At UW, Cook and a team of researchers have developed a way to eliminate using antibiotics in animals altogether. His team discovered a way to immunize animals against the types of bacteria and pathogens that would normally require antibiotics to treat.

Cook’s product uses an antibody embedded inside an egg that immunizes animals once fed to them. Cook injects hens with a protein, and the hens subsequently make an antibody to the protein. That antibody is then passed on to the egg the hen produces. The egg is then put into the feed of the animals a farmer wants to vaccinate.

“They put it in the egg and they do this naturally, and we use the egg with the antibodies as a replacement for antibiotics,” Cook said.

The product has now become the centerpiece of a Madison startup, Ab E Discovery. The company was founded 18 months ago by Cook and a colleague in his lab, Jordan Sand. Ab E Discovery has filed for patents on the product and is in the process of marketing it to large-scale meat producers.

The growing number of large-scale farms where more animals live creates more opportunities for them to get sick, Cook said.