Marcelo Bertolini Wins International Award for Graduate Student Research

Doctoral student Marcelo Bertolini received first-place honors for graduate student research at the 2002 Annual Meeting of the International Embryo Transfer Society, coincidentally held in his native Brazil. Marcelo competed with 46 other graduate students from around the world in competition based on research quality expressed in a written abstract, a poster session and an oral presentation. The research he presented was designed to determine why calves born from in vitro fertilization (IVF) procedures sometimes have abnormally high birth weights, a problem seen in cattle and sheep but not humans. His results demonstrated that IVF fetuses develop a placenta with enhanced nutrient transport from the mother to the fetus, which could account for enhanced fetal growth. This honor is Marcelo's second major graduate student research award. In 2000 he placed first in graduate student research competition at the Annual Meeting of the Western Section American Society of Animal Science. His earlier research suggested that the placenta, not the fetus itself, was a likely contributor to the birth of large IVF calves, a theory on which his subsequent experiments were based. Marcelo recently completed his Ph.D. studies in the laboratory of department chair Gary Anderson and accepted a postdoctoral research position in the department working on transgenic animal production while his wife Luciana completes her Ph.D. studies in genetics in Dr. Jim Murray's laboratory.