Dr. Frank Mitloehner Hired as Air Quality Extension Specialist

The department is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Frank Mitloehner as our new Air Quality Extension Specialist. Dr. Mitloehner has a background in both animal science and agricultural engineering. A native of Germany, he earned a Master of Agricultural Engineering degree from the University of Leipzig (Germany) in 1996 where he specialized in beef cattle production, physiology, animal behavior and environmental management.  After Leipzig, he spent a year engaged in graduate studies at the University of Göttingen, then enrolled in the graduate program in animal science at Texas Tech University (Lubbock) where he continued his studies on the relationship between animal production systems and the environment. In 2000, he was granted a Ph.D. in Animal Science with a dissertation on environmental and behavioral management of feedlot cattle. In this research Dr. Mitloehner found that aerial dust concentrations in feedlots could be reduced by 30% by changing the feeding regimen of feedlot cattle from the traditional morning (or noon) feeding to times that reflect more accurately the animals' natural drive to eat at sunrise, noon and just before sunset. This alternative feeding management strategy reduced the incidence of dust-generating behaviors in cattle. In conjunction with his air quality research, Dr. Mitloehner studied the effects of heat stress on the performance, carcass quality, physiology and behavior of cattle and pigs. Beginning August 2000, Dr. Mitloehner was a post-doctoral fellow in the Department of Animal Science and Food Technology at Texas Tech studying heat stress amelioration and dust control in cattle. 

In his new position in the department, Dr. Mitloehner will focus on the identification of optimal management strategies and resource-use programs that contribute to reducing the impact of animal agricultural practices on air quality while limiting negative economic impacts on the agricultural industry and ensuring the environmental sustainability of the industry. As a Cooperative Extension Specialist, Dr. Mitloehner will work with county-based farm advisors, veterinarians, industry groups, public officials, regulators and faculty researchers to plan and coordinate statewide extension education and information transfer programs related to the improvement of air quality and associated management practices of livestock. His applied research interests include air sampling of particulate matter (dust), odorous gases such as ammonia and hydrogen sulfide as well as nonodorous carbon monoxide from livestock operations. Other research interests include the correlation of offensiveness of odors and their chemical composition (olfactometry and chemical analysis of odors) and determination of the interrelationships of odor and dust.

Dr. Mitloehner has considerable international experience, having worked in South Africa, Paraguay, China and Australia. He has served as a consultant for the government of Paraguay and several cattle feedlot companies in the area of behavioral and environmental management.