bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Research in language teaching and learning in Austria (2011–2017)
Authors: Dalton-Puffer Christiane , Boeckmann Klaus-Börge , Hinger Barbara 
Published: June 2019

AbstractThis overview of seven years of research on language learning and teaching in Austria reflects a period of steady growth for the language teaching and learning research community, a development due to a national policy agenda aiming for a stronger research base in teacher education. The target languages of the teaching and learning processes investigated are primarily German, English, French, Italian, Spanish as well as several Slavic languages, reflecting the geographical, sociolinguistic and language policy situation of this increasingly multilingual country. This multilingualism means there are clearly many more first languages (L1s) than only German involved in the learning situations investigated. While all the studies reviewed here illustrate research driven by a combination of local and global concerns in connection with different theoretical frameworks, some specific clusters of research interest emerge. These are: societal and individual multilingualism, language education policy, language teacher education, language(s) in other subjects, early language learning, language acquisition and learning, literature and culture, testing and standardisation, digital media, and teaching materials.
Opportunities and possible methods to improve reproduction in the pig
Authors: Johnson Rodger K. , Neal Steven M. 
Published: June 2019

Genetic selection for litter size received little attention either by scientists or commercial pig breeders until recently. Low heritability of litter size, its sex-limited expression and the fact that it cannot be measured until reproductive maturity are often given as reasons. But the major reason may be that the reproductive rate of pigs is already quite high, and the economic value of genetic changes in litter size have been small relative to those of efficiency and composition of growth.The economics of pig production have changed and technological and biological advances have caused us to re-examine the economic value of traits. Reducing fat in the carcass and more efficient conversion of feed to lean meat have always been, and will continue to be, high priority selection objectives for pig breeders. But expensive, environmentally controlled gestation, farrowing and nursery houses are the norm of modern pig production and increasing litter size will result in a significant reduction in the cost of producing lean meat (Tess et al., 1983).
Changes in the producer payments scheme
Authors: Amies S. J. 
Published: June 2019

For many years, the Milk Marketing Board (MMB) of England and Wales has operated a pricing system related to the compositional quality of milk supplied by the producer and to the month of supply. As milk production has increased and the seasonal pattern altered, a need has arisen to alter the pricing system.The volume of milk for manufacture has more than doubled since 1970 and now exceeds that taken by the liquid market. The fat and protein elements of milk are of considerably greater value to the manufacturing market than lactose. To match producer payments more closely to market realities, the MMB will, from April 1984, replace the fat and solids-not-fat compositional quality payment scheme with one based on fat, protein and lactose. The proposed prices at 1983/84 levels are: fat, 2.02; protein, 1.77; and lactose, 0.28 pence/1/10 g/kg.In the last 10 years, the seasonal trough of production has moved from December to August/September. It is still deepening and adds considerably to marketing costs. In an attempt to slow this trend and also provide a disincentive to additional supplies at peak, the MMB is altering its seasonal price adjustments. Milk prices will be increased in August and September and decreased in May and June.These changes will not affect the total sum of money available to producers, hence most of them will see little difference to their annual income. The exception will be those producers supplying milk of either especially low or high protein and, to a lesser extent, fat content. The change in seasonal adjustments will, however, cause a noticeable disruption in the cash flow to all producers.
Milk compositional ranges and trends
Authors: Crabtree R. M. 
Published: June 2019

The effects of breed, stage of lactation, age and seasonality on the compositional quality of milk are discussed. The Jersey breed has the highest fat and protein contents, 51.9 and 38.5 g/kg milk, respectively, followed by the Guernsey breed, with 46.4 and 36.3 g/kg milk. The British Holstein has the lowest fat and protein contents, at 37.3 and 32.0 g/kg milk, respectively, whilst the Ayrshire is intermediate between the Channel Island and the Friesian and Holstein breeds. The range of fat within a breed may be over 20 g/kg milk. The variation in protein content is less than this value but may be over 10 g/kg milk. Lactose values vary less than those for fat and protein. Mean lactose values are 45.5 g/kg, with a range from 41.0 to 50.0 g/kg milk.The protein content of milk is high in early lactation, falls rapidly to reach a minimum at approximately 6 weeks after calving, increases slowly to 6 months after calving and then increases rapidly to the end of lactation. The fat content of milk is also high in early lactation and falls to a minimum between the 6th and 10th weeks of lactation. It then rises in a manner similar to protein. Converse changes occur with lactose: the content is low in colostrum and increases to twice its initial value within the 1st week. It remains steady until the 5th or 6th week of lactation, after which it declines slowly and then more rapidly towards the end of lactation.The fall in the fat content of milk from the 1st to the 5th lactation is progressive and of the order of 2 g/kg milk. Solids-not-fat content declines by approximately 4 g/kg. This fall in solids-not-fat is largely a fall in lactose; the change in protein content is small. In Friesian herds, a decrease in average lactose content from 46.9 to 44.7 g/kg milk from 1st to 3rd lactation and over has been observed.The average fat content of bulk milk in England and Wales is highest in October and November and lowest in May and June. The protein content of milk falls to a low level in March, rises rapidly during April and May and shows a slight fall in July, followed by an increase until October, when a progressive fall occurs during the winter months. The lactose content of milk does not vary as much as protein, with values being 0.5 g/kg higher in June and 0.8 g/kg lower in September than the overall average.
1.1 Computers and Their Potential: Application to Animal Production
Authors: Spedding C. R. W. 
Published: June 2019

Modern computers combine the capacity not only to carry out calculations very quickly but also to make many calculations simultaneously, to remember what they have done, as well as their instructions, and to do all this using very little space and with great reliability. These abilities to calculate, record and remember far exceed those of people and, where these qualities are all that are required, computers can substitute for people — very often for many people. But, of course, agriculture as a whole does not employ many people and the scope for substitution may not be great: it is, however, likely to be greater in animal rather than in crop production.Computers can only make decisions where adequate data are available (Blackie and Dent, 1979) and where the weight to be attached to each piece of information is pre-determined. The conceptual framework also has to be adequate, so that decisions are also pre-determined for given values of the variables considered. This is not the same thing as exercising judgement but, in fact, it can come very close to it. A computer landing an aircraft, playing chess or diagnosing a disease behaves very like a human being, and a very skilful, experienced one at that. Computers have considerable advantages in terms of speed of response to feedback and thus, in addition to the power of decision, they possess great power to control and monitor operations.In looking to the future, therefore, it is probably not necessary to try and predict what computers will be able to do: they are already able to do most things and will be able to do virtually anything. It does not follow, of course, that they should be used just because it is technically possible: mere technical feasibility is not sufficient justification for doing anything. This is true of all technical developments and computers are no different in two important respects.
Patterns of substrate utilization from birth to weaning
Authors: Fletcher J. M. 
Published: June 2019

AbstractStrategies to reduce the relatively high incidence of death and disease in young animals must be based on an understanding of the particular metabolic requirements in the period from birth to weaning. In this period, substrate availability and the pathways of substrate utilization differ from those of the foetus and of the adult. Metabolic requirements must be met from the energy stores laid down before birth and from the nutrients present in colostrum and milk. The young animal has a large glucose demand and after exhaustion of hepatic glycogen reserves this must be met by gluconeogenesis. Initiation of gluconeogenesis requires concomitant oxidation of fatty acids, either derived from adipose tissue or from the diet. The young animal is particularly susceptible to hypothermia. Non-shivering thermogenesis in brown adipose tissue uses fatty acids to uncouple oxidation from phosphorylation and also as the major oxidative substrate. In addition, non-shivering thermogenesis is dependent on a minimum concentration of circulating glucose. Shivering thermogenesis is initially fuelled by oxidation of intra-muscular glycogen and then primarily by dietary fat. Growth of white adipose tissue by deposition of dietary fatty acids is an important feature of the metabolism of many species before weaning and this may have several survival advantages.
Principles of techniques that rely on gas measurement in ruminant nutrition
Authors: Theodorou M. K. , Lowman R. S. , Davies Z. S. , Cuddeford D. , Owen E. 
Published: June 2019

Abstract
In vitro gas production techniques have become popular for characterizing the rate and extent of digestion of ruminant foods. In a typical gas production study, gas (predominantly carbon dioxide) is produced as particles of substrate are fermented by rumen micro-organisms in a bicarbonate buffered culture medium. Innovations in equipment design, including automated pressure recording systems and mathematical descriptions of the gas production profiles themselves, make the techniques both simple and precise and therefore good as laboratory procedure. The technique of measuring gas is of value in ruminant science because the kinetics of gas production and substrate degradation are very closely correlated. However, although it is relatively easy to measure gas volumes and to determine the kinetics of gas production, the underlying processes that give rise to the gas in the first place are complex and not well understood. Therefore, there is concern about what is being measured in gas production studies and how this relates to the digestion process in the ruminant animal. In this paper we review some of the fundamental properties of gases, describe their behaviour in liquids and consider some of the biological and chemical factors influencing gas production. From a knowledge of how gases behave in liquids and at gas-liquid interfaces, both at ambient and increased temperatures and pressures, it is possible to deduce what is happening in gas production studies. However, although the technique is invaluable for obtaining information about the digestion of particulate substrates in anaerobic ecosystems, we conclude that gas production should be used with caution in routine food evaluation studies.
Modelling fermentation in an in vitro gas production system: effects of microbial activity
Authors: Jessop N. S. , Herrero M. 
Published: June 2019

In order to understand and ultimately predict the voluntary intake and performance of ruminants, it is necessary to know the nutritional value of foods. Most recent systems for predicting nutrient supply are dynamic in nature and characterize foods in terms of the quantities of available nutrients and their potential rates of supply. The in vitro gas production system has been used to characterize the carbohydrate fraction of foods in this manner. For the technique to be able to do this, two assumptions must be satisfied. First, that the rate of fermentation is limited by characteristics of the food and secondly that the pattern of gas production correlates closely with the pattern of food fermentation.Low microbial activity within the system could invalidate both assumptions since it could (i) limit the rate of food fermentation, thus not allowing the potential rate determined by the physical and chemical nature of the food to be measured and (ii) result in partition of food carbohydrate into new microbial matter, thus reducing the amount of volatile fatty acids and hence gas produced per unit of food fermented.The aims of this study were mathematically to simulate food fermentation within an in vitro system and to use this representation to investigate the potential effects of variation in microbial activity on the characterization of foods.
Comparison of rumen liquor and faeces from cows as sources of micro-organisms for the in vitro gas production technique
Authors: Mauricio R. M. , Owen E. , Dhanoa M. S. , Theodorou M. K. 
Published: June 2019

Bioassay methods to estimate the digestibility of forages for ruminants, such as the in vitro digestibility technique (Tilley and Terry, 1963), the nylon bag technique (Ørskov et al., 1980) and the gas production methods of Menke and Steingass (1988) and Theodorou et al. (1994), require rumen fistulated animals, either to provide a suitable in situ environment or to provide rumen liquor as a source of inoculum. Not only is establishing and maintaining fistulated animals expensive, but fistulation is an invasive technique which is increasingly discouraged on animal welfare grounds. There is therefore a need to find an alternative to rumen liquor as a source of micro-organisms for bioassays.Although the Tilley and Terry (1963) technique is widely used, it is limited by being an end-point digestibility method. Ørskov et al. (1988) showed that intake of forages and their rate of digestion in the rumen are more correlated than intake and digestibility. Thus, since 1988, there has been much interest in determining rate of rumen degradability using the nylon bag technique (Huntington and Givens, 1995). However, as indicated earlier, this in vitro technique requires fistulated animals. Recently Sileshi et al. (1996) showed that the in vitro gas production technique of Theodorou et al. (1994), offers a possibility of assessing rate of rumen degradation.The purpose of the present experiment was to compare rumen liquor and faeces as sources of inoculum in the gas technique of Theodorou et al. (1994).
The effect of the length of the priming period on fermentation characteristics using the pressure transducer technique
Authors: Harris D. M. , Beever D. E. 
Published: June 2019

The pressure transducer technique of Theodorou et al. (1984) is becoming of increasing importance in food evaluation. The main advantage over end-point procedures is the collection of kinetic data on a food. Previously such data were only obtained by sequential sacrifice or in situ techniques. Earlier work (Harris, 1996) showed that kinetics in the early stages of the incubation may not accurately simulate the processes occurring in vivo and this led to the use of a priming technique when the microbial innocula is acclimatized for 24 h to a priming food similar to the basal diet of the donor animal. This work investigates the effect of the length of priming on fermentation characteristics of two foods.Samples of barley grain and straw were ground through a 1-mm screen and a priming food of grass silage and concentrates prepared according to the method of Harris (1996). Gas production was determined from the barley grain and straw using bovine rumen liquor after exposing the microbial population to the priming food for 0 (unprimed), 6, 12, or 24 h. Gas volumes were recorded manually and the blank corrected volumes fitted to the equation of France et al. (1993).
Science and knowledge transfer – what the pig industry needs
Authors: Sheldon M J 
Published: June 2019

The scientific needs of the pig industry change on an ongoing basis, partly because needs are satisfied from time to time, and partly because crises pass. However, there is something more to it than that. Changing need can be characterised as a function of the pig industry's hierarchy of scientific need. The four layers in the hierarchy, in ascending order, can be named thus: Do no harm; Stay in business; Cost less; Charge more.Do no harm means: don't make people ill (or worse); don't pollute the environment; and don't impair the welfare of pigs in our care. These are basic qualifiers to have the right to produce pigs at all. They tend to be absolute needs where interpretation might be necessary, but where relative positions are not likely to be acceptable (i.e. the pig industry is no worse than the rest). A failure to satisfy these needs makes the pig industry a pariah, and renders all other activity in the industry irrelevant.
Non-invasive endocrine assessments in the domestic sow: towards an automated reproductive monitoring system for pig production
Authors: Pickard A. R. , Vazquez J. M. , Pemberton R. M. , Hart J. P. , Mottram T. T. 
Published: June 2019

AbstractA method for monitoring the reproductive status of female pigs, using non–invasive hormone analysis was developed. Plasma and saliva samples were collected from five reproductively active sows, and analysed for oestradiol–17ß and progesterone by immunoassay. The oestradiol–17ß content of the saliva samples was also measured using a novel biosensor–based method to demonstrate, in principle, the potential to develop an automated system for hormone analysis and interpretation. A hand–held saliva sampling device was designed and built for the purpose of this experiment. Plasma and saliva samples were collected for 3.5 months from four of the five sows. The vascular access port implanted into the fifth sow failed; therefore she could only be used for saliva collection. Saliva sampling was 100% successful for the first two weeks of the study. Over the entire sampling period, daily and twice weekly samples could be collected on 86% of the attempts made. Both progesterone and oestradiol–17ß were measured in saliva samples using conventional immunoassay techniques.
Biosecurity strategies for conservation of farm animal genetic resources
Authors: Wrathall A.E. , Simmons H.A. 
Published: June 2019

AbstractThe foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) epidemic in the U.K. in 2001 highlighted the threat of infectious diseases to rare and valuable livestock and stimulated a renewed interest in biosecurity. Not all diseases resemble FMD, however; transmission routes and pathological effects vary greatly, so biosecurity strategies must take this into account. Realism is also needed as to which diseases to exclude and which will have to be tolerated. The aim should be to minimise disease generally and to exclude those diseases that threaten existence of the livestock, or preclude their national or international movement. Achieving this requires a team effort, bearing in mind the livestock species involved, the farming system (‘open’ or ‘closed’) and the premises. Effective biosecurity demands that practically every aspect of farm life is controlled, including movements of people, vehicles, equipment, food, manure, animal carcasses and wildlife. Above all, biosecurity strategies must cover the disease risks associated with moving the livestock themselves, and this will require quarantine if adult or juvenile animals are imported into the herd or flock. Reproductive technologies such as artificial insemination and embryo transfer offer much safer ways for getting new genetic materials into herds/flocks for breeding than bringing in live animals. Embryo transfer is especially safe when the sanitary protocols promoted by the International Embryo Transfer Society (IETS) and advocated by the Office International des Epizooties (OIE: the ‘World Organisation for Animal Health’) are used. It can also allow the full genetic complement to be salvaged from infected animals. Cryobanking of genetic materials, especially embryos, is another valuable biosecurity strategy because it enables storage for contingencies such as epidemic disease or other catastrophes.
Social organisation and dominance in relation to resource ascendancy within a selected group of weaned foals
Authors: Tracey S. , Verwiji R. , Bland I. , Whitaker T.C. 
Published: June 2019

Houpt et al (1977) stated that injuries sustained during dominance hierarchies, and poor nutritional condition of low ranked horses are the most common and serious equine behaviour related problems. Often aggression patterns are exhibited over resource dominance. If optimum management conditions are to be attained, regard for social structure, temperament and dominance within groups is paramount; this may be especially important where enclosed barn or stable environments are used. Studies of social organisation often assume linear relationships, unfortunately this may obscure irregularities found within the social structure (Martin and Bateson 1993, Lehner 1996). This study investigates social structure and how dominance determines resource (concentrate feed) ascendancy.A group of nine foals (n = 5♀,n = 4♂) were directly observed whilst being fed concentrates within an enclosed barn (Figure 1), daily for 40mins over a 25 day period. Dominance and displacement behaviours were observed and collated at 4min intervals via scan sampling. All foals were observed simultaneously and continuously.
The use of branding within the equine related charity sector and the implications of brand orientation
Authors: Abraham D. M. , Walsh Rita 
Published: June 2019

The Charity Commission website lists in excess of 100 equine charities (Charity Commission, 2003) and this figure does not include those whose annual income is under £1,000. The size and nature of equine related charities varies enormously. In 2002 the top 6 equine charities (listed below) had a combined income of £40m and were responsible for rescuing approximately 600 horses, ponies and donkeys (Peplow, 2003).Blue CrossInternational League for the Protection of HorsesHome of Rest for HorsesThe Donkey SanctuaryRedwingsHorse and Pony Protection AssociationWhilst these larger charities have grown organically over the years, many smaller charities are failing to survive and are in some situations having to be ‘rescued’ themselves by their larger counterparts. The public, consisting of present and potential donors, are offered a vast choice of charities to support. Philanthropic behaviour has at best stagnated in recent years (Sargeant & Lee, 2002).
The climate of the Estuary and Firth of Clyde
Authors: Smith K. 
Published: June 2019

SynopsisThe climatic character of this particular shoreline environment is analysed with a major emphasis on the contrasts between the upper estuary and the Clyde coast. The relatively mild, dry and sunny conditions along much of the Ayrshire coast are described and explained, although attention is also drawn to the effects of smaller-scale variations in topography, especially on temperatures. Sea breeze mechanisms are identified and illustrated with reference to a specific event.