1,726 research outputs found
Importance of Estrus Expression Before Fixed-time AIon Conception Rates in Beef Cattle
Expression of estrus prior to fixed-time AI has been reported to strongly impact overall pregnancy success. Behavioral estrus is a visual indicator that a cow or heiferâs internal environment is prepared for breeding. Insemination of a cow or heifer after estrus has been expressed will yield greater pregnancy success due to adequate uterine environment, increased fertilization rates, increased accessory sperm numbers, and increased overall embryo survival. It can be difficult to analyze the effects of estrus on pregnancy success across studies due to differences in number of animals and proportion of animals exhibiting estrus per study. In order to accurately analyze such data, a meta-analysis was used to place all studies on an equal level, thus, eliminating study bias. In the present study, a meta-analysis was conducted using data available on 10,116 beef cows and heifers in 26 studies that utilized the 5 most common fixed-time AI protocols to examine the effect of expression of estrus prior to insemination on conception rates. The overall model indicated a positive effect of estrus on conception rates with cows expressing estrus before fixed-time AI having greater conception rates compared with those not exhibiting estrus. There are also numerous management factors that can influence expression of estrus. Data were available on 547 cows that were synchronized with a CIDR based fixed-time AI protocol for estrus for 2 to 4 years. Analysis of these cows indicated that days postpartum did not impact estrus expression. In contrast, Body Condition Score (BCS) influenced estrus expression with cows in a BCS of †4 having decreased expression of estrus compared to those with a BCS \u3e 4. Initiation of estrous cycles before the breeding season also influenced estrus expression, with anestrous cows having greater expression of estrus compared with estrus-cycling cows. Fixed-time AI protocols offer producers the added benefit of reduced labor needed for heat detection, but the results of this study indicate the importance of detecting an animal in estrus prior to breeding. In conclusion, among all currently recommended fixed-time AI protocols, cows expressing estrus before fixed-time AI had improved conception rates, and BCS and estrus-cycling status had the greatest influence on expression of estrus
Dilaton as the Higgs boson
We propose a model where the role of the electroweak Higgs field is played by
the dilaton. The model contains terms which explicitly violate gauge
invariance, however it is shown that this violation is fictitious, so that the
model is a consistent low energy effective theory. In the simplest version of
the idea the resulting low energy effective theory is the same as the top mode
standard model.Comment: 6 pages, v2 with expanded discussio
Quantum teleportation of entangled coherent states
We propose a simple scheme for the quantum teleportation of both bipartite
and multipartite entangled coherent states with the successful probability 1/2.
The scheme is based on only linear optical devices such as beam splitters and
phase shifters, and two-mode photon number measurements. The quantum channels
described by multipartite maximally entangled coherent states are readily made
by the beam splitters and phase shifters.Comment: 4 pages, no figure
Is current management of the Antarctic krill fishery in the Atlantic sector of the Southern Ocean precautionary?
This paper explains the management of the Antarctic krill (Euphausia superba) fishery in the Atlantic sector of the Southern Ocean, and current knowledge about the state of the regional krill stock. In this region, krill fishing is permitted in an area of approximately 3.5 million km2 which is divided into four subareas (labelled Subareas 48.1 to 48.4) for management and reporting purposes. The effective regional catch limit (or âtrigger levelâ), established in 1991, is 0.62 million tonnes yearâ1, equivalent to ~1% of the regional biomass estimated in 2000. Each subarea has also had its own catch limit, between 0.093 and 0.279 million tonnes yearâ1, since 2009. There is some evidence for a decline in the abundance of krill in the 1980s, but no evidence of a further decline in recent decades. Local-scale monitoring programs have been established in three of the subareas to monitor krill biomass in survey grids covering between 10 000 and 125 000 km2. Cautious extrapolation from these local monitoring programs provides conservative estimates of the regional biomass in recent years. This suggests that fishing at the trigger level would be equivalent to a long-term exploitation rate (annual catch divided by biomass) of <7%, which is below the 9.3% level considered appropriate to maintain the krill stock and support krill predators.
Subarea catch limits exceed 9.3% of conservatively estimated subarea biomass in up
to 20% of years due to high variability in krill biomass indices. The actual exploitation
rate in each subarea has remained <3% because annual catches have been <50% of the
trigger level since 1991. Comparison with the 9.3% reference exploitation rate suggests
that current management is precautionary at the regional scale. The subarea catch limits
help prevent excessive concentration of catch at the subarea scale. Finer-scale management
might be necessary to manage the risk of adverse impacts which might occur as a
result of concentrated fishing in sensitive areas or climate change. Frequent assessment
of the krill stock will enhance CCAMLRâs ability to manage these risks. Continuing the
local monitoring programs will provide valuable information on krill variability, but more
information is required on how the monitored biomass relates to biomass at the subarea
and regional scales
Geometric Strategy for the Optimal Quantum Search
We explore quantum search from the geometric viewpoint of a complex
projective space , a space of rays. First, we show that the optimal quantum
search can be geometrically identified with the shortest path along the
geodesic joining a target state, an element of the computational basis, and
such an initial state as overlaps equally, up to phases, with all the elements
of the computational basis. Second, we calculate the entanglement through the
algorithm for any number of qubits as the minimum Fubini-Study distance to
the submanifold formed by separable states in Segre embedding, and find that
entanglement is used almost maximally for large . The computational time
seems to be optimized by the dynamics as the geodesic, running across entangled
states away from the submanifold of separable states, rather than the amount of
entanglement itself.Comment: revtex, 10 pages, 7 eps figures, uses psfrag packag
Little Higgses from an Antisymmetric Condensate
We construct an SU(6)/Sp(6) non-linear sigma model in which the Higgses arise
as pseudo-Goldstone bosons. There are two Higgs doublets whose masses have no
one-loop quadratic sensitivity to the cutoff of the effective theory, which can
be at around 10 TeV. The Higgs potential is generated by gauge and Yukawa
interactions, and is distinctly different from that of the minimal
supersymmetric standard model. At the TeV scale, the new bosonic degrees of
freedom are a single neutral complex scalar and a second copy of SU(2)xU(1)
gauge bosons. Additional vector-like pairs of colored fermions are also
present.Comment: 13 page
Geometry of entangled states
Geometric properties of the set of quantum entangled states are investigated.
We propose an explicit method to compute the dimension of local orbits for any
mixed state of the general K x M problem and characterize the set of
effectively different states (which cannot be related by local
transformations). Thus we generalize earlier results obtained for the simplest
2 x 2 system, which lead to a stratification of the 6D set of N=4 pure states.
We define the concept of absolutely separable states, for which all globally
equivalent states are separable.Comment: 16 latex pages, 4 figures in epsf, minor corrections, references
updated, to appear in Phys. Rev.
Gravitational Smearing of Minimal Supersymmetric Unification Predictions
A short and mean paper.Comment: 10 pages total + 1 postscript figure (included), revised: all lines
are TRULY < 70 characters long (try it!); LBL-32905, UCB-PTH-92/3
Nonexotic Neutral Gauge Bosons
We study theoretical and experimental constraints on electroweak theories
including a new color-singlet and electrically-neutral gauge boson. We first
note that the electric charges of the observed fermions imply that any such Z'
boson may be described by a gauge theory in which the Abelian gauge groups are
the usual hypercharge along with another U(1) component in a kinetic-diagonal
basis. Assuming that the observed quarks and leptons have
generation-independent U(1) charges, and that no new fermions couple to the
standard model gauge bosons, we find that their U(1) charges form a
two-parameter family consistent with anomaly cancellation and viable fermion
masses, provided there are at least three right-handed neutrinos. We then
derive bounds on the Z' mass and couplings imposed by direct production and
Z-pole measurements. For generic charge assignments and a gauge coupling of
electromagnetic strength, the strongest lower bound on the Z' mass comes from
Z-pole measurements, and is of order 1 TeV. If the new U(1) charges are
proportional to B-L, however, there is no tree-level mixing between the Z and
Z', and the best bounds come from the absence of direct production at LEPII and
the Tevatron. If the U(1) gauge coupling is one or two orders of magnitude
below the electromagnetic one, these bounds are satisfied for most values of
the Z' mass.Comment: 26 pages, 2 figures. A comparison with the LEP bounds on sneutrino
resonances is include
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