The American Meat Science Association (AMSA) has announced that the recipient of the 2016 Intercollegiate Meat Judging Meritorious Service Award will be Dr. Mark Miller, Professor and San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo Distinguished Chair in Meat Science at Texas Tech University. The award, sponsored by Food Safety Net Services and Agri-West International, will honor Dr. Miller during the AMSA 69th Reciprocal Meat Conference on Tuesday, June 21, 2016 in San Angelo, Texas.
Throughout his career, Dr. Miller has sustained an incredible in the areas of coaching winning teams and conducting noteworthy research. He has mentored and coached 293 meat team members across 32 teams at the world class level, and collectively, his teams have retired 23 championship cuts, unprecedented since the start of meat judging in 1926. He has also coached seven 4-H teams, hosted 500 to 600 kids at various meat judging camps, participated in 33 coaching clinics, and has led efforts on the international level through the creation of the Honduran Meat Judging Program and his assistance with the Australian ICMJC since 2011. Under his coaching, the average team size has grown from 4.6 students to 14.5 students to date.
Dr. Miller has generated an overall interest in meat science that has led more than 100 former meat judging team members to work under him in a graduate program and perform some of the most time consuming and rigorous research studies. Dr. Miller has extensively investigated the effects of growth implants and feed additives on beef quality, consumer satisfaction and red meat yield. He has investigated the impacts of implants and beta-agonists on carcass cutability and meat characteristics to ensure the beef marketed to consumers meets their demand for consistent and pleasurable eating experiences.
Dr. Miller and his coworkers at Texas Tech University have ongoing studies in Latin America, including Costa Rica, Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Panama and Mexico, that are working to improve the safety of meat being imported into the U.S. Dr. Miller’s individual focus has been on the development of international research partnerships. He has collected carcass data, food safety samples and conducted consumer studies in Australia, New Zealand, Poland, France, Japan and Korea, and has had more than 35 students intern on international research internships during the past 6 years. To date, the projects he has served as investigator or co-investigator on have totaled more than $36 million, and have resulted in more than 200 referred journal articles, 15 books and book chapters, more than 320 technical articles, 342 abstracts and 2 U.S. Patents.