This equipment includes electrical stun, bleed tunnel, dunking type scalder, rotary drum picker, manual evisceration line, commercial giblet chiller, Stein pilot-scale air impingement oven and an Alkar smokehouse for processed cooked meats.

A look inside one of the new broiler breeder houses.

Also available are commercial-scale broiler grow-out houses, battery brooders, hatchery and feed mill with pelleting facilities. A central analytical laboratory provides standard analytical procedures and includes poultry microbiological facilities with several standard microbial incubators, modified atmosphere incubators and the Gene-Trak nonisotopic rapid detection system for Salmonella. Animal Science facilities and equipment include USDA approved slaughter equipment, meat fabrication room, coolers, walk-in freezer, band saw, grinder, stuffer, chopper, vacuum packager, scales, patty machine, convection oven, temperature data logger, shear testing device and spectrocolorimeter.