Ultrasound evaluation of ovarian dynamics in Indubrasil cows submitted to two nutritional managements.

The objective of this study was to compare ovarian dynamics of Indubrasil cows submitted to grazing or confinement regimes. Follicular growth was monitored daily starting at estrus during two consecutive estrous cycles in seven adult non-lactating Indubrasil cows with body score 4 (classification 1 to 5), in 2x7 experiment. The first evaluation was in the grazing regime, when animals were kept in pastures of Brachiaria brizantha cv Marandu intercropped with Leucaena leococephala, with water and mineral salt ad libitum. The second evaluation was performed during the following estrous cycle when animals were submitted to the confinement regime, and fed with corn silage, proteinated mineral salt and water ad libitum. An ultrasound HS 1500 (Honda®, Japan) equipped with a linear 7.5 MHZ probe was used to assess follicle and luteal dynamics. Data were recorded according to the day of the cycle and are presented as means ± standard deviation. Means were compared by T Tests and differences considered significant when P<0.05. The duration of the first estrous was 20±1.6 and 21±1.22 days for grazing and confined animals, respectively. The number of follicular waves was 2±0.49 and 3±0.40 and their duration was 9±1.99 and 9±1.65 days, for grazing and confined animals, respectively. The maximum diameter of the ovulatory follicle was larger in confined (15±0.51mm; p <0.05) than grazing animals (13±0.87mm). For subordinate follicles, the maximum diameter was 9±1.13mm and 9±0.82mm for grazing and confined animals, respectively. The dominant follicle persisted for 7±1.41 and 6±0.82 days in grazing and confined animals, respectively. Finally, the persistence of the corpus luteum was 14±1.59 and 15±1.06 days for grazing and confined animals, respectively. These data suggest that diet influences growth rate and size of the ovulatory follicle in Indubrasil cows. We speculate that greater dry matter intake in the confinement regime may have promoted an increase in the metabolism of steroid hormones, influencing dominant follicle growth. This abstract describes for the first time follicle dynamics in Indubrasil cows, which was found to be very similar to other Bos indicus breeds

Production of bovine embryos and calves cloned by nuclear transfer using mesenchymal stem cells from amniotic fluid and adipose tissue.

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Standard decomposition of expansive ergodically supported dynamics

In this work we introduce the notion of weak quasigroups, that are quasigroup operations defined almost everywhere on some set. Then we prove that the topological entropy and the ergodic period of an invertible expansive ergodically supported dynamical system $(X,T)$ with the shadowing property establishes a sufficient criterion for the existence of quasigroup operations defined almost everywhere outside of universally null sets and for which $T$ is an automorphism. Furthermore, we find a decomposition of the dynamics of $T$ in terms of $T$-invariant weak topological subquasigroups.Comment: 18 pages, the conditions on the entropy in Theorem 3.5 was improved. Some small changes in the text, by adding more explanation

In-flight thermal experiments for LISA pathfinder: simulating temperature noise at the inertial sensors

Thermal Diagnostics experiments to be carried out on board LISA Pathfinder (LPF) will yield a detailed characterisation of how temperature fluctuations affect the LTP (LISA Technology Package) instrument performance, a crucial information for future space based gravitational wave detectors as the proposed eLISA. Amongst them, the study of temperature gradient fluctuations around the test masses of the Inertial Sensors will provide as well information regarding the contribution of the Brownian noise, which is expected to limit the LTP sensitivity at frequencies close to 1 mHz during some LTP experiments. In this paper we report on how these kind of Thermal Diagnostics experiments were simulated in the last LPF Simulation Campaign (November, 2013) involving all the LPF Data Analysis team and using an end-to-end simulator of the whole spacecraft. Such simulation campaign was conducted under the framework of the preparation for LPF operations

The LISA pathfinder mission

ISA Pathfinder (LPF), the second of the European Space Agency's Small Missions for Advanced Research in Technology (SMART), is a dedicated technology validation mission for future spaceborne gravitational wave detectors, such as the proposed eLISA mission. LISA Pathfinder, and its scientific payload - the LISA Technology Package - will test, in flight, the critical technologies required for low frequency gravitational wave detection: it will put two test masses in a near-perfect gravitational free-fall and control and measure their motion with unprecedented accuracy. This is achieved through technology comprising inertial sensors, high precision laser metrology, drag-free control and an ultra-precise micro-Newton propulsion system. LISA Pathfinder is due to be launched in mid-2015, with first results on the performance of the system being available 6 months thereafter. The paper introduces the LISA Pathfinder mission, followed by an explanation of the physical principles of measurement concept and associated hardware. We then provide a detailed discussion of the LISA Technology Package, including both the inertial sensor and interferometric readout. As we approach the launch of the LISA Pathfinder, the focus of the development is shifting towards the science operations and data analysis - this is described in the final section of the paper

Free-flight experiments in LISA Pathfinder

The LISA Pathfinder mission will demonstrate the technology of drag-free test masses for use as inertial references in future space-based gravitational wave detectors. To accomplish this, the Pathfinder spacecraft will perform drag-free flight about a test mass while measuring the acceleration of this primary test mass relative to a second reference test mass. Because the reference test mass is contained within the same spacecraft, it is necessary to apply forces on it to maintain its position and attitude relative to the spacecraft. These forces are a potential source of acceleration noise in the LISA Pathfinder system that are not present in the full LISA configuration. While LISA Pathfinder has been designed to meet it's primary mission requirements in the presence of this noise, recent estimates suggest that the on-orbit performance may be limited by this `suspension noise'. The drift-mode or free-flight experiments provide an opportunity to mitigate this noise source and further characterize the underlying disturbances that are of interest to the designers of LISA-like instruments. This article provides a high-level overview of these experiments and the methods under development to analyze the resulting data.Comment: 13 pages, 5 figures. Accepted to Journal Of Physics, Conference Series. Presented at 10th International LISA Symposium, May 2014, Gainesville, FL, US

Disentangling the magnetic force noise contribution in LISA pathfinder

Magnetically-induced forces on the inertial masses on-board LISA Pathfinder are expected to be one of the dominant contributions to the mission noise budget, accounting for up to 40%. The origin of this disturbance is the coupling of the residual magnetization and susceptibility of the test masses with the environmental magnetic field. In order to fully understand this important part of the noise model, a set of coils and magnetometers are integrated as a part of the diagnostics subsystem. During operations a sequence of magnetic excitations will be applied to precisely determine the coupling of the magnetic environment to the test mass displacement using the on-board magnetometers. Since no direct measurement of the magnetic field in the test mass position will be available, an extrapolation of the magnetic measurements to the test mass position will be carried out as a part of the data analysis activities. In this paper we show the first results on the magnetic experiments during an end- to-end LISA Pathfinder simulation, and we describe the methods under development to map the magnetic field on-board

A strategy to characterize the LISA-Pathfinder cold gas thruster system

The cold gas micro-propulsion system that will be used during the LISA-Pathfinder mission will be one of the most important component used to ensure the "free-fall" of the enclosed test masses. In this paper we present a possible strategy to characterize the effective direction and amplitude gain of each of the 6 thrusters of this system