Effect of sorghum tannin levels and postweaning day on some morphophysiological characteristics of the digestive tract of piglets

An experiment was conducted with piglets to evaluate the effect of dietary sorghum tannin level on trypsin activity, digesta pH, the weight of digestive organs, and intestinal morphology. Sixteen weaned (at 28 days of age) Duroc x Landrace piglets (eight per treatment) were fed, from postweaning until slaughter, either a diet with low-tannins sorghum (SBT) or one with high-tannins sorghum (SAT). Four animals per treatment were slaughtered on each of days 3 and 16 postweaning. Also, four piglets were slaughtered at weaning (day 0) as a control group. There were no effects (P>0.05) of dietary tannin levels on pancreatic trypsin activity; development of pancreas, stomach, liver, and small intestine; digesta pH in stomach, duodenum, jejunum, and ileum; and morphology of intestinal villi and crypts. The variables weight at sacrifice and relative weight of digestive organs, excepting liver, were affected (P<0.05) by days after weaning (0, 3 or 16), being highest at d 16. Ingesta pH in all four parts of the digestive tract was also affected (P<0.05) by days postweaning, with significant differences as follows: stomach, max. at d 0 and min. at d 3; duodenum, max. at d 16 and min at d 3; jejunum, max. at d 3 and min at d 0 and 16; ileum, max at d 3 and min at d 16. Crypt depth in jejunum and ileum was greater (P<0.05) at d 16 than at d 3 postweaning. In conclusion, dietary tannins did not impact negatively the morphological and physiological characteristics studied. The changes observed suggest a digestive adaptation to starter feed

Update on the Combined Analysis of Muon Measurements from Nine Air Shower Experiments

Over the last two decades, various experiments have measured muon densities in extensive air showers over several orders of magnitude in primary energy. While some experiments observed differences in the muon densities between simulated and experimentally measured air showers, others reported no discrepancies. We will present an update of the meta-analysis of muon measurements from nine air shower experiments, covering shower energies between a few PeV and tens of EeV and muon threshold energies from a few 100 MeV to about 10GeV. In order to compare measurements from different experiments, their energy scale was cross-calibrated and the experimental data has been compared using a universal reference scale based on air shower simulations. Above 10 PeV, we find a muon excess with respect to simulations for all hadronic interaction models, which is increasing with shower energy. For EPOS-LHC and QGSJet-II.04 the significance of the slope of the increase is analyzed in detail under different assumptions of the individual experimental uncertainties

Search for Spatial Correlations of Neutrinos with Ultra-high-energy Cosmic Rays

For several decades, the origin of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) has been an unsolved question of high-energy astrophysics. One approach for solving this puzzle is to correlate UHECRs with high-energy neutrinos, since neutrinos are a direct probe of hadronic interactions of cosmic rays and are not deflected by magnetic fields. In this paper, we present three different approaches for correlating the arrival directions of neutrinos with the arrival directions of UHECRs. The neutrino data are provided by the IceCube Neutrino Observatory and ANTARES, while the UHECR data with energies above ∼50 EeV are provided by the Pierre Auger Observatory and the Telescope Array. All experiments provide increased statistics and improved reconstructions with respect to our previous results reported in 2015. The first analysis uses a high-statistics neutrino sample optimized for point-source searches to search for excesses of neutrino clustering in the vicinity of UHECR directions. The second analysis searches for an excess of UHECRs in the direction of the highest-energy neutrinos. The third analysis searches for an excess of pairs of UHECRs and highest-energy neutrinos on different angular scales. None of the analyses have found a significant excess, and previously reported overfluctuations are reduced in significance. Based on these results, we further constrain the neutrino flux spatially correlated with UHECRs

Lawson criterion for ignition exceeded in an inertial fusion experiment

For more than half a century, researchers around the world have been engaged in attempts to achieve fusion ignition as a proof of principle of various fusion concepts. Following the Lawson criterion, an ignited plasma is one where the fusion heating power is high enough to overcome all the physical processes that cool the fusion plasma, creating a positive thermodynamic feedback loop with rapidly increasing temperature. In inertially confined fusion, ignition is a state where the fusion plasma can begin "burn propagation" into surrounding cold fuel, enabling the possibility of high energy gain. While "scientific breakeven" (i.e., unity target gain) has not yet been achieved (here target gain is 0.72, 1.37 MJ of fusion for 1.92 MJ of laser energy), this Letter reports the first controlled fusion experiment, using laser indirect drive, on the National Ignition Facility to produce capsule gain (here 5.8) and reach ignition by nine different formulations of the Lawson criterion