The Opportunity: A 3D Animation About Karma

The Opportunity is a three dimensional animation that illustrates the idea that by helping others you can inadvertently help yourself. The story is told using an animated sunflower, bees, tulip, and farmer. In a sunflower garden, a sunflower tries to entice a bee to pollinate it, but a tulip (that is not supposed to be in the sunflower garden) attracts all of the bees. The tulip sees the farmer coming to weed out any unwanted plants. Seeing the fear in the tulip’s eyes, the sunflower helps disguise the tulip. The farmer is tricked and the tulip is saved. With the tulip disguised, the bee chooses to pollinate the sunflower instead. Through this story, the goal is to show that the good in helping others does not just stop at the recipient getting what they want. Eventually the good deed is repaid without that being the original intent. According to Dictionary.com, karma is defined as an action, seen as bringing upon oneself inevitable results, good or bad, either in this life or in a reincarnation This is the basic underlying principle of this story. http://markreisch.blogspot.com The final animation exhibits a four minute visual story

High-efficiency biolistic co-transformation and regeneration of 'Chardonnay' ( Vitis vinifera L.) containing npt-II and antimicrobial peptide genes

A reliable and efficient system for transformation and regeneration of 'Chardonnay' (Vitis vinifera L.) plants via microprojectile bombardment was developed. Improvements over the previous biolistic transformation system included: (1) the use of gold particles for bombardment; (2) step-wise selection at 10 then 15mg/l kanamycin; and (3) embryo induction at 27°C. Embryogenic cell cultures were either bombarded with pBI426, which contains the reporter gene gus (uidA) coding for β-glucuronidase (GUS), or were co-bombarded with pSAN237 carrying the npt-II (neomycin phosphotransferase II) selectable marker gene, and a second plasmid with an antimicrobial peptide gene. A large number of transient (7,883±1,928) and stable (46±32) blue spots per plate at 2 and 95days after bombardment, respectively, were obtained according to GUS expression analyses. A total of 447 putative transgenic embryos was harvested from 84 bombarded plates. From these embryos, 242 (54%) were regenerated into plants within the first year of the experiment. Southern blot analyses confirmed integration of the transgenes into the grape genome. Co-transformation was tested with four separate antimicrobial constructs. The co-transformation frequency of unlinked genes was 48% as measured by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), and 56% as estimated by dot blot hybridization. Expression of the gus gene, and PCR and Southern blot analyses of npt-II and antimicrobial genes from regenerated plants document stable transformation of 'Chardonnay' and establish the parameters for highly-efficient biolistic transformation in V. vinifer

Herding Livestock – the Phoenix Rises from the Ashes? Digital Herding as a Future Tool for Grazing Livestock

Today, sustainable management of grazing livestock requires high efforts in management and fencing. Nowadays, several developments in digital technologies for herding grazing animals are arising. We conducted a systematic review on current developments in digital technologies for managing grazing animals within the landscape. We mainly focused on cattle (Bos taurus) and sheep (Ovis aries). We highlight the most promising developments of virtual fencing used in recent research to evaluate effectiveness, animal behaviour and welfare. Moreover, we highlight current research in digital herding by drones and robots. We discuss the potential and current limitations of digital tools for sustainable grazing management. Recent study results showed that virtual fences are highly efficient in keeping cattle within allocated pasture areas. So far, there has been no evidence for harmful impacts on animal welfare or reduction in animal performance. First findings suggest that drones can also herd and move animals. However, knowledge on the efficiency and potential effects on animal welfare when using drones is limited. First findings have shown that robots are able to gather animals to a specific location and heart-rate and blood tests showed that the animals were less stressed by the robot than they were by a human. However, research on herding drones and robots is still in its infancy. Digital tools provide the opportunity for precise livestock movement control and could facilitate the implementation of both productive and biodiversity-friendly grazing

Use of differential thermal analysis to quantify bud cold hardiness of grape selections and clones

Differential thermal analysis (DTA) was used to characterize primary bud mid-winter cold hardiness of Vitis spp. Bud hardiness reached a maximum and was rather stable during the months of January and February at Geneva, New York. Because cold tolerance increases during periods of prolonged cold, observed freezing temperature was adjusted on the basis of the freezing temperature of cv. Concord on the day of observation. DTA gives reproducible and meaningful estimates of bud freezing temperature. Such data account for at least 50 % of the among-cultivar variance in overall vine cold hardiness

Remaily Seedless Grape

Since the late 19th century when grape breeding began at the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station, a major goal has been to combine certain fruit attributes such as seedlessness, crisp texture, and adherent skin of Vitis vinifera L. table grapes with some of the vegetative characters such as disease resistance and cold hardiness of native American hybrid (V. labruscana, Bailey) grape cultivars

A multichannel frequency response analyser for impedance spectroscopy on power sources

A low-cost multi-channel frequency response analyser (FRA) has been developed based on a DAQ (data acquisition)/LabVIEW interface. The system has been tested for electric and electrochemical impedance measurements. This novel association of hardware and software demonstrated performance comparable to a commercial potentiostat / FRA for passive electric circuits. The software has multichannel capabilities with minimal phase shift for 5 channels when operated below 3 kHz. When applied in active (galvanostatic) mode in conjunction with a commercial electronic load (by discharging a lead acid battery at 1.5 A) the performance was fit for purpose, providing electrochemical information to characterize the performance of the power source

Reactions to uncertainty and the accuracy of diagnostic mammography.

BackgroundReactions to uncertainty in clinical medicine can affect decision making.ObjectiveTo assess the extent to which radiologists' reactions to uncertainty influence diagnostic mammography interpretation.DesignCross-sectional responses to a mailed survey assessed reactions to uncertainty using a well-validated instrument. Responses were linked to radiologists' diagnostic mammography interpretive performance obtained from three regional mammography registries.ParticipantsOne hundred thirty-two radiologists from New Hampshire, Colorado, and Washington.MeasurementMean scores and either standard errors or confidence intervals were used to assess physicians' reactions to uncertainty. Multivariable logistic regression models were fit via generalized estimating equations to assess the impact of uncertainty on diagnostic mammography interpretive performance while adjusting for potential confounders.ResultsWhen examining radiologists' interpretation of additional diagnostic mammograms (those after screening mammograms that detected abnormalities), a 5-point increase in the reactions to uncertainty score was associated with a 17% higher odds of having a positive mammogram given cancer was diagnosed during follow-up (sensitivity), a 6% lower odds of a negative mammogram given no cancer (specificity), a 4% lower odds (not significant) of a cancer diagnosis given a positive mammogram (positive predictive value [PPV]), and a 5% higher odds of having a positive mammogram (abnormal interpretation).ConclusionMammograms interpreted by radiologists who have more discomfort with uncertainty have higher likelihood of being recalled

Virtual Fencing Predictable for Cattle? A Simple Method to Test Whether and How Fast Cattle Can Learn the Association Between Acoustic Signal and Electric Pulse

Virtual fencing (VF) offers promising future prospects for improved grazing management as it has the potential to simplify fencing. VF lines are easily drawn and shifted via GPS coordinates. A VF collar emits an acoustic signal when the animal approaches the VF line. The signal stops immediately when the animal turns around. If the animal continues to move towards the VF line, a short electric pulse is emitted. A teaching and an operating mode are provided by the VF collars. The animals automatically change mode when they respond correctly to 20 consecutive acoustic signals without receiving an electric pulse. A prerequisite for using the technology is the ability of the grazing animal to learn to predict the electric pulse, therefore we used the time until mode change (from teaching to operating) to evaluate the learning ability and speed of 16 Fleckvieh heifers equally divided into two groups. All heifers were naive to VF prior to the study (conducted 05.07-16.07.2021). On the first day, the two groups were equipped with VF collars (® Nofence, AS, Batnfjordsøra Norway) and assigned to two adjacent pastures. On day eight, the collars were deactivated for a short time and then activated to start in teaching mode again to analyze differences in mode change speed when they were naive to the technology or experienced. The animals remained on the same pasture after reactivation of the collars. We investigated the time to reach theoperating mode (Δ) for each consecutive round (days one and eight) and found a significant difference (p \u3c 0.0001). Average Δ was 49.32 ± 0.41 h and 2.31± 0.41 h for round one and two, respectively. The faster mode change speed of the second round suggested successful learning. Given our study results, cattle learned to predict (and avoid) the electric pulse of VF collars