Design and Implementation of Livestock Tracking and Logging System at Oakley Farm

The goal of this project is to decrease the cost of maintaining a cattle farm. It is estimated that the average annual profit of one head of cattle is only $125, while the cost of purchasing cattle tracking technology is upwards of$300. We are developing technology similar to what is available on the market, but will lower the cost of equipping each head of cattle to $20.We at the Computer Science Department have designed a network that will span the area of a given farm to transmit data to a server, which will store necessary information on a database. Mineral feeders on the farm will be equipped with a tag reader, a Raspberry Pi 3 to capture and send data, a live-feed camera, and self-sustaining solar power provided by the MET department. Each time a cow uses the feeder, the tag reader will scan the tag and relay data to the Raspberry Pi 3, which will communicate with our server to store necessary information. Users will have access to a website developed by the Computer Science team. The website allows access to information stored in the database, satellite mapping of the farm with cattle tag locations throughout the farm, and live video feed of the mineral feeder. One of our main design objectives is to create a user-friendly environment, and our simplistic website design reflects just that. We believe that this system will be necessary and usable in a wide set of environments across the country

Laboratory Practices and Incidence of Non-O157 Shiga Toxin–producing Escherichia coli Infections

We surveyed laboratories in Washington State, USA, and found that increased use of Shiga toxin assays correlated with increased reported incidence of non-O157 Shiga toxin–producing Escherichia coli (STEC) infections during 2005–2010. Despite increased assay use, only half of processed stool specimens underwent Shiga toxin testing during 2010, suggesting substantial underdetection of non-O157 STEC infections

Virulence Profiling of Shiga Toxin-Producing Escherichia coli O111:NM Isolates from Cattle

Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) O111:NM is an important serotype that has been incriminated in disease outbreaks in the United States. This study characterized cattle STEC O111:NM for virulence factors and markers by PCR. Major conclusions are that STEC O111:NM characterized in this study lacks stx(2) and the full spectrum of nle gene markers, and it has an incomplete OI-122