Chemical characterization of wood and extractives of fast-growing Schizolobium parahyba and Pinus taeda

This study aims to evaluate the chemical composition of wood and extractives of Pinus taeda and Schizolobium parahyba (guapuruvu) as potential feedstock for new applications in the biorefinery industry. For this purpose, their content of α-cellulose, hemicellulose, insoluble lignin, hot water solubility, NaOH_1% solubility, inorganic materials (ash), and monomeric sugars by high-performance liquid chromatography was quantified. Attenuated total reflectance infrared spectroscopy and thermogravimetric analysis were also used to complete the physicochemical characterization of the studied woods. The extractives were obtained by soxhlet extraction with ethanol:toluene and dichloromethane and identified with pyrolysis-gas chromatography/mass spectroscopy technique. The results showed that guapuruvu wood has the higher amount of hemicellulose (16%) when compared to pine wood (10%), which resulted in higher solubility in alkali solution. Furthermore, in relation to other biomasses, the two woods presented more percentage of lignin and minor content of hemicelluloses. The P. taeda wood presented the highest percentage of extractives mainly composed of fatty acids and aromatic hydrocarbons, while guapuruvu wood had a higher percentage of phenolic compounds and also fatty acids. Both the materials have low content of extractives with dichloromethane and were mainly composed of lipophilic compounds.     

Segregation and associations of enological and agronomic traits in Graciano × Tempranillo wine grape progeny (Vitis vinifera L.)

The main objective of this research was the evaluation of the variability present in a segregating wine grape population derived from a cross between Graciano × Tempranillo, two Spanish varieties, in order to select improved genotypes with potential for producing high-quality wines in a climate change scenario. For that purpose, the phenotypic segregation of 16 agronomic traits related to production and phenology and 11 enological traits related to technical and phenolic maturity was studied in the progeny for three consecutive years. All traits presented transgressive segregation and continuous variation. Year effect was significant for all traits except total, extractable and skin anthocyanins content. However, a high level of genotype consistency for enological traits was revealed by repeatabilities and correlations between years. Significant correlations among traits were observed but most associations were weak. Furthermore, the CAPS (Cleaved Amplified Polymorphic Sequence) marker for the VvmybA genotype was tested to determine whether it would be useful in indirect selection for berry anthocyanins content. The results showed that the number of homozygous and heterozygous genotypes for the functional colour allele adjusted to a 1:1 segregation ratio, and that homozygous genotypes had significantly higher anthocyanins content. Principal component analysis found eight variables that contributed up to 80 % of the phenotypic variability present in the population. Seven groups of hybrids were distinguished based on ripening time, cluster weight, berry weight and anthocyanins content by cluster analysis; and fourteen genotypes were pre-selected for further research.     

Factors affecting plasma prolactin concentrations throughout gestation in high producing dairy cows

The aim of the present study was to investigate possible relationships between plasma concentrations of prolactin and the following factors throughout gestation in lactating dairy cows: photoperiod, season, milk production, Neospora caninum-seropositivity, twin pregnancy, and plasma concentrations of pregnancy associated glycoproteins-1 (PAG-1), progesterone and cortisol. Pregnancy was diagnosed by trans-rectal ultrasonography on Day 40 post-insemination and by palpation per rectum on Days 90, 120, 150, 180 and 210 or until abortion in aborting cows. Blood samples were collected from each animal immediately before each pregnancy diagnosis. The study population was comprised of 73 non-aborting (54 Neospora-seropositive cows) and 20 aborting cows (all Neospora-seropositive) cows. In non-aborting cows, GLM repeated measures of analysis of variance revealed that lactation number and days in milk had no effect on plasma prolactin concentrations throughout gestation, whereas high plasma prolactin concentrations were significantly associated with high plasma levels of cortisol and PAG-1, with Neospora-seropositivity, positive photoperiod (increasing day length), twin pregnancy, and with low plasma progesterone concentrations. An interaction among plasma prolactin, plasma cortisol and milk production was observed in that plasma prolactin concentrations differed significantly throughout gestation and were highest in high-producing cows with high cortisol levels. In Neospora-seropositive non-aborting versus aborting cows, mean prolactin concentrations failed to differ on Days 40, 90, 120, 150 and 180 of pregnancy, whereas prolactin values were significantly lower (P = 0.03) in aborting animals on Day 210 of pregnancy. Our results indicate that a positive photoperiod and Neospora-infection lead to increased plasma prolactin concentrations throughout gestation. Reduced prolactin concentrations detected in Neospora-seropositive aborting cows compared to non-aborting animals suggests a protective effect of prolactin in N. caninum infection.     

Factors Affecting Plasma Pregnancy-associated Glycoprotein 1 Concentrations Throughout Gestation in High-producing Dairy Cows

This study was designed to establish the factors, if any, which could affect plasma pregnancy-associated glycoprotein-1 (PAG-1) expression in a study population of 87 pregnant, high-producing dairy cows. The factors examined were: semen providing breed (Holstein-Friesian vs Limousin), outcome of gestation (male vs female newborn, and singleton vs twin pregnancies), lactation number, milk production at pregnancy diagnosis, plasma progesterone concentration, season of gestation (warm period, March–November vs cool period, December–February), and day of gestation (40, 90, 120, 150, 180 and 210). Pregnancy was diagnosed by transrectal ultrasound on day 40 post-insemination and by palpation per rectum on days 90, 120, 150, 180 and 210. Blood samples were collected from each animal immediately before each pregnancy diagnosis. The relative contributions of the different factors on PAG-1 concentrations were evaluated by GLM repeated measures analysis of variance. No significant effects of the herd, foetal sex, milk production, lactation number and plasma progesterone concentrations were observed. In contrast, twin pregnancy, the use of Limousin semen and conception during the cool period were correlated with significantly increased plasma PAG-1 concentrations throughout gestation. Our data indicate that both cow well-being during early placental development, determined in our conditions by reduced heat stress when conception occurred in the cool season, and crossbreed pregnancies lead to improved PAG-1 production throughout the gestation period.     

Intrauterine Neospora caninum inoculation of heifers

Here, we studied the potential of Neospora caninum tachyzoites to infect heifers when administered in utero by artificial insemination via contaminated semen. Eighteen primiparous cyclic heifers were hormonally synchronized and artificially inseminated. Nine of them, which were inseminated with semen containing 10(7) live N. caninum NC-1 isolate-tachyzoites, reacted with seroconversion and a specific IFN-gamma response. Moreover, N. caninum DNA was demonstrated by a nested-PCR in the blood of all nine heifers and in brain, lungs, liver and uterine horn of several of them. In contrast, nine heifers inseminated with tachyzoite-free semen developed no antibody or IFN-gamma responses, and no parasite DNA was detected in blood or organs. At necropsy, viable embryos were detected in one and six of the infected and non-infected heifers, respectively. No specific Neospora DNA was detected in any of the embryos. This study provides evidence that intrauterine inoculation via contaminated semen cause N. caninum infection in cattle.     

Sorption and thermodynamic properties of buried juvenile <Emphasis Type="Italic">Pinus sylvestris</Emphasis> L. wood aged 1,170 ± 40 BP

The hygroscopicity and thermodynamic properties of buried juvenile Pinus sylvestris L. wood with an age of 1,170 ± 40 BP were compared with the corresponding values of juvenile wood of the same species from recently cut trees. The 35 and 50°C isotherms were plotted following the saturated salts method and subsequently fitted in accordance with the GAB model. The isotherms were then compared by means of the hysteresis coefficients. X-ray diffractograms were used to analyse the crystal structure of the cellulose. The effect of time on the buried wood caused hemicelluloses degradation and a decrease in the crystallinity index and the crystallite length, resulting in an increase in the proportion of amorphous zones. Because of this, the equilibrium moisture contents of the buried wood are higher than of the recent wood, both in adsorption and desorption. In terms of the thermodynamic properties, the heat involved is greater in the buried wood than in the recent wood.     

饲粮中主要谷物与谷物颗粒大小对早期罗曼褐壳蛋鸡生产性能和蛋品质的影响

试验旨在研究饲粮中主要谷物和谷物的几何平均粒径（GMD）对20～48周龄罗曼褐壳蛋鸡生产性能与蛋品质的影响。试验选择960只罗曼褐壳蛋鸡,采用完全随机设计为6×2×3,共分6个处理组．谷物饲粮分别为玉米和小麦,谷物粉碎粒度分别为6、8、10mm。每个处理设8个重复,每个重复20只。所有的饲粮配方设计中包含50％的玉米或小麦。每4周记录生产性能结果,第48周龄时测量蛋品质。试验结果表明,GMD为10mm时鸡采食量显著高于GMD为6和8mm时（P〈0.05）,说明粗糙的谷物粉碎粒度一定程度上有助于提高蛋鸡的采食量,而对蛋品质参数均没有显著影响。可以得出结论,谷物类型与谷物GMD除了影响早期罗曼褐壳蛋鸡采食量随谷物粉碎粒度的增加而增加外,其生产性能和蛋品质指标变化均不显著。     

Linking models for assessing agricultural land use change

The ex-ante assessment of the likely impacts of policy changes and technological innovations on agriculture can provide insight into policy effects on land use and other resources and inform discussion on the desirability of such changes. Integrated assessment and modeling (IAM) is an approach that can be used for ex-ante assessment. It may combine several quantitative models representing different processes and scales into a framework for integrated assessment to allow for multi scale analysis of environmental, economic and social issues. IAM is a challenging task as models from different disciplines have a different representation of data, space and time. The aim of this paper is to describe our strategy to conceptually, semantically and technically integrate a chain of models from different domains to assess land use changes. The models that were linked are based on different modeling techniques (e.g. optimization, simulation, estimation) and operate on different time and spatial scales. The conceptual integration to ensure consistent linkage of simulated processes and scales required modelers representing the different models to clarify the data exchanged and interlinking of modeling methodologies across scales. For semantic integration, ontologies provided a way to rigorously define conceptualizations that can be easily shared between various disciplines. Finally, for technical integration, OpenMI was used and supplemented with the information from ontologies. In our case, explicitly tackling the challenge of semantic, conceptual and technical integration of models forced researchers to clarify the assumptions of their model interfaces, which helped to document the model linkage and to efficiently run models together. The linked models can now easily be used for integrated assessments of policy changes, technological innovations and societal and biophysical changes.