West Texas A&M University hosts ultrasound certification event

AMARILLO, Texas (KFDA) - West Texas A&M University hosted a certification event for international ultrasound technicians.

“It’s an international certification for ultrasound for the beef industry, we’re very fortunate to serve the industry in this manner. We’ve got technicians from Brazil, from Canada and all over the United States,” said Dr. Tommy Perkins, associate professor for WTAMU Ag Sciences.

The ultrasound technology provides better knowledge of a cow’s genetics and how they can be worked to improve.

“If you enjoy a really highly marbled steak, because of this technology that we’re using, you get to have a better chance to get a choice of prime steak when you go to the grocery store, so the technology has been around for 30 years and it’s made tremendous advancements in the beef industry because of it,” said Dr. Perkins.

West Texas A&M University professors say the technology will elevate the beef industry in areas worldwide.

“We work in Brazil to improve meat quality over there and we just came here to take this certification to make our few technicians better, to do good work over there,” said Ultrasound Technician Liliane Suguisawa.

Ultrasound technicians say the future of the industry is going to benefit for years to come.

“We’re collecting carcass dates on these cattle so that we can use it to generate EPD’s so that we don’t have to kill them to know what their carcass was. Carcass traits are highly heritable,” said David Aborn, ultrasound technician.

By using ultrasounds they can elevate the meat market and price to sell.

“If we know what a bull or heifer is, we can make breeding decisions on them later, so it’s really unique. It’s really kind of spread the generational intervals on selecting for higher carcass quality,” said Aborn.

One more step in WTAMU’s goal of bringing the Panhandle to the world.

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