Replacement Nellore heifers receiving supplementation under different herbage allowance: effects on forage characteristics, performance, physiology, and reproduction.

In Brazil, heifers typically calve at 36-48 months. Due to the high demand for meat and the need to reduce slaughter age, high supplementation has become commonly used in beef cattle farming. However, the literature remains scarce on studies that explore the impact of grazing management during the background phase on the productivity and reproductive efficiency of young Nellore heifers.

Long-term impacts of 48-h water and feed deprivation on blood and performance responses of grazing Nellore heifers.

The study investigated the effects of 48-h water and feed deprivation on blood and the performance of grazing Nellore () heifers. Twenty-four Nellore heifers (initial body weight [BW] = 238 ± 10 kg; age = 16 ± 2 mo), were ranked by initial BW and age and randomly assigned to one of the two treatments: (1) grazing animals with free access to pasture, water, and mineral-mix (CON; = 12), or (2) the same grazing conditions but deprived of pasture, water, and mineral-mix for 48 h (DPR; = 12). The paddocks consisted of cv.

Impact of 48-h water and feed deprivation and hydroxychloride sources of copper and zinc on the metabolism and performance of grazing Nellore cattle during the dry period.

Procedures such as transport and marketing can subject animals to water and feed deprivation and impair animal health and performance. Maintaining the mineral status of animals under these conditions can bring benefits to health and performance. The use of hydroxychloride mineral sources can improve mineral status, nutrient digestibility and performance.

Video-Assisted Needle Core Biopsy in Children Affected by Neuroblastoma: A Novel Combined Technique.

 This study aims to evaluate the experience gained with video-assisted needle-core biopsy in patients affected by neuroblastoma (NB).  We retrospectively reviewed all the patients presenting at our center with a thoracic, abdominal, and/or pelvic NB who underwent biopsy between 2007 and 2014. Data on demographics, localization, and size of the tumor, image-defined risk factors involved in each case, technical details about biopsies performed, qualitative and quantitative adequacy of tumor sampling and histological diagnosis, postoperative details, and complications were recorded and analyzed.

Intraoperative bronchoscopy for bronchial carcinoid parenchymal-sparing resection: a pediatric case report.

Bronchial carcinoid tumors are the most common primary pulmonary neoplasm in the pediatric population. The widely accepted treatment for carcinoid tumors is surgical, specifically aiming at being as much as conservative on lung parenchyma, while the entire tumor is resected. A brief case is described, highlighting the importance and advantages of a surgical and endoscopic combined approach.

Redo surgery in Hirschsprung disease: what did we learn? Unicentric experience on 70 patients.

Purpose: This article is aimed at describing a series of 70 patients who underwent a redo pull-through in the period between January 1991 and January 2007 and to compare them with a series of consecutive patients with Hirschsprung disease who underwent a single pull-through.

Methods: The notes were reviewed, and a comprehensive interview based on a disease-specific questionnaire for continence and quality of life was submitted to all eligible patients. We used a number of consecutive patients who underwent a single pull-through for Hirschsprung disease as control group.

Risk factors for renal function impairment in a series of 502 patients born with spinal dysraphisms.

Objective: To evaluate the risk of renal damage in a large series of patients affected by spinal dysraphism.

Methods: Renal function was studied in 502 spinal dysraphisms treated over the last 25 years in a single center: 283 meningomyelocele (MMC), 90 caudal regression syndrome (CRS) and 129 spinal lipoma (SL) cases. In patients with normal and impaired renal function, we compared congenital renal anomalies, vesicoureteric reflux, bladder voiding pattern and upper tract dilatation, analyzing the results with the Fisher test.

Spleen surgery in pediatric age: seven-year unicentric experience.

Background: Either "open" and laparoscopic spleen surgery in pediatric age are well known and performed with ease in children. Yet, few data regarding follow-up and outcome are discussed in the international literature.

Materials And Methods: Clinical notes of all patient who underwent spleen surgery in a single center between 2000 and 2007 were reviewed and a specific follow-up questionnaire was administered, aiming to evaluate pre- and postoperative data, especially considering underlying disease, cosmetic results, and quality of life after surgery.

Analog VLSI circuits as physical structures for perception in early visual tasks.

A variety of computational tasks in early vision can be formulated through lattice networks. The cooperative action of these networks depends on the topology of interconnections, both feedforward and recurrent ones. This paper shows that it is possible to consider a distinct general architectural solution for all recurrent computations of any given order.

Centric-minded templates for self-motion perception.

We propose a two-layer neuromorphic architecture by which motion field pattern, generated during locomotion, are processed by template detectors specialized for gaze-directed self-motion (expansion and rotation). The templates provide a gaze-centered computation for analyzing motion field in terms of how it is related to the fixation point (i.e.

Functional periodic intracortical couplings induced by structured lateral inhibition in a linear cortical network.

The spatial organization of cortical axon and dendritic fields could be an interesting structural paradigm to obtain a functional specificity without postulating highly specific feedforward connections. In this article, we investigate the functional implications of recurrent intracortical inhibition when it occurs through clustered medium-range interconnection schemes (Wörgötter & Koch, 1991; Somogyi, 1989; Kritzer, Cowey, & Somogyi, 1992). Moreover, the interaction between the inhibitory schemes and visual orientation maps is explored.

Neuronal intestinal dysplasia: clinical experience in Italian patients.

The authors present a review of 431 children biopsied and studied with the following histochemical and immunohistochemical techniques: 1) acetylcholinesterase activity; 2) alphanaphthylesterase activity; 3) S-100 protein immunohistochemical technique; 4) glyoxylic acid method. Two hundred forty-eight patients of our series presented different forms of dysganglionosis, 12 of them (4.8%) presenting neuronal intestinal dysplasia type B.

Long-gap oesophageal atresia: a combined endoscopic and radiologic evaluation.

The final aim of the treatment of oesophageal atresia is to restore continuity without the interposition of intestinal segments. The authors present the results of a new diagnostic method combining endoscopy and radiology to evaluate the development of pouches in oesophageal atresia. This new method has been successfully adopted in four patients aged between 4 and 8 months, three with type I and one with type III complicated atresia.

Leiomyosarcoma of the cecum in pediatric age: a case report and review of Italian reports.

The authors report a case of leiomyosarcoma of the cecum and review all the Italian reports of mesenchymal neoplasms registered in the RMS-Italy register. They emphasize the extreme rarity of intestinal leiomyosarcoma, especially with colon involvement: their case appears to be the only one registered in Italy in the last 12 years.

[Necrotizing enterocolitis].

Necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) is an important cause of neonatal morbidity and mortality. During the last few years, there was an increase in the incidence of this disease, associated with a better knowledge of NEC, and an increase in survival rate, associated with the development, even from a technological point of view, of neonatal intensive care units. In this study, the authors first perform the diagnostic procedures and describe the anatomical and clinical characteristics of NEC, then evaluate by standard criteria a series of patients observed during the last 5 years, revising the various surgical treatments adopted and the results obtained.