The latest episode of the Georgia Tech Research Podcast focuses on a critical but often unseen component of Georgia’s agricultural infrastructure: the Georgia Poultry Laboratory Network (GPLN). 

Host Stephanie Richter, a senior research scientist in GTRI’s ATAS laboratory, is joined by Dr. Louise Dufour-Zavala, executive director of GPLN, for a conversation on poultry health, disease prevention, emergency response, and the laboratory network’s close coordination with industry, state, and federal partners.

Throughout the episode, Richter and Dufour-Zavala explore how GPLN functions day to day, why its work is essential to Georgia’s economy, and how science, speed, and communication work together when animal health is on the line.

GPLN exists to help keep Georgia’s poultry flocks healthy, safe, and market-ready. That mission plays out through an extensive testing and surveillance operation, with approximately 1.7 million samples processed annually. The episode emphasizes that this testing supports not only flock health but also food safety, business continuity, and export eligibility.