{"id":56,"date":"2025-10-21T13:16:18","date_gmt":"2025-10-21T13:16:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/?p=56"},"modified":"2025-11-13T23:20:53","modified_gmt":"2025-11-13T23:20:53","slug":"agriculture-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/agriculture-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Preventing livestock disease outbreaks"},"content":{"rendered":"
Economic Impact<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n

A new ag tech startup aims to ensure healthier swine herds in Nebraska and beyond, key to an industry that generates more than $60 billion annually.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DARO, housed at Nebraska Innovation Campus, provides noninvasive, whole-herd disease surveillance with molecular analysis tools \u2013 a major advance over conventional monitoring methods, which use blood or oral fluid samples from a sample of pigs. The company focuses on early disease detection, particularly for porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome, the most economically damaging virus for swine producers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe pathogen surveillance we\u2019ve developed gives us the ability to take certain sample types for livestock, specifically swine, and understand if there\u2019s PRRS or other pathogens present for an early detection method,\u201d said Josh DeMers, DARO\u2019s chief operating officer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur goal is to make pathogen data available and accessible just like people interact with weather reports and forecasts,\u201d said Kristen Bernhard, DARO founder and CEO. \u201cWe want it early and accurate.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The technology is timely as producers keep an eye on African swine fever, an exceptionally destructive viral threat that isn\u2019t yet in the U.S. but is present in the Caribbean. Early detection is vital, as there are no treatments or vaccines against the disease.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

Our goal is to make pathogen data available and accessible just like people interact with weather reports and forecasts.<\/p>\nKristen Bernhard<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Bernhard, who previously managed the Pathogens Genomics laboratory at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, leveraged multiple University of Nebraska economic development supports to launch DARO. They include The Combine, a statewide initiative supporting high-growth entrepreneurs in food and agriculture, and NIC\u2019s BioTech Connector lab facility. The company\u2019s surveillance technology is independently developed and fully proprietary to DARO. The startup has received more than $1 million in local venture capital investments to produce a product to test for one of the most common diseases in pigs.        <\/p>\n\n\n\n

DARO reflects the value of uniting multiple scientific and development backgrounds. Bernhard\u2019s background in population genetics was foundational in her developing DARO\u2019s technology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bailey Barcal, director of laboratory operations, also brings experience gained at UNMC, where she was a medical laboratory scientist in the Emerging Pathogens Laboratory. Alison Neujahr, the lead genomics researcher, earned a Ph.D. at UNL in complex biosystems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the business side, DeMers, former program manager of The Combine, provides startup knowledge. Rick Knudtson, an angel investor, has tech entrepreneurship expertise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Additional Content<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\n
IANR news release<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n
Silicon Prairie News<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n\n
UNO news release<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n
Agriculture<\/a>, <\/span>Alison Neujahr<\/a>, <\/span>Bailey Barcal<\/a>, <\/span>BioTech Connector Lab<\/a>, <\/span>DARO<\/a>, <\/span>Innovation<\/a>, <\/span>Josh DeMers<\/a>, <\/span>Kristen Bernhard<\/a>, <\/span>Nebraska Innovation Campus<\/a>, <\/span>Pathogens Genomics<\/a>, <\/span>Rick Knudtson<\/a>, <\/span>Swine<\/a>, <\/span>The Combine<\/a><\/div>\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A new ag tech startup aims to ensure healthier swine herds in Nebraska and beyond, key to an industry that generates more than $60 billion annually. DARO, housed at Nebraska Innovation Campus, provides noninvasive, whole-herd disease surveillance with molecular analysis tools.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":225,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[16,81,80,79,74,186,75,76,132,77,82,73,78],"class_list":["post-56","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economic-impact","tag-agriculture","tag-alison-neujahr","tag-bailey-barcal","tag-biotech-connector-lab","tag-daro","tag-innovation","tag-josh-demers","tag-kristen-bernhard","tag-nebraska-innovation-campus","tag-pathogens-genomics","tag-rick-knudtson","tag-swine","tag-the-combine"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":476,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56\/revisions\/476"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/research.unl.edu\/annualreport\/2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}