Grass Growth Modelling: to Increase Understanding and Aid Decision Making On-Farm

Key points Crop and grass growth models have been developed over the last 50 years, or so, but general appreciation of their benefits and potential has been recognised only relatively recently. The most popular application of grass growth models has traditionally been for knowledge understanding. There is growing awareness of the potential of models in decision support systems (DSS) applications to aid pasture management and grassland budgeting on dairy farms. Although some models have been developed for DSS, their widespread uptake in industry has been slow; challenges still exist which need to be addressed in order to improve their precision and user-friendliness

GrassCheck: Monitoring and Predicting Grass Production in Northern Ireland

Grass budgeting is a key management practice on dairy farms to balance grass supply on paddocks with grass demand by the grazing herd. Grass budgets must be pre-emptive to be effective. The uncertainty of grass production and the difficulty in quantifying both current and forecasted rates of growth hamper effective budgeting and paddock management. Grass growth rates are highly variable both in time and space. Therefore, they vary greatly between locations at any given time and also across the season at any given location. Figure 1 shows the pattern of growth rates recorded at the Agricultural Research Institute of Northern Ireland (ARINI) in the two seasons before this project. The GrassCheck project was established in Northern Ireland to quantify current rates of grass growth and grass quality and to predict growth rates for up to 2 weeks in advance. The project will run from 2004 until 2006. This paper outlines the project and reports on its findings after one year

Autumn Management of Grass-legume Pasture

Duration of autumn grazing may affect the long-term balance of grass and legume in a sward. Effects of early and late autumn closing dates were studied on productivity and morphology of orchardgrass (Dactylis glomerata) and white clover (Trifolium repens) in replicated grazed swards. Early-closed paddocks continued to accumulate herbage during autumn, resulting in greater winter senescence than late-closed paddocks. Spring-cut herbage mass was not affected by autumn management; however, late closing had significantly more clover than early closing. Early-closed paddocks were grass domlnanl, with few relatively large tillers and few clover growing points compared with late-closed paddocks at the end of each grazing season. Late closing resulted in more than twice as many clover growing points as early-closed. Stolon mass was greater, but starch and total non-structural carbohydrate contents were less during autumn in late- than in early-closed paddocks. Improvement in clover growing point density and stolon mass in the late-closed treatment may favour clover persistence in mixed swards

Modelling Winter Grass Growth and Senescence

In temperate climates, because net grass growth in winter is low, most grass growth models deal with the main growing season (Mar-Oct in the N Hemisphere), with little emphasis on grass growth in winter (Nov-Feb). However, grass tissue turns over continuously (Hennessy et al., 2004) and the fate of herbage entering the winter is important in extended grazing season systems. This study aimed to model winter grass growth for the period 15 Oct 2001 to 28 Jan 2002 for a range of autumn closing dates (1 Sep, 20 Sep and 10 Oct) by modifying an existing model, so that the amount of green leaf could be predicted at intervals over the winter

On a Modification of the Boundary State Formalism in Off-shell String Theory

We examine the application of boundary states in computing amplitudes in off-shell open string theory. We find a straightforward generalization of boundary state which produces the correct matrix elements with on-shell closed string states.Comment: Latex, 10 pages, refs added, minor typos correcte

The Boundary State Formalism and Conformal Invariance in Off-shell String Theory

We present a generalization of the boundary state formalism for the bosonic string that allows us to calculate the overlap of the boundary state with arbitrary closed string states. We show that this generalization exactly reproduces world-sheet sigma model calculations, thus giving the correct overlap with both on- and off-shell string states, and that this new boundary state automatically satisfies the requirement for integrated vertex operators in the case of non-conformally invariant boundary interactions.Comment: 19 pages, 0 figure

Normal human breast xenografts activate N-nitrosodimethylamine: identification of potential target cells for an environmental nitrosamine.

Normal human breast tissue maintained as xenografts in female Balb/c (nu/nu) athymic mice is capable of metabolising N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) to active intermediates that will react with DNA. Administration of NDMA to mice with slow-release implants of 17 beta-oestradiol which provide human physiological (luteal phase) circulating oestrogen levels and increase cell proliferation in the xenograft (Laidlaw et al., 1992), leads to an apparent increase in the extent of reaction with DNA compared to controls without oestrogen implants. In mice with oestrogen implants, measurements of the amounts of the promutagenic lesion, O6-methyl-2'-deoxyguanosine formed in DNA clearly indicated a dose related increase in the extent of reaction. Detection of O6-methyl-2'-deoxyguanosine using immunohistochemical procedures revealed that the nuclei of cells of the glandular epithelium, supportive tissue and adipose tissue, in decreasing order of prevalence, were positively stained for the presence of this DNA lesion. Epithelial cells, which are the putative target cells for carcinogenesis in the breast, are therefore prone to promutagenic damage as a result of exposure to an environmental nitrosamine