1,721,619 research outputs found
Carbon footprint of intensive vs. extensive dairy farming in Gargano area
Full text linkCarbon footprint is an indicator of environmental sustainability
quantifying the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions generated by
the individual or collective activities. Two dairy farms located in Foggia province (CaseStudy1, CS1;
CaseStudy2, CS2) both raising Mediterranean buffaloes (B) and
crossbred Italian Friesian cows (C) with different management
systems (intensive vs. extensive) were studied to investigate the
impacts of milk production. Data about herd characteristics (live
weights, mortality, fertility, production), diets composition, and
manure management of dairy buffaloes (n = 136 vs. n = 78, CS1B
and CS2B respectively) and dairy cows (n = 44 vs. n = 31, CS1C
and CS2C respectively) were collected to evaluate the GHG emissions
on a year basis according to FAO assessment model
(GLEAM-i ver 1.9, https://www.fao.org/gleam/resources/en/).
Considering the global warming potential (GWP) of buffalo farms,
the more extensive system in CS2B was found less impactful than
the intensive CS1B, showing −33.7% of total GHG emissions
(expressed as kg CO2-eq/year) and −50.8% of total CH4 (expressed
as kg CH4/year). Both feed intake (kg DM/year) and milk production
(kg/year) were lower in CS2B (−48.3% and −52.7 % respectively),
so that it resulted more impactful (+42.5%) when milk
emission intensity (kg CO2-eq/kg protein) was considered. The
total N2O emission (kg N2O/year) was +56.7% in CS2B due to the
different manure management.
Regarding the dairy cow farms, CS2C was found less impactful
in terms of both total GHG and CH4 (−21.1% and −37.5% respectively)
emissions. Feed intake and milk production were lower
in CS2C (−32.4% and −36.9% respectively), resulting the milk
emission intensity higher (+25.8%) than in CS1C. Consistently
with emissions in buffalo farms, the total N2O emission was
higher (+56.6%) in the extensive system.
Data processing suggested that GHG emissions were closely
related to feed production practices, diet composition and manure
management in the different farms. On this regard, formulating
diets that match the nutritional animal requirements, improving
feed digestibility and availability, introducing alternative protein
source or by-product, and implementing manure and animal
waste processing, could allow a more sustainable use of natural
resources, limiting the potential negative environmental impacts
while preserving farm remunerability
The role of long noncoding RNAs in the epigenetic control of gene expression
No full textRecent advances in the methodologies employed to deeply analyse the complexity of transcriptomes have unveiled the existence of a new class of transcripts, long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs). A significant amount of effort has been dedicated to the study of lncRNAs, and a large body of evidence now exists indicating their relevant role in different regulatory steps of gene expression. Given the role of epigenetics in disease development and progression, this Minireview focuses on lncRNAs involved in epigenetic control and provides an overview of the mechanisms used to guide epigenetic-modifying complexes to adjacent (cis-acting) or independent (trans-acting) genomic loci. Furthermore, it describes the activities of these transcripts in controlling the formation and spreading of heterochromatin domains. Just as other RNA molecules have found therapeutic application, though much remains to be elucidated about the structure and function of these lncRNAs, they too could hold potential as biomarkers, targets, and therapeutic agents
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
koamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
Author-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.
No full textAuthor-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.</p
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