Multi-pronged approach to mycotoxin risk management in dairy cows

One of the challenges in mycotoxin management is that the importance of the different mycotoxins changes over time. The relevance of some of the well-known mycotoxins is going down, whereas new mycotoxins emerge. During the webinar, “Multi-pronged Approach to Mycotoxin Risk Management in Dairy Cows”, Professor Antonio Gallo, Associate Professor in Animal Nutrition, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Italy , will present his views on the impact of Fusarium produced mycotoxins on the performance of dairy cows. He will also elaborate on recent research performed at the University on strategies to mitigate the effects of Fusarium and other mycotoxins.

The problems caused by the different mycotoxins can vary enormously between various mycotoxins. Secondly, moulds can be present without producing significant amounts of mycotoxins. Dr. Swamy Haladi, Programme Manager Mycotoxin Risk Management will provide practical information on how to work out which mycotoxins are present and to what extend they are likely to cause problems. Next to that, mitigation strategies will be discussed. He will focus on what should be taken into account to identify if mycotoxins are impacting milk quality and/or dairy cow performance.

Dr. Haladi is Global Programme Manager for the Mycotoxin Risk Management Programme for Selko Feed Additives. He obtained his Bachelor and Master degrees in veterinary science in India, and then moved to Canada to obtain his PhD in animal and poultry science. During studies and career, he continued to gain more interest and knowledge in the area of mycotoxins, especially the global challenges around this topic.

He published various articles in both peer-reviewed journals as well as industry magazines and he truly understands the global challenge of mycotoxins. He also developed practical limits for mycotoxins in various species.

Professor Antonio Gallo graduated at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (UCSC) of Piacenza with a Bachelor of Science in Agricultural Sciences and Technology. On February 18th, 2008 he received a Ph.D. degree in Animal and Nutrition Sciences from the UCSC of Piacenza. He defended a thesis entitled “Aflatoxins absorption and excretion dynamics in dairy cows: technical strategies to reduce metabolites carry over in milk”. Between February 2008 and February 2010, he obtained a research fellowship on Animal Nutrition at ISAN of UCSC.

From March 2009 to February 2013, he was full time Researcher at ISAN of UCSC. From February 2013 to 2016, he was a Post-doc at ISAN of UCSC. From April 2016, he was a Researcher in Animal Nutrition at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (UCSC) of Piacenza, Italy. From February 2021, he is Associate Professor in Animal Nutrition.

His main research topics regard nutrition science, feed&food evaluation, feed & food safety and modeling digestive and metabolic processes in animals. In 2019 and 2020, he has been included in the World's Top 2% Scientists list of Stanford University.