Market concentration, supply, quality and prices paid by local authorities in the English care home market.

We investigate the impact of exogenous local conditions which favor high market concentration on supply, price and quality in local markets for care homes for older people in England. We extend the existing literature in: (i) considering supply capacity as a market outcome alongside price and quality; (ii) taking account of the chain structure of care home supply and differences between the nursing home and residential care home sectors; (iii) using an econometric approach based on reduced form relationships that treats market concentration as a jointly determined outcome of a complex market. We find that areas susceptible to a high degree of market concentration tend to have greatly restricted supply of care home places and (to a lesser extent) a higher average public cost, than areas susceptible to low degree of market concentration.

Meat quality in the Danish pig population anno 2018.

The level of meat quality was assessed in a random sample of the Danish pig population. No PSE was found in m. semimembranosus, and, depending on the definition of PSE, no pigs or only 2% of the pigs were categorised as having PSE in the M.

Immune modulation treatments-where is the evidence?

While advances in assisted reproductive techniques have been substantial, failure of the apparently viable embryo to implant remains a source of distress and frustration to patients and specialists alike. The unique maternal immunological response to the embryo and the notion that defects in early placentation underlie the great complications of pregnancy have focused attention on the therapeutic potential of peri-implantation immunomodulation. On the face of it, the rationale for this approach is very attractive.

Maternal age and child morbidity: A Danish national cohort study.

Introduction: The mean age at delivery has increased over the latest half of a century. Women of advanced maternal age have increased obstetrical risks and increased risk of chromosomal abnormalities and some other specified diagnoses in the offspring. The aim of this study was to assess the association between maternal age and overall child morbidity according to main diagnosis groups.

Prediction of total fatty acid parameters and individual fatty acids in pork backfat using Raman spectroscopy and chemometrics: Understanding the cage of covariance between highly correlated fat parameters.

This study investigates how Partial Least Squares regression models for predicting individual fatty acids (FAs) and total FA parameters depend on Raman spectral variation associated with the iodine value in pork backfat. The backfat was sampled from pigs, which were fed with different dietary fat sources and levels. Good correlations between the Raman spectra and the total FA composition parameters and most individual FAs were obtained (R(CV)(2)=0.

Evaluation of the sustainability of contrasted pig farming systems: economy.

The aim of this paper is to present an efficient tool for evaluating the economy part of the sustainability of pig farming systems. The selected tool IDEA was tested on a sample of farms from 15 contrasted systems in Europe. A statistical analysis was carried out to check the capacity of the indicators to illustrate the variability of the population and to analyze which of these indicators contributed the most towards it.

Evaluation of the sustainability of contrasted pig farming systems: development of a market conformity tool for pork products based on technological quality traits.

A market conformity tool, based on technological meat quality parameters, was developed within the Q-PorkChains project, to be included in a global sustainability evaluation of pig farming systems. The specific objective of the market conformity tool was to define a scoring system based on the suitability of meat to elaborate the main pork products, according to their market shares based on industry requirements, in different pig farming systems. The tool was based on carcass and meat quality parameters that are commonly used for the assessment of technological quality, which provide representative and repeatable data and are easily measurable.

Evaluating environmental impacts of contrasting pig farming systems with life cycle assessment.

Environmental impacts of 15 European pig farming systems were evaluated in the European Union Q-PorkChains project using life cycle assessment. One conventional and two non-conventional systems were evaluated from each of the five countries: Denmark, The Netherlands, Spain, France and Germany. The data needed for calculations were obtained from surveys of 5 to 10 farms from each system.

Evaluation of the sustainability of contrasted pig farming systems: integrated evaluation.

The aim of this paper is to present an approach for an integrated evaluation of the sustainability of pig farming systems, taking into account the three classical pillars: economy, environment and society. Eight sustainability themes were considered: Animal Welfare (AW), Animal Health (AH), Breeding Programmes (BP), Environment (EN), Meat Safety (MS), Market Conformity (MC), Economy (EC) and Working Conditions (WC). A total of 37 primary indicators were identified and used for the evaluation of 15 much contrasted pig farming systems in five EU countries.

Evaluation of the sustainability of contrasted pig farming systems: the procedure, the evaluated systems and the evaluation tools.

Although a few studies consider the sustainability of animal farming systems along the three classical main pillars (economy, environment and society), most studies on pig farming systems address only one of these pillars. The present paper is the introduction to a series of companion papers presenting the results of a study undertaken within the EU-supported project Q-PorkChains, aiming at building a comprehensive tool for the evaluation of pig farming systems, which is robust to accommodate the large variability of systems existing in Europe. The tool is mostly based on questions to farmers and comprises a total of 37 dimensions distributed along eight themes: Animal Welfare, Animal Health, Breeding Programmes, Environmental Sustainability, Meat Safety, Market Conformity, Economy and Working Conditions.

[Atypical debut of symptoms of fallopian tube cancer].

Fallopian tube cancer is rare and accounts for 0.3-1% of all gynaecological cancers. We describe a case of undiagnosed fallopian tube cancer presenting as a swollen inguinal lymph node and later diagnosed with PET-CT.

Vision-based method for tracking meat cuts in slaughterhouses.

Meat traceability is important for linking process and quality parameters from the individual meat cuts back to the production data from the farmer that produced the animal. Current tracking systems rely on physical tagging, which is too intrusive for individual meat cuts in a slaughterhouse environment. In this article, we demonstrate a computer vision system for recognizing meat cuts at different points along a slaughterhouse production line.

The content of macronutrients in milk from mothers of very preterm infants is highly variable.

Introduction: The objective of this study was to determine the content of macronutrients in human milk (HM) from mothers who gave birth very prematurely, and to investigate possible associations between macronutrients and certain maternal and infant characteristics.

Material And Methods: Mothers of very preterm infants with a gestational age (GA) below 32 weeks expressed milk for analysis two weeks after birth, every second week until discharge, at term, at two, and at four months of corrected age. The milk was analyzed using mid-infrared transmission spectroscopy.

X-ray tomography using the full complex index of refraction.

We report on x-ray tomography using the full complex index of refraction recorded with a grating-based x-ray phase-contrast setup. Combining simultaneous absorption and phase-contrast information, the distribution of the full complex index of refraction is determined and depicted in a bivariate graph. A simple multivariable threshold segmentation can be applied offering higher accuracy than with a single-variable threshold segmentation as well as new possibilities for the partial volume analysis and edge detection.

Electrical stimulation affects metabolic enzyme phosphorylation, protease activation, and meat tenderization in beef.

The objective of this study was to investigate the response of sarcoplasmic proteins in bovine LM to low-voltage electrical stimulation (ES; 80 V, 35 s) after dressing and its contribution to meat tenderization at an early postmortem time. Proteome analysis showed that ES resulted in decreased (P < 0.05) phosphorylation of creatine kinase M chain, fructose bisphosphate aldolase C-A, β-enolase, and pyruvate kinase at 3 h postmortem.

Effect of low-voltage electrical stimulation after dressing on color stability and water holding capacity of bovine longissimus muscle.

The effect of low voltage electrical stimulation after dressing (ES) on color stability and water holding capacity (WHC) of beef was investigated. Nine Swedish red cattle were slaughtered and the left side was electrically stimulated (80 V, 35 s) approximately 30 min after stunning, whereas the other side was not treated and used as control. Color and its stability, WHC, and protein solubility were evaluated on longissimus lumborum muscles from the two sides.

Virtual dissection of pig carcasses.

This paper proposes the use of computed tomography (CT) as a reference method for estimating the lean meat percentage (LMP) of pig carcasses. The current reference is manual dissection which has a limited accuracy due to variability between butchers. A contextual Bayesian classification scheme is applied to classify volume elements of full body CT-scans of pig carcasses into three tissue types.

Effects of dietary soybean oil on lipid and protein oxidation in pork patties during chill storage.

The effect of dietary soybean oil on lipid and protein oxidation in low and high fat pork patties made from quadriceps femoris during chill storage in a high oxygen atmosphere packaging (80% O(2)/20% CO(2)) in the dark for 7 days was investigated. Pigs were fed either a standard diet or a diet added 2% soybean oil. After slaughter high fat pork patties were prepared for both feeding regimes by addition of back fat from pigs fed the same diet whereas low fat pork patties were prepared without addition of back fat.

High-oxygen packaging atmosphere influences protein oxidation and tenderness of porcine longissimus dorsi during chill storage.

The effect of modified atmosphere packaging (70% O(2)/30% CO(2)) and skin packaging (no oxygen) on protein oxidation and texture of longissimus dorsi was investigated during storage for 14 days at 4°C. High oxygen atmosphere resulted in reduced tenderness and juiciness and SDS-PAGE revealed cross-linking of myosin heavy chain through disulfide bonding, and the content of protein thiols was reduced indicating protein oxidation. Myofibril fragmentation was reduced in meat stored in high oxygen atmosphere indicating less proteolysis and/or cross-linking of proteins.

The combined effect of antioxidants and modified atmosphere packaging on protein and lipid oxidation in beef patties during chill storage.

Effect of rosemary extract and ascorbate/citrate (1:1) in combination with modified atmosphere packaging (100% N(2), 80% O(2)/20% N(2)) on protein and lipid oxidation in minced beef patties during storage in the dark for up to 6 days at 4°C was investigated. A high level of oxygen in the packaging atmosphere was found to increase both lipid and protein oxidation during storage as evaluated by TBARS analysis of secondary lipid oxidation products and by 2,4-dinitrophenylhydrazine derivatization of protein carbonyls. Both antioxidant systems tested were found to inhibit lipid oxidation but not protein oxidation.