Surveillance for lumpy skin disease and foot and mouth disease in the Kimberley, Western Australia

We quantified the sensitivity of surveillance for lumpy skin disease (LSD) and foot and mouth disease (FMD) in cattle in the Kimberley region of Western Australia. We monitored producer and veterinary activity with cattle for 3 years commencing January 2020. Each year, ~274,000 cattle of 685,540 present on 92 pastoral leases (stations) were consigned to other stations, live export or slaughter. Veterinarians examined 103,000 cattle on the stations, 177,000 prior to live export, and 10,000 prior to slaughter. Detection probabilities for the disease prior to transport or during veterinary procedures and inspections were elicited by survey of 17 veterinarians working in Northern Australia. The veterinarians estimated the probabilities that they would notice, recognise, and submit samples from clinical cases of LSD and FMD, given a 5% prevalence of clinical signs in the herd. We used scenario tree methodology to estimate monthly surveillance sensitivity of observations made by producers and by veterinarians during herd management visits, pre-export inspections, and ante-mortem inspections. Average monthly combined sensitivities were 0.49 for FMD and 0.37 for LSD. Sensitivity was high for both diseases during the dry season and low in the wet season. We estimated the confidence in freedom from the estimated surveillance sensitivity given one hypothetically infected herd, estimated probability of introduction, and prior confidence in freedom. This study provided assurance that the Kimberley is free of these diseases and that routine producer and veterinary interactions with cattle are adequate for the timely detection of the disease should they be introduced.

Designing a probe beam and an ultraviolet holographic microinterferometer for plasma probing

The requirements and techniques for time- and space-resolved picosecond probing of laser-produced plasmas are reviewed. The design and limitations of a holographic microinterferometer are discussed, and optical pulse techniques are presented. This technique can provide significant data for understanding the absorption of energy within laser-produced plasmas. The primary requirements are to measure the electron densities in the 10(20)-10(21)-e/cc range, with density contour velocities of 10(6) to 10(7) cm/sec and spatial resolution of 1 microm or better. For these velocities one requires a probe pulse duration of 3-30 psec, an UV wavelength as short as feasible, and large numerical aperture optics corrected for spherical aberration. Interferograms of laser-produced plasmas obtained at 2660 A with a combined resolution of 1 microm and 15 psec are presented.