Effects of birth weight and standardized litter size on growth performance of boars and subsequent reproductive performance

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of birth weight and rearing litter size on growth and reproductive performance of boars. One hundred and forty male piglets were allotted to two groups, based on litter size: a smaller litter (SL) (8 piglets/litter, 70 boars) and a larger litter (LL) (12 piglets/litter, 70 boars). The boars in these litters were separated into two birth weight subgroups: lower birth weight (LBW) (mean: 1.15 kg, 70 boars) and greater birth weight (GBW) (mean: 1.59 kg, 70 boars). Testes volume, sexual activity and semen quality of boars at 180 days old were evaluated. The males in the GBW group, when compared with the LBW group, had greater bodyweight at 21, 28, and 63 days old (P <0.01) and 180 days old (P <0.05), greater testes volume and semen volume (P <0.05), greater sperm concentration and total number of sperm in the semen (P <0.01) and a longer ejaculation time (P <0.05). The boars in the SL group had greater (P <0.01) bodyweight at 21 and 28 days old, greater (P <0.05) sperm concentration and total number of sperm in the semen than boars in the LL group. These results indicate that birth weight is a good predictor of sperm production in adult boars and suggest the possibility of increasing sperm production in adult boars by reducing the litter size in which they are reared.Keywords: Boars, bodyweight, piglets, reproduction, seme

Effect of sow age on the apparent total tract digestibility of nutrients in the diet

Abstract The objective of this research was to evaluate the effect of sow age on apparent total tract digestibility of nutrients and the concentration of metabolizable energy in the diet. The experiment was carried out on 20 gestating sows, divided into two groups: Group I -10 sows in first pregnancy (131 ± 4.5 kg) and Group II -10 sows in fourth pregnancy (225 ± 8.2 kg). Sows in the two groups were fed identical diets for sows during early pregnancy. The total collection of faeces began on day 30 of pregnancy and lasted eight days. Sows in the fourth pregnancy had greater digestibility coefficients of dry matter (4.1 percentage units), organic matter (3.4 percentage units), crude protein (5.5 percentage units) and crude fibre (6.2 percentage units) than sows in the first pregnancy. The total tract digestibility of ether extract, starch and sugars was not affected by pig age. The metabolizable energy, determined according to the content of digestible nutrients, in the sow diet in fourth pregnancy was 0.7 MJ/kg higher than in the diet of sows in their first pregnancy. Results of this research indicate that sow age should be considered when formulating diets during early pregnancy

Mediating Semantic Web Service Access using the Semantic Firewall

As the technical infrastructure to support Grid environments matures, attention should focus on providing dynamic access to services, whilst ensuring such access is appropriately monitored and secured. Access policies may be dynamic, whereby intra-organisational workflows define local knowledge that could be used to establish appropriate credentials necessary to access the desired service. We describe a typical Grid-based scenario that requires local semantic workflows that establish the appropriate security access, whilst global workflows define how external services are accessed. We present the Semantic Firewall, and the use of Process-based Access Control (PBAC) to mediate service access, and present OWL-S extensions that support additional PBAC access policies. Finally, a prototype implementation that validates this approach is presented

Influence of inorganic Se + vitamin E and organic Se + vitamin E on reproductive performance of young boars

The objective of the study was to compare the influence of the organic Se (Se-Yeast) + vitamin E and inorganic Se (Na2SeO3) + vitamin E on reproductive performance of young boars. The studies were carried on the 80 young boars. A feeding test was started on day 70 of their life. Inorganic Se group males received 0.2 mg inorganic Se + 30 mg vitamin E, those of organic Se group 0.2 mg organic Se + 60 mg vitamin E in 1 kg of the diet ration. The experiment was performed in two seasons: I - June-September, II - January-April. On day 180 of life (close of the test), the boars were subjected to live evaluation: testes volume, libido level, semen characteristics as well as Se content and glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px) activity in seminal plasma and blood serum. The boars of group inorganic Se obtained higher (P = 0.01) selection index of live evaluation than those of the group organic Se. The boars of group organic Se were characterized by better libido level, higher (P = 0.05) concentration and total number of spermatozoa in an ejaculation, lower (P = 0.01) percentage of semen with morphological changes and higher (P = 0.01) value of osmotic resistance test of acrosome membranes in spite of the fact that GSH-Px activity in seminal plasma was lower when compared with those of the group inorganic Se. The findings show that organic Se + vitamin E has been of a more favourable influence on reproductive performance of young boars than that of inorganic Se + vitamin E. More favourable influence of organic Se + vitamin E was observed in winter-spring season than in summer

CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AND NUTRITIVE VALUE OF SPRING HULLED BARLEY VARIETIES

Abstract BIEL, W. and E. JACYNO, 2013. Chemical composition and nutritive value of spring hulled barley varieties. Bulg. J. Agric. Sci., The objective of this research was to evaluate the chemical composition and nutritive value of four spring hulled barley varieties (Antek, Skarb, Nagradowicki and Granal) grown in one location in Poland. In the study were determined: chemical composition, amino acids composition and coefficients of nutritive value of protein, namely chemical score (CS), essential amino acid index (EAAI) and biological value (BV). The apparent digestibility coefficients (ADC) of nutrients were examined on 32 Wistar rats (n=8 rats per barley variety). The chemical components: ash, crude protein, ether extract, starch, dietary fibre, lignin and pentosans differed statistically (P≤0.05) between the barley varieties. The higher crude protein content in barley was accompanied by lower contents of the starch and dietary fibre. The Granal variety had a lower (P≤0.05) crude protein content however; the lysine content and quality of protein (CS, EAAI and BV) were higher than in the other three varieties. On the other hand, the ADC of crude protein and of other nutrients in the Granal variety were lower (not significantly, excepting the pentosans; P≤0.05) than in the remaining varieties. In contrast to Granal variety, the Antek variety with the highest (P≤0.05) protein content had the lowest lysine and threonine levels and quality of protein however, the ADC of crude protein was higher (P≤0.05) in comparison with the remaining varieties. Lysine was the most limiting the quality of grain barley proteins in all examined varieties. The coefficients of nutritional values (CS, EAAI, BV) of the proteins of all examined barley varieties showed the good quality of a protein for monogastric animals

Semantic Security in Service Oriented Environments

As the technical infrastructure to support Grid environments matures, attention must be focused on integrating such technical infrastructure with technologies to support more dynamic access to services, and ensuring that such access is appropriately monitored and secured. Current approaches for securing organisations through conventional firewalls are insufficient; access is either enabled or disabled for a given port, whereas access to Grid services may be conditional on dynamic factors. This paper reports on the Semantic Firewall (SFW) project, which investigated a policy-based security mechanism responsible for mediating interactions with protected services given a set of dynamic access policies, which define the conditions in which access may be granted to services. The aims of the project are presented, and results and contributions described

Chemical composition of hulled, dehulled and naked oat grains

The objective of the work was to evaluate the influence of genetic and mechanical removal of hulls from oat grains on their nutrient content. The studies included three cultivars and six lines of oat grains. In grain samples of hulled (5 samples), dehulled (5 samples) and naked (4 samples) oats, the following components were determined: chemical composition (ash, crude protein, crude fat, crude fibre and its components) and amino acids and fatty acid composition. The grain of naked and dehulled oats contained significantly more crude protein, crude fat and polyunsaturated fatty acids, and considerably less saturated fatty acids and crude fibre than hulled oats. In addition, the dietary fibre composition was more favourable than the naked oats. The coefficients of nutritional values of the protein (total essential amino acids, essential amino acid index and amino acids score) of naked oats were higher than hulled and dehulled oats. In all the tested oat grain samples, lysine was the most limiting amino acid. The study showed that genetic and mechanical reduction of the proportion of hulls in oat grains resulted in a significant decrease in dietary fibre content and a significant increase in nutrient content.Keywords: Hulled and dehulled oat grains; naked oat grains; chemical compositio