University of Wyoming weaves blockchain into wool blankets
A lamb looks at the camera in a farm in Slovakia. The University of Wyoming is using wool from its sheep program and NFTs to create collectible throws. (Zuzana Gogova / Getty Images)
Share Apr 20, 2021 | EDSCOOP
The University of Wyoming will sell blankets this August embedded with blockchain technology and woven from local wool, the result of a partnership between its agriculture and technology programs.
A microchip containing a non-fungible token a unique digital marker stored on the blockchain and a QR code will be embedded in a leather label on the heavy-duty wool throw, according to a university press release. The wool is sourced from the UW Extension sheep program’s flock, and the technology was developed through the university’s Center for Blockchain and Digital Innovation.
Throws spun from Wyoming wool will boost UW sheep program, utilize blockchain
UW ExtensionThe wool top, semi-processed wool, is fed into the machine that spins it into yarn at Mountain Meadow Wool in Buffalo.
LARAMIE, WY – Profits from sales of limited-edition throws made from wool grown and knitted in Wyoming will be reinvested back in the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources sheep and wool program at the University of Wyoming’s Laramie Research and Extension Center (LREC).
Photo Outside Business Journal
Whit Stewart, UW Extension sheep specialist, approached Scott Lake, LREC director, with the idea to create the wool throws. With Lake’s help, the team gained support from the college and dean Barbara Rasco, who has been a huge proponent of the project and the sheep industry efforts as a whole, shared Stewart.
Sheep-plaguing worm resisting common treatments farmprogress.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from farmprogress.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
April 9, 2021
A roundworm that plagues sheep grazing irrigated pastures has been found to be resistant to common classes of dewormers, according to a recently published report online in the Sheep & Goat Research Journal.
University of Wyoming Extension sheep specialist Whit Stewart says research by him and scientists at Montana State University and the University of Georgia that began in 2017 is a baseline resistance study for the warm season barber pole worm (
Haemonchus contortus) and associated deworming management practices across sheep flocks in the region.
The worm has a stripe that winds around it like a barber’s pole.
“To our knowledge, it is the first published estimate of barber pole worm resistance in the Intermountain West,” Stewart says. “We basically found that we are seeing the barber pole worm being resistant to our common classes of dewormers on flocks grazing irrigated acres in the region.”
February 1, 2021
A University of Wyoming scientist whose work springs from the needs of Wyoming forage producers and another whose focus is increasing sheep producer profitability have received outstanding research awards from UW’s Wyoming Agricultural Experiment Station (WAES).
Anowar Islam, a professor in the Department of Plant Sciences, received the Outstanding Research Award. Whit Stewart, an assistant professor in the Department of Animal Science, received the Early Career Research Award.
WAES is the research branch of the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources.
Islam joined UW in 2008 as an assistant professor and has received over $3.8 million in research funding.
“Anowar Islam has evaluated the most critical needs of Wyoming forage producers and has responded to those needs with an aggressive research program that has had a significant impact on county extension educators and producers and, certainly, the scientific community,” wrote Mark Marsalis, a profess