The Effect of Genotype on Response in Body Composition to Variation in Dietary Protein : Energy Ratios

An experiment with 480 day-old chicks of four commercial strains was conducted to study theeffect of genotype on response in body composition to variation in dietary protein: energy ratios. Thechicks were randomly allocated into 4x2x4 factorial and fed on a commercial starter diet (250 g CP and12.5 MJ of ME /kg) from hatching to 5 d of age and divided into two groups with three replicationseach of 16 birds and given either the such starter diet (S) or a finisher diet (F) containing 190 g CP and13.0 MJ of ME /kg. The birds were reared in strain-and sex-intermingled groups in brooders and followoncages until they reached the target body weight of 600-650 g (females) or 650-700 g (males) andtransferred to single cages and fed S or F diet until 1200-1300 g (females) or 1300-1400 g (males). Thelighting program was 23 h light for the first two days, and reduced to 18 h/d for the remainder of theexperiment. There were considerable variations in relative growth performance, FCR, carcass fat andabdominal fat due to genotypes and dietary regimen. Although birds tend to response in similar waywhen dealing with the excesses and insufficient supply, the nutrient requirements in relation to theprotein: energy ratios should be designed according to genetic background.The accumulation of fatduring the growing period was primarily due to the genetic variation whereas beyond this age, variationin abdominal fat was due principally to dietary effects

An Evaluation of the Efg Growth Model in Its Capacity to Predict Amino Acid Requirements in Broilers

An experiment imposing the multi continuous phase feeding was carried out to evaluate the EFG(Emman, Fisher and Gous) Growth Model in its capacity to predict amino acid requirements in broilers.Birds were fed using blended summit (247.91g/kg CP, 3200 kcal of ME /kg) and dilution (166.26 g/kgCP, 3200 kcal of ME g/kg ) diets and offered to 2-4 or 8 phases. Two hundred male day-old broilerchicks of two commercial strains (A=Ingham and B = Steggles) were used. The predicted responseswere greater than the observed both gain (g/d) and feed intake (g/d). The discrepancy between theobserved and predicted gain in the strain A and B birds, showed a different pattern, with a markeddifference during the early growing period, with a degree of convergence in the late growing period forthe strain A but the reverse picture for the strain B. This shows that strain characterization is notaccurate due to an inadequate definition of the genotypes by the model. Non agreement betweenpredicted and determined gain and feed intakes provided little benefit in moving towards a morefrequent change in diet to accommodate predicted growth-related changes in amino acid requirements

Trust economics feasibility study

We believe that enterprises and other organisations currently lack sophisticated methods and tools to determine if and how IT changes should be introduced in an organisation, such that objective, measurable goals are met. This is especially true when dealing with security-related IT decisions. We report on a feasibility study, Trust Economics, conducted to demonstrate that such methodology can be developed. Assuming a deep understanding of the IT involved, the main components of our trust economics approach are: (i) assess the economic or financial impact of IT security solutions; (ii) determine how humans interact with or respond to IT security solutions; (iii) based on above, use probabilistic and stochastic modelling tools to analyse the consequences of IT security decisions. In the feasibility study we apply the trust economics methodology to address how enterprises should protect themselves against accidental or malicious misuse of USB memory sticks, an acute problem in many industries

Interface sharpening in CoFeB magnetic tunnel junctions

We report grazing incidence x-ray scattering evidence for sharpening of the interface between amorphous Co60Fe20B20 and AlOx during in situ annealing below the Co60Fe20B20 crystallization temperature. Enhancement of the interference fringe amplitude in the specular scatter and the absence of changes in the diffuse scatter indicate that the sharpening is not a reduction in topological roughness but a reduction in the width of the chemical composition profile across the interface. The temperature at which the sharpening occurs corresponds to that at which a maximum is found in the tunneling magnetoresistance of magnetic tunnel junctions

Optical excitation of a coherent transverse optical phonon in a polycrystalline Zr metal film

Copyright © 2007 The American Physical SocietyOptical pump-probe measurements of transient reflectivity were made on a sputtered polycrystalline thin film of hcp Zr. On top of a slow multiexponential decay, an oscillatory signal was observed with frequency varying from the initial value of f(0)=2.24 +/- 0.06 THz at zero time delay to a value of 2.56 +/- 0.12 THz after 2 ps, which is similar to that of a transverse optical (TO) phonon near the Gamma point of the Brillouin zone. From the data, the TO phonon relaxation time was determined to be 0.67 ps. The excitation of the coherent phonon was identified as being mediated by resonant coherent Raman scattering

A7DB: a relational database for mutational, physiological and pharmacological data related to the α7 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor

BACKGROUND: Nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) are pentameric proteins that are important drug targets for a variety of diseases including Alzheimer's, schizophrenia and various forms of epilepsy. One of the most intensively studied nAChR subunits in recent years has been α7. This subunit can form functional homomeric pentamers (α7)(5), which can make interpretation of physiological and structural data much simpler. The growing amount of structural, pharmacological and physiological data for these receptors indicates the need for a dedicated and accurate database to provide a means to access this information in a coherent manner. DESCRIPTION: A7DB is a new relational database of manually curated experimental physiological data associated with the α7 nAChR. It aims to store as much of the pharmacology, physiology and structural data pertaining to the α7 nAChR. The data is accessed via web interface that allows a user to search the data in multiple ways: 1) a simple text query 2) an incremental query builder 3) an interactive query builder and 4) a file-based uploadable query. It currently holds more than 460 separately reported experiments on over 85 mutations. CONCLUSIONS: A7DB will be a useful tool to molecular biologists and bioinformaticians not only working on the α7 receptor family of proteins but also in the more general context of nicotinic receptor modelling. Furthermore it sets a precedent for expansion with the inclusion of all nicotinic receptor families and eventually all cys-loop receptor families

Measurement of hot electron momentum relaxation times in metals by femtosecond ellipsometry

Copyright © 2005 The American Physical SocietyTime-resolved ellipsometric measurements were made upon Au, Cu, Ag, Ni, Pd, Ti, Zr, and Hf thin films. Using an elliptically polarized pump beam, the decay of the optically induced polarization of the sample was observed. Characteristic relaxation times are extracted and interpreted in terms of scattering of linear and angular momentum of hot electrons. A systematic variation is observed between different metals that reflects their underlying band structure