Estudio immunohistoquímico de tumores de folículos pilosos caninos

El objetivo de este trabajo ha sido analizar los patrones de expresión de varias citoqueratinas e involucrina en tumores del folículo piloso canino con especial interés en los que exhiben menor diferenciación tricofítica. En el estudio se han utilizado 71 tumores foliculares diagnosticados en el Servicio de Diagnóstico de Histología y Anatomía Patológica Comparadas de la UCO. Las muestras, fijadas en formol al 10%, se procesaron de la forma habitual para diagnóstico histopatológico y se utilizó la técnica ABC para el estudio inmunohistoquímico. Los tumores foliculares se clasificaron histopatológicamente según Golsmidht y cols, (1998) como tricoepiteliomas (22), epiteliomas intracutáneos cornificantes (23) y tricoblastomas (5)y pilomatricomas (21)

Nefropatía congénita en Schnauzer miniatura

Un Schnauzer miniatura, macho, de 13 meses de edad, presenta un cuadro de vómitos crónicos con historia clínica de gastritis. El examen físico y las pruebas complementarias permiten diagnosticar un cuadro compatible con la nefropatía familiar del Schnauzer miniatura. Se instauró dieta y tratamiento médico hasta que el animal empeoró a los dos meses y medio

Immunohistochemistry studies on bovine squamous cell carcinoma morphological characterization of epidermal cell proliferation and differentiation markers and characterization of cytokeratins

Bovine Ocular Squamous Cell Carcinoma (OSCC) is a general designation for a group of primary neoplasias of keratinocytes arising from ocular tissues, especially the lids and particularly the third eye lid. OSCC has been diagnosed all over the world with high prevalence, being the most common bovine tumour and the one causing the most significant economic losses (Hamir & Parry, 1980; Dennis et al., 1985, Heeney & Valli, 1985; Wilcock, 1993). In Portugal, the frequency of these tumours is particularly high in the Azores, where in S. Miguel Island a large number of cattle affected with OSCC is rejected for consumption at slaughter. OSCC is the second most frequent neoplasia after urinary bladder tumours, representing 21% of all cases of rejection due to neoplasia (Pinto et al, 1996). Several reasons have been advanced to explain this situation namely the fact that animals stay in pasture all year around, with a prolonged exposition to day light and benefiting from few shelters. The ingestion of toxic plants present the pasture could also give rise to photosensitazation problems, either primary or due to hepatic toxicity, that could generate predisposing conditions to the development of OSCC

Productive performance of Tenebrio molitor larvae in response to the protein level in the substrate

Insect production for animal feeding is receiving increasing interest worldwide. The dietary protein level is a key factor influencing overall production and feeding costs. Thus, a growth performance trial was conducted with Tenebrio molitor larvae for 28 days using substrate feeds based on wheat grain and barley straw with increasing levels of soybean meal to reach 100 (10P), 120 (12P), 140 (14P) and 160 (16P) g crude protein (CP) per kg dry matter (DM). Four trays per treatment, with 40 larvae and 24 g substrate, were set up. Average mortality was 0.142 and did not differ among treatments. Feed intake decreased linearly (L, P<0.001) and quadratically (Q, P<0.01) and larval growth (mg/d per larvae) tended to decrease (Q, P=0.065) as the dietary CP increased from 100 to 160 g/kg DM. Protein intake, however, increased (L, P<0.001) with the CP content of the diet. Feed to gain ratio decreased (L, P<0.01) as the dietary CP level increased but total production per tray of DM, CP or ether extract, was not affected. In conclusion, an increase in the dietary CP content over 100 g/kg DM by including soybean meal in the substrate might not be needed to optimise larval growth. A CP content in the diet of 100 g/kg might improve the economic results because of lower feeding costs

Fitting of pH conditions for the study of concentrate feeds fermentation by the in vitro gas-production technique

Two experiments were conducted to simulate in vitro the fermentation conditions under high-concentrate feeding. The concentration of bicarbonate ion in the buffer of the incubation solution was assayed in Experiment 1, by adjusting medium pH to 6.50, 6.25, 6.00, 5.75 and 5.50, in two incubation series of 12 h, using barley as the reference substrate. The pH diminished linearly (P < 0001) by lowering the buffer, and remained constant throughout 12 h, except for treatments 5.75 and 5.50, where pH dropped to 5.51 and 5.31 at 12 h. Gas production decreased linearly with a decreasing medium pH (P < 0.001), with the total volume of gas produced after 12 h being highly dependent (P < 0.01) on pH at 12 h (R 2 = 0.629), thus demonstrating the importance of the incubation pH for estimation of fermentation of concentrate feeds. In Experiment 2, the effect of pH on direct and indirect proportion of gas was studied by adding 0.0, 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4 and 0.5 mmol of acetic acid, either with or without (water added instead) rumen inoculum, to the media. Linear multiple regressions established between the volume of gas produced and the addition of acetic acid, and the bicarbonate ion concentration showed high determination coefficients for water (R 2 = 0.929) and rumen inoculum (R 2 = 0.851). Without inoculum, indirect gas production ranged from 9.4 to 12.4 mL/mmol of acid for medium pH of 5.50-6.50. With rumen inoculum, indirect gas was 20.8 mL/mmol acid, although this may have been biased by the contribution of inoculum itself to direct fermentation

Fitting of the in vitro gas production technique to the study of high concentrate diets

In vitro rumen fermentation systems are often adapted to forage feeding conditions, with pH values ranging in a range close to neutrality (between 6.5 and 7.0). Several attempts using different buffers have been made to control incubation pH in order to evaluate microbial fermentation under conditions simulating high concentrate feeding, but results have not been completely successful because of rapid exhaustion of buffering capacity. Recently, a modification of bicarbonate ion concentration in the buffer of incubation solution has been proposed, which, together with using rumen inoculum from donor ruminants given high-concentrate diets, allows for mimicking such conditions in vitro. It is important to consider that the gas volume recorded is in part directly produced from microbial fermentation of substrates, but also indirectly from the buffering capacity of the medium. Thus, the contribution of each (direct and indirect) gas source to the overall production should be estimated. Another major factor affecting fermentation is the rate of passage, but closed batch systems cannot be adapted to its consideration. Therefore, a simple semicontinuous incubation system has been developed, which studies the rate and extent of fermentation by gas production at the time it allows for controlling medium pH and rate of passage by manual replacement of incubation medium by fresh saliva without including rumen inoculum. The application of this system to studies using high concentrate feeding conditions will also be reviewed here

Rumen Fermentation of Feed Mixtures Supplemented with Clay Minerals in a Semicontinuous In Vitro System

Interest in using clays in the diets of ruminants to improve health and performance is increasing. The microbial fermentation of 65:35 (HC) or 35:65 (HF) concentrate:forage feeds, alone or with zeolite (Z), bentonite (B), or sepiolite (S), was studied in an in vitro semicontinuous culture system. The medium pH was allowed to drop for the first 6 h and was gradually buffered thereafter. For the HC diet, the medium pH was higher with Z throughout incubation (p 0.05) were observed in dry matter disappearance, microbial mass, or volatile fatty acids. However, the inclusion of B in HC reduced the ammonia concentration at 6 and 12 h with respect to C (p < 0.05). The inclusion of zeolite as an additive in the diets of ruminants stabilizes the rumen environment during the first stages of fermentation in terms of pH and ammonia concentration, especially in high-concentrate diets. The buffering effect of bentonite and sepio-lite was lower, and both might reduce ruminal microbial fermentation, depending on the concentrate proportion

Fermentation pattern of several carbohydrate sources incubated in an in vitro semicontinuous system with inocula from ruminants given either forage or concentrate-based diets

The fermentation pattern of several carbohydrate sources and their interaction with the nature of microbial inoculum was studied. Barley (B), maize (M), sorghum, (S), sugarbeet pulp (BP), citrus pulp (CP) and wheat bran (WB) were tested in an in vitro semicontinuous system maintaining poorly buffered conditions from 0 to 6 h, and being gradually buffered to 6.5 from 8 to 24 h to simulate the rumen pH pattern. Rumen fluid inoculum was obtained from lambs fed with either concentrate and barley straw (CI) or alfalfa hay (FI). The extent of fermentation was higher with CI than FI throughout the incubation (p < 0.05). Among the substrates, S, BP and M maintained the highest pH (p < 0.05), whereas CP recorded the lowest pH with both inocula. Similarly, CP recorded the highest gas volume throughout the incubation, followed by WB and B, and S recorded the lowest volume (p < 0.05). On average, the total volatile fatty acid (VFA), as well as lactic acid concentration, was higher with CP than in the other substrates (p < 0.05). The microbial structure was more affected by the animal donor of inoculum than by the substrate. The in vitro semicontinuous system allows for the study of the rumen environment acidification and substrate microbial fermentation under intensive feeding conditions. © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland

Environmental disclosure and Eco-innovation interrelation. The case of Spanish firms

The actual drivers of companies' environmental disclosure have been widely studied and yet with no conclusive results. Most literature looks for the link between environmental performance and environmental disclosure, as reflection of the company instrumental or normative approach to sustainability. However, over the last decade, a growing number of companies are joining the ranks of eco-innovation, focusing their strategy on environmental innovation, and paving the way for new approaches to environmental disclosure. The main objective of this paper is to assess if eco-innovation in companies can be acting as a non-intended driver to disclosure of environmental reporting, in connection to the Resources Based View theory, and the search for competitive advantage. An extensive research has been undertaken with Spanish eco-innovative companies, evaluating their environmental disclosure standards from a two-fold perspective: managers' perception and public available environmental reporting. The findings bring in interesting implications about the mismatch between managers' perception of their environmental disclosure and accounting standards, and the actual disclosure of environmental reporting made available to their stakeholders. Within the studied sample, eco-innovation appears to be a driver for environmental disclosure from an inside-out approach encompassed in the RBV theory, where environmental information is primarily meant for managerial purposes and only secondarily to inform stakeholders. Los impulsores reales de la divulgación ambiental de las empresas han sido ampliamente estudiados y, sin embargo, sin resultados concluyentes. La mayoría de la literatura busca el vínculo entre el desempeño ambiental y la divulgación ambiental, como reflejo del enfoque instrumental o normativo de la compañía hacia la sostenibilidad. Sin embargo, durante la última década, un número creciente de compañías se están uniendo a las filas de la ecoinnovación, enfocando su estrategia en la innovación ambiental y allanando el camino para nuevos enfoques para la divulgación ambiental. El objetivo principal de este documento es evaluar si la ecoinnovación en las empresas puede actuar como un impulsor no intencionado de la divulgación de informes ambientales, en relación con la teoría de la Vista basada en los recursos y la búsqueda de una ventaja competitiva. Se ha llevado a cabo una extensa investigación con empresas ecoinnovadoras españolas, evaluando sus estándares de divulgación ambiental desde una doble perspectiva: la percepción de los administradores y la información ambiental disponible al público. Los hallazgos traen implicaciones interesantes sobre el desajuste entre la percepción de los gerentes sobre su divulgación ambiental y sus normas contables, y la divulgación real de los informes ambientales puestos a disposición de sus partes interesadas. Dentro de la muestra estudiada, la ecoinnovación parece ser un impulsor para la divulgación ambiental desde un enfoque integral incluido en la teoría de la RBV, donde la información ambiental se destina principalmente a fines administrativos y solo de manera secundaria a informar a los interesados