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Sept 2025

1. New Centre Director: Congratulations to Dr Rebecca Doyle who has been appointed as the new Director for the Animal Welfare Centre. Rebecca is jointly appointed with the University of Edinburgh and the International Livestock research Institute (ILRI). She is also a member of the Global Agenda for Sustainable Livestock (GASL) where she coordinates the Animal Welfare Action Network.  Weblink
2. New Programme Directors: We would like to congratulate the following who have been appointed as Co-directors for the MSc Applied Animal Behaviour and Animal Welfare – Prof. Susan Jarvis and Cynthia Naydani; Online MSc International Animal Welfare, Ethics and Law - Dr Sarah Brown and Dr Jill MacKay.
3. Welcome: We would like to offer a warm welcome to all our new and returning MSc students. We look forward to seeing you in-person and online and we encourage you to engage with activities across campus, the University and keep in touch through our various social media channels. Vet School Postgraduate webpage
4. New publication: Otani, Y. et al. (2025) Cross-cultural variation in understanding of animal welfare principles and animal management practices among veterinary and animal welfare professionals in the UK and Japan. Animal welfare. [Online] 34. https://doi.org/10.1017/awf.2025.10026
5. Conference: Dr Sarah Brown and Dr Michelle Reeves attended the ISAE meeting in Utrecht, Netherlands. Sarah’s presentation formed part of an NC3Rs funded project, ‘Affective bias testing confirms sex differences in rats’ preference for how they are tickled’ and Michelle presented research completed during her PhD at SRUC, ‘Assessing ewe welfare: ewe-lamb distance measured by Bluetooth Low Energy data’.
6. Visitors: The Centre hosted the Global Coalition for Animal Welfare at R(D)SVS, over the summer, for a workshop where we presented our work alongside colleagues from SRUC, and discussed how animal welfare changes are enacted by GCAW members.
7. Symposium: Dr Rebecca Doyle presented at the ‘sharing knowledge between R(D)SVS and Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Mansoura University, Egypt (FVM-MU), on 1 Sept 2025. Rebecca’s talk ‘the role of animal welfare in One Health’.

June 2025

1. Announcement: We start off with an important announcement. Cathy Dwyer, our Centre Director, is leaving her post with us. As SRUC expand their Aberdeen-based School of Veterinary Medicine and Biosciences, Cathy will be leading on the development of animal welfare in the school strategy, along with continuing to lead the SRUC animal behaviour and welfare team. Our AWC team will be led by Rebecca Doyle in the interim. Together, we look forward to continuing to collaborate on animal welfare research and extension between the AWC and SRUC.
2. New team member: We welcome Poppy Sibthorpe to the team; Poppy is a post-doctoral researcher leading a research program on the welfare of racing horses. The project is a collaboration between UoE and SRUC, with the team including Cathy Dwyer, Tamsin Coombs, Gemma Pearson, and Marie Rowland. Funded by the Hong Kong Jockey Club
3. New resource: A range of free pdf resources (aligning with the 5 domains) focusing on dairy cattle. You can also self-test your understanding with the mini-quiz. edin.ac/welfare-dairy
4. New publications: Loftus, L., Newman, A., Leach, M. et al. Exploring the induction and measurement of positive affective state in equines through a personality-centred lens. Sci Rep 15, 18550 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-98034-8 and Loftus, L. et al. (2025) Inducing and measuring positive affective state in domesticated equines: A Delphi consultation.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tvjl.2025.106370
5. Visitors: Over the past two months we have welcomed a delegation from the vet school in Karnataka, India (KVAFSU; Karnataka Veterinary, Animal and Fisheries Sciences University), who were on a study tour fostering animal welfare research; an intern, Sujit Regmi from Nepal visiting on a World Veterinary Association/CEVA studentship; and Dr Femi Oyeniyi from Ekiti State Polytechnic, Nigeria who was visiting SRUC and the Animal Welfare Centre, on a UFAW scholarship.
6. Congratulations: Professor Nat Waran has been awarded an Order of the British Empire (OBE), for services to equine welfare, research and education.

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