Elanco Animal Health Inc. announced Feb. 4 a four-year agreement with Purdue University and the Purdue Research Foundation with the goal to collaborate and train talent as Elanco seeks solutions to solve some of the greatest challenges in animal health.

The alliance allows Elanco to work side by side with Purdue’s leading animal health research scientists with specific expertise in structural biology, protein engineering, microbiome discovery and clinical research, the announcement said.

Elanco said the alliance includes seven types of collaborations and five intellectual property scenarios, which provides its research teams with the resources to turn ideas and technical needs into action with greater speed and agility.

“This alliance with Purdue adds momentum toward Elanco’s promise to rigorously innovate for the benefit of our customers and improve the health of animals,” said Aaron Schacht, Elanco executive vice president innovation, regulatory and business development. “Purdue’s dedication to delivering solutions has propelled the institution into amassing strengths in a wide array of disciplines and is a natural partner of choice.”

Purdue said it views this alliance and the ability for students to work alongside professionals as key to the university's land-grant mission of developing the workforce of tomorrow. An alliance of this scope educates students on real industry challenges, creating students that graduate prepared to solve many of the industry’s greatest issues.

“Purdue and Elanco are working on ways to improve the animal health and their food intake to increase the absorption of important nutrients consumed by animals using state-of-the-art tools,” said Richard Kuhn, the Trent & Judith Anderson distinguished professor in science with the Purdue department of biological sciences. “This new agreement is a great opportunity to expand the collaborations between Purdue and Elanco because this type of research is a strength for both of us, and we anticipate the research will have a strong global impact.”

According to an announcement from Purdue, the collaboration will:

“Elanco and Purdue have a strong alignment of mission and values, and we anticipate many positive results from this important alliance,” Purdue Research Foundation president Brian Edelman said. “This partnership is designed to educate students on real industry problems, advance research endeavors, provide collaboration opportunities with skilled research scientists and world-class laboratories and train the next generation of our workforce.”

The alliance also will advance research endeavors such as collaborative discovery, co-development of new innovations and advance recurrent technologies with joint access to mutual resources and capabilities, Elanco said.