A cross-sectional survey on wounds in horses in New Zealand

AIM: To determine the frequency and type of skin wounds encountered by New Zealand veterinarians in their equine patients, the duration and estimated costs of treatment as well as the expected outcomes for these wounds.

METHODS: An online survey was sent to all veterinarians registered with the New Zealand Equine Veterinary Association. The survey comprised questions on the location and experience of respondents, the number of wound-related cases in relation to the total equine caseload, the type and anatomical location of wounds treated, the frequency, duration and costs of treatments, the outcome of wound treatment and an estimate of the most common causes of death or euthanasia in their equine patients.

RESULTS: The survey response rate was 110/262 (41.9%). The median number of equine cases seen by respondents was 20 (interquartile range (IQR) 6–60) per month; of these, five (IQR 2–10) were wound related. Wounds ranked third after lameness and respiratory disease for the relative frequency with which respondents encountered them. Of 102 respondents 59 (58%) reported that their clients frequently treated wounds incurred by their horse without consulting a veterinarian. Wounds on the distal limb, whether involving only the skin or also deeper structures, were reported by 86/101 (85%) respondents as the most frequently encountered. Wounds in this location also incurred the longest treatment period and were the most prone to develop complications. Finally, wounds ranked second, after colic, as the most common cause of death/euthanasia in the veterinary respondents’ equine patients.

CONCLUSIONS: The data obtained via the survey indicate that skin wounds, particularly on the distal limb, are a common occurrence in horses in New Zealand and, when they involve structures underlying the skin, are costly and time-consuming to manage and may lead to decreased performance, retirement or euthanasia. Consequently, we recommend that more effort be devoted to the education of equine veterinarians and owners, and that appropriate research funds be allocated to help improve patient outcomes.     

NATURAL ADJUSTMENT OF POPULATION DENSITY OF LARCH CASEBEARER (COLEOPHORA DAHURICA)

Population increase of Larch casebearer(C. dahurica)were controlled by compre-hensive factors.Spring wind caused 27％ of larvae on crown to fa11 down.Early and late frosts,larch catempillar,sawfly and needle cast of larch could reduce the food quality and quantity of larchcasebearer and had indrect effects on population density. Birds,ants and spites were the mainpredators of C.dahurica. The parasite complex comprised Piermalebae,Eulophidae,Ichneumonidaeand Braconidae."Self--adjustment",of population caused by"self--population density",only runseffectively at a high larval density.     

Genome‐wide association study for plasma very low‐density lipoprotein concentration in chicken

The plasma very low‐density lipoprotein (VLDL) concentration is an effective blood biochemical indicator that could be used to select lean chicken lines. In the current study, we used Genome‐wide association study (GWAS) method to detect SNPs with significant effects on plasma VLDL concentration. As a result, 38 SNPs significantly associated with plasma VLDL concentration were identified using at least one of the three mixed linear model (MLM) packages, including GRAMMAR, EMMAX and GEMMA. Nearly, all these SNPs with significant effects on plasma VLDL concentration (except Gga_rs16160897) have significantly different allele frequencies between lean and fat lines. The 1‐Mb regions surrounding these 38 SNPs were extracted, and twelve important regions were obtained after combining the overlaps. A total of 122 genes in these twelve important regions were detected. Among these genes, LRRK2, ABCD2, TLR4, E2F1, SUGP1, NCAN, KLF2 and RAB8A were identified as important genes for plasma VLDL concentration based on their basic functions. The results of this study may supply useful information to select lean chicken lines.     

饲喂频率对生长猪饲粮养分消化率的影响

为研究饲喂频率对生长猪总能(GE)和养分的表观回肠消化率(AID)和表观全肠道消化率(ATTD)的影响,试验将24头回肠末端安装简单T型瘘管、平均初始体重为(40.7±1.3)kg的生长猪随机分到M2组(每天饲喂2次)和M12组(每天饲喂12次),每个处理组12个重复,每个重复1头猪。试验期共9 d,包括5 d适应期,2 d粪样收集期和2 d食糜收集期。结果表明:平均日采食量(ADFI)、平均日增重(ADG)和耗料增重比不受饲喂频率的影响(P0.1);饲喂频率对粗灰分、干物质(DM)、粗脂肪(EE)、碳水化合物(CHO)、粗蛋白(CP)、中性洗涤纤维(NDF)、酸性洗涤纤维(ADF)以及GE的AID无显著影响(P0.1);M2组的粗灰分、DM、EE、CP、NDF和GE的ATTD显著低于M12组(P0.05);M2组EE和ADF(P0.05)、NDF(P0.01)的后肠道消化率显著低于M12组;M2组ADF和CP的ATTD以及GE的后肠道消化率有低于M12组的趋势(P0.1)。由此可见,生长猪饲喂玉米-豆粕型饲粮,GE和养分的AID不受饲喂频率的影响,但增加饲喂频率能提高GE和养分的后肠消化率和ATTD。     

我国车用天然气业务发展现状与展望

汽车尾气污染和化石能源的不断消耗,迫切要求人类寻找新能源替代传统车用燃料,天然气作为车用燃料应运而生.对国内外车用天然气业务现状进行了梳理和论述,对我国车用天然气业务所面临的形势和竞争势态进行了分析,指出:我国车用天然气需求潜力巨大,LNG汽车将成为天然气汽车发展的亮点,油气合建站将成为建站的新模式.与此同时,车用天然气业务还应在建立健全相关法规、提高安全生产意识、重视重要设备国产化以及保障供应避免气荒等方面继续努力.     

清代晋北主要自然灾害与社会应对

清代山西北部地区风灾、旱灾、蝗灾、雹灾以及地震等自然灾害频繁发生,给民众生产生活带来极大影响。文章讨论清代山西北部地区主要自然灾害的发生特点、规律等问题,分析自然灾害对农业生产带来的影响,继而对各类自然灾害发生后具体社会应对加以分析,对政府及民众防灾、抗灾、减灾等行为具体讨论,从自然灾害角度探讨人地关系等问题。     

豫西天然次生林林分特征调查研究

在豫西熊耳山北坡、崤山南坡,调查天然次生林林分特征。结果表明：豫西天然次生林是因受人为因素影响而形成的多代萌生林,处于恢复演替过程中的初级阶段。沟谷及山坡下部林木多呈簇生分布,株数较多;山坡中上部林木枝杈较多,自然整枝不良;林缘及郁闭度小于0.8的林分中灌木稠密;森林层间藤本缠绕。这种森林自然生长状态影响林木正常生长和综合效益发挥,应加强森林抚育。     

Effects of Temperature Changes on the Contractility of Isolated Small Intestinal Smooth Muscle in Rabbits

In order to explore the influence of temperature changes on animal digestive tract smooth muscle,the contractility of isolated rabbit small intestine (duodenum,jejunum and ileum) were measured at different temperatures (39→32℃,32→39℃,39→42℃ and 42→39℃) using the biological signal processing system.The results showed that the contraction frequency of duodenum and jejunum was positively correlated with temperature changes between 39 and 32℃,while the amplitude and tension of duodenum were negatively correlated with temperature changes.Only the contraction frequency of ileum was positively correlated with temperature changes between 39 and 32℃.Changes of frequency,amplitude and tension of duodenum between 39 and 42℃ were similar with those changes between 39 and 32℃.However,the contraction of jejunum and ileum was irregular.When the temperature was decreased from 42 to 39℃,the contraction of small intestine could not return to the condition in 39℃.The results suggested that the optimal bath temperature was 37℃ in contraction test of rabbit small intestine in vitro,and the present results could be referenced to explore the disorder of gastrointestinal movement due to the change of environment temperature in animals.     

Illumination invariant segmentation of vegetation for time series wheat images based on decision tree model

Effective and efficient segmentation of vegetation from digital plant images is an actively studied topic in crop phenotyping. Many of the formerly proposed methods showed good performance in the extraction under controlled light conditions but it is still hard to properly extract only vegetation from RGB images taken under natural light condition where the images can contain shadowed and lighted parts with specularly reflected parts of plants. In this paper, we propose a robust method to extract vegetation from the plant images taken under natural light conditions using wheat images. The method is based on a machine learning process, decision tree and image noise reduction filters. We adopted the CART algorithm to create a decision tree in the training process and examined its performance using test images, comparing it with the performances of other methods such as ExG, ExG-ExR and Modified ExG which are widely used recently. The results showed that the accuracy of the vegetation extraction by the proposed method was significantly better than that of the other methods particularly for the images which include strongly shadowed and specularly reflected parts. The proposed method also has an advantage that the same model can be applied to different images without requiring a threshold adjustment for each image.     

自然材料在侗寨台阶上的运用研究

在对侗寨民居环境的调研中,侗族人们运用自然材料青石板搭建台阶,其尺度感的把握,技巧运用及空间布局,很好地符合使用者的需求,利用地势的高差合理地将台阶铺设融于自然之中,使台阶的功能与形式自然、纯朴地表现出来。经过代代发展侗族人们铸就了对自然材料的领悟和运用及对材料之美的理解和尊重。