The duration of lot-feeding of sheep before sea transport

Adult wethers (n = 750) were lot-fed for 13 days, 8 days or 3 days before a simulated voyage lasting 18 days to examine whether the period of lot-feeding affected the proportion of sheep that ate pelleted feed and their body weight change during simulated shipping. There was no significant difference in the proportion of non-feeders between treatment groups on days 7 and 14 of the voyage. Body weights were not significantly different between the treatment groups on days 14 and 18 of the voyage. Overall body weight loss, from the farm to the end of simulated shipping, was 4.08 kg (+/- 0.28, s.e.m.), 4.58 kg (+/- 0.28) and 4.51 kg (+/- 0.28) in sheep lot-fed for 13 days, 8 days and 3 days, respectively, and was not significantly different between treatments. It was concluded that lot-feeding for 13 days conferred no advantage in body weight or numbers of non-feeders compared with shorter periods in this study.     

Effects of Confluent, Roscovitine Treatment and Serum Starvation on the Cell-cycle Synchronization of Bovine Foetal Fibroblasts

The present study was designed to examine the effects of cell-cycle synchronization protocols, such as confluent, roscovitine treatment and serum starvation, in bovine foetal fibroblasts on synchronization accuracy at G0/G1, viability, apoptosis, necrosis and ploidy for use as a nuclei donor. The cells in 5-10 passages were randomly allocated into three treated groups. Cells were cultured either in Dulbecco's modified Eagle's medium (DMEM) + 10% foetal bovine serum (FBS) until 90% confluent (group 1, confluent), in DMEM + 10% FBS + 30 microM roscovitine for 12 h (group 2, roscovitine), or in DMEM + 0.5% FBS for 5 days (group 3, serum starvation). Most of the cells (>80%) in all groups were arrested at the G0/G1 stage. Although the rates did not differ, cells in group 1 showed an increased cell population arrested at the G0/G1 phase. Significantly (p < 0.05) higher rates of apoptosis occurred in group 3 than in group 1 and 2 (10% vs 6% and 6%, respectively). No differences in chromosomal abnormality were observed among groups. However, by increasing the number of cell culture passages up to 15, significantly (p < 0.05) higher chromosomal abnormality was observed than in 5 and 10 passages (39% vs 28% and 23%, respectively) in group 1. The results clearly indicated that bovine foetal fibroblasts could be effectively synchronized at G0/G1 stages by all the three different treatments, confluent, roscovitine and serum starvation. However, cells in confluent showed reduced apoptosis and necrosis when they underwent 5-10 passages, exhibiting increased percentage of cells with stable chromosome diversity. Hence, cells in confluent merit further studies before they could be used as nuclear donors.     

Soil saturation effects on forest dynamics: scaling across a southern boreal/northern hardwood landscape

Patch modeling can be used to scale-up processes to portray landscape-level dynamics. Via direct extrapolation, a heterogeneous landscape is divided into its constituent patches; dynamics are simulated on each representative patch and are weighted and aggregated to formulate the higher level response. Further extrapolation may be attained by coarsening the resolution of or lumping environmental data (e.g., climatic, edaphic, hydrologic, topographic) used to delimit a patch.Forest patterns at the southern boreal/northern hardwood transition zone are often defined by soil heterogeneity, determined primarily by the extent and duration of soil saturation. To determine how landscape-level dynamics predicted from direct extrapolation compare when coarsening soil parameters, we simulated forest dynamics for soil series representing a range of drainage classes from east- central Maine. Responses were aggregated according to the distribution of soil associations comprising a 600 ha area based on local- (1:12,000), county- (1:120,000) and state- (1:250,000) scale soil maps. At the patch level, simulated aboveground biomass accumulated more slowly in poorer draining soils. Different soil series yielded different communities comprised of species with various tolerances for soil saturation. When aggregated, removal of waterlogging caused a 20–60% increase in biomass accumulation during the first 50 years of simulation. However, this early successional increase and the maximum level of biomass accumulation over a 200 year period varied by as much as 40% depending on the geospatial data. This marked discrepancy suggests caution when extrapolating with forest patch models by coarsening parameters and demonstrates how rules used to rescale environmental data need to be evaluated for consistency.     

The 5‐lipoxygenase inhibitor tepoxalin induces oxidative damage and altered PTEN status prior to apoptosis in canine osteosarcoma cell lines

The 5‐lipoxygenase (5‐LOX) inhibitor tepoxalin has been shown to slow canine osteosarcoma (OSA) tumour xenografts growth, yet the mechanisms are poorly elucidated. Further examination of tepoxalin in canine OSA cell lines shows that tepoxalin treated cells undergo apoptosis through caspase‐3 activation and annexin staining. Interestingly, apoptosis is superseded by an increase in reactive oxygen species (ROS), as measured by activation of dihydrorhodamine 123 and mitosox. This increase in ROS appears to be related to the 5‐LOX inhibitor regardless of cellular 5‐LOX status, and was not observed after treatment with the tepoxalin metabolite RWJ20142. Additionally, 5‐LOX inhibition by tepoxalin appears to increase phosphatase and tensin (PTEN) homolog activity by preventing its alkylation or oxidation. PTEN modification or inhibition allows phosphoinositide‐3 (PI3) kinase activity thereby heightening activation of protein kinase B (AKT) phosphorylation. Our data suggest that off target oxidation and LOX inhibition play roles in the apoptotic response.