37 research outputs found
Nutritive Quality of Hay and Silage from Natural Grazing Land in South Western Nigeria
In the tropics, inadequate nutrition caused by scarcity of forages and its low quality constitutes a major constraint to good performance of ruminant animals (Lukuyu et al. 2011). Herbage availability during the wet season often exceeds animal requirements (Chakoma et al. 1999). As the dry season sets in, the protein level of the accumulated forages drops and the fibre level increases, with an increase in lignin content while voluntary intake decreases. Due to lack of quality forage especially in the dry season, animals feeding on them tend to lose weight and their productivity will be negatively affected.
In order to reduce the limitations of feeds for ruminant animals especially during dry season, there is need to develop feed conservation strategies. The use of high quality forages appears to be the most feasible option to serve this purpose. Therefore, conservation of excess forages produced in the rainy season can be utilized as supplements during the dry season to be able to alleviate poor performance of ruminant animals and will also enhance incomes of small-scale farmers.
The aim of this study was to determine the suitability of conserved forages (hay and silage) from the natural grazing land as dry season supplementary feed for ruminant animals grazing in natural pastureland
Long-term neural and physiological phenotyping of a single human
Psychiatric disorders are characterized by major fluctuations in psychological function over the course of weeks and months, but the dynamic characteristics of brain function over this timescale in healthy individuals are unknown. Here, as a proof of concept to address this question, we present the MyConnectome project. An intensive phenome-wide assessment of a single human was performed over a period of 18 months, including functional and structural brain connectivity using magnetic resonance imaging, psychological function and physical health, gene expression and metabolomics. A reproducible analysis workflow is provided, along with open access to the data and an online browser for results. We demonstrate dynamic changes in brain connectivity over the timescales of days to months, and relations between brain connectivity, gene expression and metabolites. This resource can serve as a testbed to study the joint dynamics of human brain and metabolic function over time, an approach that is critical for the development of precision medicine strategies for brain disorders