Paul Kononoff

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Paul Kononoff

Professor & Dairy Nutrition Extension Specialist Animal Science University of Nebraska-Lincoln

Contact

Address
ANSC C220j
Lincoln, NE 68583-0908
Phone
402-472-6442 On-campus 2-6442
Email
pkononoff2@unl.edu
Website
Website
Social Media

Dr. Paul Kononoff joined the Department of Animal Science at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln in 2005 and currently serves as a Professor and Extension Dairy Nutrition Specialist. His research focuses on dairy cattle nutrition, with emphasis on energy metabolism, rumen fermentation, feed characterization, and strategies to improve efficiency and sustainability, including reducing methane emissions. His work integrates fundamental animal bioenergetics with practical feeding applications to support profitable and environmentally responsible dairy production. Dr. Kononoff is an ex-officio member of both the Nebraska State Dairy Association (NSDA) and Midwest Dairy (Dairy Council of Nebraska), where he contributes to advancing dairy industry outreach and education. He has received the 2025 NSDA Industry Person of the Year award. He recently (2025) completed 6 years of service as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Dairy Science, where he helped guide the journal through a period of record growth, expanded global reach, and evolving standards in scientific publishing.

Education

Ph.D., Dairy and Animal Science, The Pennsylvania State University, 2002
M.S., Animal Science, University of Saskatchewan, 1998
B.S.A., Animal Science, University of Saskatchewan, 1995

Research

My research focus is primary focused on solving problems related to the feeding the lactating dairy cow. My research covers several major areas of dairy nutrition namely, 1) energy metabolism and enteric methane production 2) forage quality, feed particle size, and effective fiber, 3) feed characterization, 4) feed byproducts.

Extension

My extension programs focus primarily on dairy production and nutrition.

Selected Publications

  • Buse, K.K., and P.J. Kononoff. 2024. Testing preference of alfalfa hay of different relative feed value (RFV) and brome hay in lactating Jersey cows. JDS Communications 0. doi:10.3168/jdsc.2024-0653.
  • Knoell, A.L., A.L. Carroll, J.V. Judy, H.C. Wilson, D.L. Morris, K.J. Herrick, S.C. Fernando, and P.J. Kononoff. 2024. Energy utilization in lactating Jersey cows consuming a mixture of DDGS and straw replacing alfalfa hay. Journal of Dairy Science 0. doi:10.3168/jds.2024-25024.
  • Buse, K.K., A.L. Carroll, B.J. Bradford, D. Min, K. Jagadish, and P.J. Kononoff. 2024. The effect of replacing conventional alfalfa hay with lower-lignin alfalfa hay on feed intake, nutrient digestibility, and energy utilization in lactating Jersey cows. Journal of Dairy Science 0. doi:10.3168/jds.2024-24966.
  • Tom, W.A., J.V. Judy, P.J. Kononoff, and S.C. Fernando. 2024. Influence of empirically derived filtering parameters, ASV, and OTU pipelines on assessing rumen microbial diversity. Journal of Dairy Science 0. doi:10.3168/jds.2023-24479.
  • Carroll, A.L., and P.J. Kononoff. 2024. Derivation of the maintenance energy requirements in Jersey cows differing in body condition score. Journal of Dairy Science 107:8034–8043. doi:10.3168/jds.2024-24940.
  • Carroll, A.L., M.L. Spangler, D.L. Morris, and P.J. Kononoff. 2024. Partitioning among-animal variance of energy utilization in lactating Jersey cows. Journal of Dairy Science 107:7734–7743. doi:10.3168/jds.2024-24740.