Graduates find employment in academic teaching and research, industrial research in the food and feed industries, in laboratory research programs with governmental and international agencies, private corporations, and in industrial or institutional management positions requiring a high level of scientific training. Considerable opportunity for study exists in joint programs with bacteriology, biochemistry, the interdepartmental graduate program in nutritional sciences, genetics, endocrinology-reproductive physiology training program, food science, physiology, agricultural and applied economics, biometry, molecular biology, and anatomy. The area of nutrition involves a joint degree with the Department of Animal Sciences and either the Department of Nutritional Sciences or the Department of Biochemistry. Usually, students work with professors from both departments so fundamental concepts complement practical applications. Ruminant nutrition candidates often minor or have a joint major in the Department of Bacteriology.
Nutritional research ranges from field studies to laboratory biochemical studies.
The endocrinology-reproductive physiology area ranges from hormonal studies with livestock, primates, and laboratory animals to biochemical studies at the cellular level. These studies include mechanism of gene action, physiological genetics, in vitro maturation, fertilization, embryo development, cloning and gene transfer, neuroendocrinology, and the environmental and genetic control of puberty and postpartum anestrus. The genetics-animal breeding focus includes a variety of areas from immunogenetics and molecular genetics to quantitative and population genetics. The animal breeding program seeks to develop, evaluate, and apply classical, quantitative, biochemical, and physiological genetics toward improving animal breeding techniques. Studies range from theoretical considerations of quantitative genetics to laboratory experimentation on genetic controls of growth and reproduction, gene transfer and cloning to field experimentation on producer herds and flocks.