Veterinary Medicine

Illustration of brain with DNA double helix

Getting gene therapy to the brain

Using a large animal model of genetic brain disease, researchers led by John H. Wolfe of the School of Veterinary Medicine, Perelman School of Medicine, and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia delivered an effective treatment across the blood-brain barrier to correct the whole brain.

Katherine Unger Baillie ・

Illustration of a T cell releasing signaling molecules, IL-4, IL-5, IL-6, IL-10, and IL-13

Navigating cytokine storms

Pairing their expertise, Nilam Mangalmurti of the Perelman School of Medicine and Christopher Hunter of the School of Veterinary Medicine have been working to understand the protective and harmful aspects of the immune response, including in COVID-19.

Katherine Unger Baillie ・

close-up image of bat on a tree trunk; three bare trees are in the right background

Bats and COVID

A new study from Penn Vet's New Bolton Center tests the guano of North American bats currently in Pennsylvania wildlife rehabilitation centers for the presence of COVID-19.

Kristina García ・

screen shot of a member of My Virtual Vet on the computer screen with a visual of the 2020 Virtual Startup Challenge Awards Ceremony cover photo

Virtual vet app wins Penn Wharton Startup Challenge

Penn Wharton Startup Challenge Competition winner My Virtual Veterinarian, a virtual veterinary portal for pet owners, makes it possible for pets to receive the care they need, when they need it.

Dee Patel ・



Media Contact


Katherine Unger Baillie

Katherine Unger Baillie Science News Officer
kbaillie@upenn.edu

In the News


NBC News

How old is your dog? New equation shows how to calculate its age in human years

Margret Casal of the School of Veterinary Medicine offered advice for promoting longevity in dogs and commented on a new equation to measure how dogs age. “It will be interesting to look at different breeds," she said. "We know that some smaller breeds live longer and some larger ones don’t live quite as long.”

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USA Today

USDA confirms that Winston the pug, believed to be first dog with coronavirus, was never infected

Shelley Rankin of the School of Veterinary Medicine said there may have been discrepancies in how labs have tested pets for COVID-19. “Samples can be positive initially but can be degraded with specimen handling,” she said, and false positives “can also occur if the original specimen had a very low number of organisms.”

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KYW Newsradio (Philadelphia)

Penn is training dogs to sniff out COVID-19 in humans

Cynthia Otto of the School of Veterinary Medicine spoke about the Working Dog Center’s efforts to train dogs to detect COVID-19 in humans. “Basically, we are looking at urine samples. We are hoping to look at saliva and breath samples as well,” she said. “We are going to tell basically if there is an odor excreted in these samples.”

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KYW Newsradio (Philadelphia)

Telehealth for dog behavior problems during COVID-19

Carlo Siracusa of the School of Veterinary Medicine spoke about the School’s new telehealth program for dog behavioral issues and offered advice for pet owners.

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Morning Edition (NPR)

Researchers experiment to see if dogs can detect COVID-19

Cynthia Otto of the School of Veterinary Medicine spoke about the potential use of scent-detecting dogs to identify COVID-19 in humans.

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The Washington Post

Dogs are being trained to sniff out coronavirus cases

Cynthia Otto of the School of Veterinary Medicine is quoted on training dogs to detect disease.

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