Influence of Maternal Protein Restriction in Primiparous Heifers During Mid- and/or Late Gestation on Progeny Feedlot Performance and Carcass Characteristics

Maternal nutrient restriction in beef cows impacts developmental processes in the fetus that may influence lifetime performance. This study investigated impacts of metabolizable protein (MP) restriction in primiparous heifers during mid- and/or late-gestation on progeny feedlot performance and carcass characteristics

Influence of Maternal Protein Restriction in Primiparous Heifers During Mid- and/or Late-gestation on Meat Quality and Fatty Acid Profile of Progeny

The objective of this study was to evaluate the influence of metabolizable protein (MP) restriction in mid- and/or late-gestation on meat quality, fatty acid profile, and carcass composition of progeny

Assortment optimisation under a general discrete choice model: A tight analysis of revenue-ordered assortments

The assortment problem in revenue management is the problem of deciding which subset of products to offer to consumers in order to maximise revenue. A simple and natural strategy is to select the best assortment out of all those that are constructed by fixing a threshold revenue $\pi$ and then choosing all products with revenue at least $\pi$. This is known as the revenue-ordered assortments strategy. In this paper we study the approximation guarantees provided by revenue-ordered assortments when customers are rational in the following sense: the probability of selecting a specific product from the set being offered cannot increase if the set is enlarged. This rationality assumption, known as regularity, is satisfied by almost all discrete choice models considered in the revenue management and choice theory literature, and in particular by random utility models. The bounds we obtain are tight and improve on recent results in that direction, such as for the Mixed Multinomial Logit model by Rusmevichientong et al. (2014). An appealing feature of our analysis is its simplicity, as it relies only on the regularity condition. We also draw a connection between assortment optimisation and two pricing problems called unit demand envy-free pricing and Stackelberg minimum spanning tree: These problems can be restated as assortment problems under discrete choice models satisfying the regularity condition, and moreover revenue-ordered assortments correspond then to the well-studied uniform pricing heuristic. When specialised to that setting, the general bounds we establish for revenue-ordered assortments match and unify the best known results on uniform pricing.Comment: Minor changes following referees' comment

Predicting Risky Drinking Outcomes Longitudinally: What Kind of Advance Notice Can We Get?

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/65954/1/j.1530-0277.2006.00033.x.pd

Performance, Carcass Characteristics, and Life Cycle Assessment of Cattle Grown Utilizing Different Combinations of Growth Promoting Technologies

The objective of this study was to determine the impact of different combinations of growth promoting technologies on live animal performance, carcass characteristics, and environmental outcomes

Serving highly vulnerable families in home-visitation programs

Home-visitation programs for families with young children are growing in popularity in the US. These programs typically seek to prevent child abuse and neglect and/or promote optimal development for infants, toddlers, and/or preschool-age children. This paper focuses on improving the capacity of home-visitation programs to meet the complex needs of highly vulnerable families with young children. Poverty, maternal depression and substance abuse, and domestic violence are noted as factors that place young children at risk for poor outcomes. The challenges of providing home-visitation services to families in which these risk factors are present are discussed. Family engagement, matching services to families’ needs, and staff capabilities are highlighted as areas in which improvements can be made to enhance home-visitation programs’ capacity to serve highly vulnerable families. Recommendations are given for improving the effectiveness of home-visitation programs in serving these families, as well for addressing policy and research issues related to the further development and evaluation of these programs.First author draf

The utilisation of health research in policy-making: Concepts, examples and methods of assessment

The importance of health research utilisation in policy-making, and of understanding the mechanisms involved, is increasingly recognised. Recent reports calling for more resources to improve health in developing countries, and global pressures for accountability, draw greater attention to research-informed policy-making. Key utilisation issues have been described for at least twenty years, but the growing focus on health research systems creates additional dimensions. The utilisation of health research in policy-making should contribute to policies that may eventually lead to desired outcomes, including health gains. In this article, exploration of these issues is combined with a review of various forms of policy-making. When this is linked to analysis of different types of health research, it assists in building a comprehensive account of the diverse meanings of research utilisation. Previous studies report methods and conceptual frameworks that have been applied, if with varying degrees of success, to record utilisation in policy-making. These studies reveal various examples of research impact within a general picture of underutilisation. Factors potentially enhancing utilisation can be identified by exploration of: priority setting; activities of the health research system at the interface between research and policy-making; and the role of the recipients, or 'receptors', of health research. An interfaces and receptors model provides a framework for analysis. Recommendations about possible methods for assessing health research utilisation follow identification of the purposes of such assessments. Our conclusion is that research utilisation can be better understood, and enhanced, by developing assessment methods informed by conceptual analysis and review of previous studies

Wine and other alcohol consumption and risk of ovarian cancer in the California Teachers Study cohort

OBJECTIVE: Whether alcohol consumption influences ovarian cancer risk is unclear. Therefore, we investigated the association between alcohol intake at various ages and risk of ovarian cancer. METHODS: Among 90,371 eligible members of the California Teachers Study cohort who completed a baseline alcohol assessment in 1995–1996, 253 women were diagnosed with epithelial ovarian cancer by the end of 2003. Multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression analysis was performed to estimate relative risks (RRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs). RESULTS: Consumption of total alcohol, beer, or liquor in the year prior to baseline, at ages 30–35 years, or at ages 18–22 years was not associated with risk of ovarian cancer. Consumption of at least one glass per day of wine, compared to no wine, in the year before baseline was associated with increased risk of developing ovarian cancer: RR = 1.57 (95% CI 1.11–2.22), P(trend) = 0.01. The association with wine intake at baseline was particularly strong among peri-/post-menopausal women who used estrogen-only hormone therapy and women of high socioeconomic status. CONCLUSIONS: Alcohol intake does not appear to affect ovarian cancer risk. Constituents of wine other than alcohol or, more likely, unmeasured determinants of wine drinking were associated with increased risk of ovarian cancer

Diversification and agrarian change under environmental constraints in rural China: Evidence from a poor township of Beijing municipality

Working paper du GATE 2007-11This article illustrates the impact of changes related to market reforms and environmental policies on the economic structure in rural China by providing a comparative analysis of several villages in a poor township in Beijing municipality. Two main concomitant phenomena are affecting agricultural and non-agricultural choices in the studied area. First, the introduction of market mechanisms is encouraging local population to engage in new activities that are closer to local comparative advantages. Second, rural households are facing new constraints in the form of environmental protection measures, which have weakened traditional insurance channels provided by forest resources and cattle stock. Drawing on household-level survey data and interviews with village heads conducted in ten villages of Labagoumen township in December 2003, this article analyzes households decisions in response to market reforms and environmental constraints. We find large disparities both between villages and households in the diversification process and discuss the reasons of observed inertia in the region, most households still heavily relying on corn production

The locomotor system of the ocean sunfish Mola mola (L.): role of gelatinous exoskeleton, horizontal septum, muscles and tendons

Adult ocean sunfish are the heaviest living teleosts. They have no axial musculature or caudal fin. Propulsion is by unpaired dorsal and anal fins; a pseudocaudal fin (‘clavus’) acts as a rudder. Despite common perception, young sunfish are active predators that swim quickly, beating their vertical fins in unison to generate lift‐based propulsion and attain cruising speeds similar to salmon and marlin. Here we show that the thick subcutaneous layer (or ‘capsule’), already known to provide positive buoyancy, is also crucial to locomotion. It provides two compartments, one for dorsal fin musculature and one for anal fin muscles, separated by a thick, fibrous, elastic horizontal septum that is bound to the capsule itself, the roof of the skull and the dorsal surface of the short vertebral column. The compartments are braced sagittally by bony haemal and neural spines. Both fins are powered by white muscles distributed laterally and red muscles located medially. The anal fin muscles are mostly aligned dorso‐ventrally and have origins on the septum and haemal spines. Dorsal fin muscles vary in orientation; many have origins on the capsule above the skull and run near‐horizontally and some bipennate muscles have origins on both capsule and septum. Such bipennate muscle arrangements have not been described previously in fishes. Fin muscles have hinged tendons that pass through capsular channels and radial cartilages to insertions on fin rays. The capsule is gelatinous (89.8% water) with a collagen and elastin meshwork. Greasy in texture, calculations indicate capsular buoyancy is partly provided by lipid. Capsule, septum and tendons provide elastic structures likely to enhance muscle action and support fast cruising