The Department of Animal, Dairy, and Veterinary Sciences (ADVS) was formed in 1977 when three individual departments were combined. The ADVS Department is large, complex, and highly diversified. We have responsibility for teaching, research, and extension in all species of farm animals. We also have service responsibilities for the Laboratory Animal Research Center and the Utah Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory (including the branch laboratory in Nephi), veterinary care of all University animals, and have the leadership role in the Interdepartmental Toxicology Program. Further, ADVS is home of the regionally recognized Caine Dairy Teaching and Research Center and the Institute for Antiviral Research.

The ADVS Department currently consists of 37 faculty, 19 professional, and 49 classified employees. This profile of employees allows ADVS to put together teams to attack problems, whether it is in research, teaching, extension, or service. This approach offers expertise for specific problem solving. Of our 259 students, approximately 200 are undergraduate majors, 23 are graduates (14 MS and 9 PhD), and 18 are enrolled in the dairy herdsman program. Many of these students are also employed by ADVS during the academic year and summer months.

Our role in undergraduate education is to provide for comprehensive training toward undergraduate degrees in Animal Science, Dairy Science, and Veterinary Science. In addition to these three primary departmental divisions, we offer a one year Dairy Herdsman Program in practical dairy management. Implied in the above is the need to provide for counseling and advising in all three major areas of ADVS, to provide classroom, laboratory, and field learning experiences that incorporates the latest scientific principles and the application of these principles, and to provide career-related, extra-curricular activities which afford organizational and leadership experience. There is a wide variety of research programs within ADVS, including animal nutrition, breeding and genetics, molecular biology, reproductive biology, animal and dairy management, animal health related programs, and toxicology. Each of the three ADVS divisions has one or more Extension Specialists. Areas of emphasis in Extension include, but are not limited to beef, dairy, equine, poultry, veterinary medicine, and toxicology. This diversity has allowed ADVS to provide services for a very large number of commodity groups, stakeholders, and other clientele both on and off campus.