Understanding the roles of faith-based health-care providers in Africa: review of the evidence with a focus on magnitude, reach, cost, and satisfaction.

At a time when many countries might not achieve the health targets of the Millennium Development Goals and the post-2015 agenda for sustainable development is being negotiated, the contribution of faith-based health-care providers is potentially crucial. For better partnership to be achieved and for health systems to be strengthened by the alignment of faith-based health-providers with national systems and priorities, improved information is needed at all levels. Comparisons of basic factors (such as magnitude, reach to poor people, cost to patients, modes of financing, and satisfaction of patients with the services received) within faith-based health-providers and national systems show some differences.

Systems biology in a commercial quality study of the Japanese Angelica radix: toward an understanding of traditional medicinal plants.

The commercial quality of Japanese Angelica radices -- Angelica acutiloba Kitagawa (Yamato-toki) and A. acutiloba Kitagawa var. sugiyama Hikino (Hokkai-toki) -- used in Kampo traditional herbal medicines, was studied by use of omics technologies.

Effect of sire mating patterns on future genetic merit and inbreeding in a closed beef cattle population.

Alternative breeding strategies were simulated based on the population structure of the Tajima strain of Japanese Black cattle. An analysis of the population structure revealed that some sires up to 20 years of age have been used in Tajima. In addition, 95% of newborn calves were the progeny of only 20 sires, and their mating frequencies were significantly skewed.

Genetic analysis of calf market weight and carcass traits in Japanese Black cattle.

Heritabilities of and genetic correlations between additive direct and maternal genetic effects for calf market weight, and additive direct genetic effects for carcass traits, were estimated for Japanese Black cattle by REML procedures under 2-trait animal models. Data were collected from calf and carcass markets in Hyogo and Tottori prefectures and analyzed separately by prefecture. Calf market weight was measured on 42,745 and 23,566 calves in Hyogo and Tottori, respectively.

Trace of native cattle in Japanese Holstein assessed by mitochondrial DNA sequence polymorphism.

On the basis of sequence variation in the displacement loop region of mtDNA, 588 Japanese and North American Holstein cows were classified into 5 mitochondrial haplotypes, which were found in Japanese Black cattle. One of the haplotypes (named type 1), which was present at the highest frequency in Japanese Black cattle, was not observed in either European or African cattle. This haplotype is characterized by 2 single-nucleotide polymorphisms.