Dr Peter Kirkland
Winner: Plant and Animal Sciences category, NSW Scientist of the Year 2008 Awards

Dr Peter Kirkland is Head of the Virology Laboratory at the Elizabeth Macarthur Agriculture Institute, the NSW Department of Primary Industries’ main facility for animal and plant disease diagnosis and research. He is also President of the World Association of Veterinary Laboratory Diagnosticians.

Dr Kirkland’s preparedness and rapid response to the 2007 equine influenza (EI) outbreak enabled the national eradication of the disease to occur at a faster rate than has ever been achieved before. He improved rapid diagnostic tests and devised innovative methods to apply them, allowing for the rapid detection of the virus, preventing its further spread and limiting its potentially devastating impact on Australia’s multi-billion dollar horse industry.  Dr Kirkland’s laboratory undertook over 145,000 laboratory tests during the control and eradication program.

Dr Kirkland’s leadership and foresight during the response to the EI incursion was the culmination of a 33 year career distinguished by groundbreaking work in animal science. He has also led laboratory responses to successive outbreaks of avian influenza and the $70 million outbreak of Newcastle disease in poultry in 1999. In 2003, when an unknown syndrome resulted in the deaths of over 50,000 piglets, Dr Kirkland’s laboratory used reverse genetic engineering to identify the unknown virus and contain it. His laboratory was already well known for having identified and eradicated the Menangle virus which caused severe disease in pigs and a serious illness in humans at another piggery in 1997.

Dr Kirkland’s laboratory was responsible for successfully developing a diagnostic test which has been globally adopted as a routine diagnostic tool for pestiviruses. He is considered an international authority on diseases due to these viruses, and in 2008 became a Designated Expert for the World Health Organisation for Animal Health for his work in this area. The Elizabeth Macarthur Agriculture Institute’s Virology Laboratory is now ranked a World Reference Laboratory. 

Dr Kirkland’s work behind the development of Australia’s National Arbovirus Monitoring Program in the late 1980s has since enabled the safe export of millions of live sheep and cattle, an export trade worth over $832 million to the Australian economy in 2007-08. 

In the last financial year alone, Dr Kirkland’s laboratory has generated over $2.5 million in royalty payments, commercialisation revenue and certification testing work for the NSW Department of Primary industries.