Protein supplementation of ruminants consuming low-quality cool- or warm-season forage: differences in intake and digestibility

An in situ study (Exp. 1) using 4 ruminally cannulated steers (343 ± 11 kg of BW) in a completely randomized design was used to compare ruminal degradation characteristics of low-quality cool-season (C3; Kentucky bluegrass straw; Poa pratensis; 6.3% CP; DM basis) and warm-season (C4; tallgrass prairie; 5.7% CP; DM basis) forage. Four ruminally cannulated steers (252 ± 8 kg of BW; Exp. 2) and 4 wethers (38 ± 1 kg of BW; Exp. 3) were used in two 2 × 2 factorial arrangements of treatments to determine the influence of supplemental CP (CPSupp; soybean meal; 0.09 and 0.19% of BW, CP basis, for steers and lambs, respectively) on nutrient intake and digestion of C3 and C4 forages. Steers and wethers were allotted to separate 4 × 4 Latin squares that ran simultaneously with 20-d periods. In Exp. 1, C3 had a greater A fraction (fraction of total pool disappearing at a rate too rapid to measure) and effective degradability of DM and NDF compared with C4 (P < 0.01). In addition, C3 had a greater (P < 0.01) A fraction and effective degradability of N, whereas the C fraction (fraction of total pool unavailable in the rumen) was less (P < 0.01) than those for C4. Consequently, RDP accounted for 84.7% of total CP in C3 as compared with 66% for C4 (P < 0.01). In Exp. 2, a CPSupp × forage interaction (P < 0.01) was noted for forage and total DMI, with CPSupp increasing intake of C4 by 47% and intake of C3 forage by only 7%. Dry matter digestibility responded similarly, with a CPSupp × forage interaction (P = 0.05; CPSupp increased digestibility by 21% with C4 and by 9% with C3 forage). In addition, CPSupp × forage interactions were noted for ruminal liquid retention time (P = 0.02; CPSupp decreased retention by 3.6 h with C4 and by only 0.6 h with C3 forage) and particulate passage rate (P = 0.02; CPSupp increased passage by 46% with C4 and by 10% with C3 forage). As in Exp. 2, a CPSupp × forage interaction (P = 0.01; CPSupp increased digestibility by 18% with C4 and by 7% with C3 forage) was observed with DM digestibility in Exp. 3. In contrast, only N balance (P < 0.01) and N digestibility (P < 0.01) were affected by CPSupp. These data suggest that intake and digestion of low-quality C3 and C4 forages by ruminants are not similar and, more important, that the physiological response of ruminants to protein supplementation of low-quality forage is dependent on forage type.

Selecting barcoding loci for plants: evaluation of seven candidate loci with species-level sampling in three divergent groups of land plants

There has been considerable debate, but little consensus regarding locus choice for DNA barcoding land plants. This is partly attributable to a shortage of comparable data from all proposed candidate loci on a common set of samples. In this study, we evaluated the seven main candidate plastid regions (rpoC1, rpoB, rbcL, matK, trnH-psbA, atpF-atpH, psbK-psbI) in three divergent groups of land plants [Inga (angiosperm); Araucaria (gymnosperm); Asterella s.l. (liverwort)]. Across these groups, no single locus showed high levels of universality and resolvability. Interspecific sharing of sequences from individual loci was common. However, when multiple loci were combined, fewer barcodes were shared among species. Evaluation of the performance of previously published suggestions of particular multilocus barcode combinations showed broadly equivalent performance. Minor improvements on these were obtained by various new three-locus combinations involving rpoC1, rbcL, matK and trnH-psbA, but no single combination clearly outperformed all others. In terms of absolute discriminatory power, promising results occurred in liverworts (e.g. c. 90% species discrimination based on rbcL alone). However, Inga (rapid radiation) and Araucaria (slow rates of substitution) represent challenging groups for DNA barcoding, and their corresponding levels of species discrimination reflect this (upper estimate of species discrimination = 69% in Inga and only 32% in Araucaria; mean = 60% averaging all three groups).

A comparison between human and machine labelling of image regions

In previous work (Campbell et al, 1997 Pattern Recognition 30 555-563) a vision system was developed which is capable of classifying objects in outdoor scenes. The approach involves segmenting the image into regions, obtaining a feature-based description of each region, and then passing this description on to an artificial neural network (ANN) which has been trained to label the region with one of eleven possible object types. The question addressed here is: how important is each of these features to overall performance, both in human and machine vision? A set of experiments was conducted in which human subjects were trained in the same labelling task as the ANN. The stimuli, each depicting a single image region, were generated from a large database of urban and rural images. The subjects were then tested on both intact and degraded stimuli. The results suggest that certain features are particularly influential in mediating overall labelling performance. An equivalent experiment was carried out with the ANN. A method is presented which allows individual features to be corrupted in such a way as to simulate the loss of certain forms of visual information. The results, which are broadly similar to those found in the previous experiment, imply that the ANN can provide a useful model of human image region labelling. It is anticipated that the methodology, which draws on both computational and psychophysical techniques, will be of use to other areas of investigation.

All the president's medics. The White House Medical Unit

All EMS providers must work for an ambulance company, right? Wrong. There are many avenues open to EMTs and paramedics that even those involved in EMS don't know about. Take a look at three providers with unique jobs: They help provide medical care for the president and vice president of the United States.

Dimensions of coping that contribute to psychopathology

In an attempt to clarify the components of coping that relate to psychopathology, this study evaluated the simultaneous contribution of coping ability and coping actually executed, as well as the independent contribution of each, to psychopathology. Ninety female college students served as the primary sample, while an additional sample of 90 female college students served as the cross-validation sample. Each subject completed the MMPI and two versions of the Ways of Coping Checklist. Findings suggest that, while coping actually executed and coping ability show substantial overlap, both components of coping independently contribute unique variance to psychopathology. Implications for coping research and theory are discussed.