Heat stress causes the animal industry over $2.5 billion in economic losses each year. As a result, much research has been conducted to mitigate the adverse effects of heat stress during the summer months. Some of the more identifiable adverse effects include decreased growth rates, altered characteristics, poor reproduction, and reduced milk yield; however, heat stress also markedly alters metabolism, endocrinology, and immunophysiology.

Zinc is required for optimal animal health and production, but feedstuffs often do not contain enough zinc to meet the requirement of animals, which means livestock are often provided supplemental zinc. Several sources of supplemental zinc are available, including inorganic and organic sources, and previous research has sought to compare the bioavailability of different zinc sources.

The role of dietary fiber in pig nutrition and health has received much research interest because of its versatility. Recently, research has been focused on the impact of either a single or a mixed dietary fiber source with a standard gestation diet.

Constipation in sows in the late gestation and lactation period is a common problem and can lead to dystocia or stillbirth, toxins in feces, uteritis, and mastitis and also influences the survival and growth of the piglets; it can also cause postpartum pain in sows and prolongs the time to litter and may also increase the release and absorption of bacterial endotoxins, resulting in postpartum dysfunction syndrome in sows.

Nontraditional feeding methods, including raw, home-cooked, and naturally sourced ingredients, are believed to be superior to traditional extruded commercial dog foods by some owners and practitioners. There are some anecdotal reports of improved health benefits of raw meat-based diets that include cleaner teeth, decreased fecal output, improvement in skin and coat, and a decrease in inflammatory-related diseases; however, there is little evidence within the scientific community to support these findings.

Recently, it was shown that dietary supplementation with key functional amino acids improves growth performance and immune status of Salmonella Typhimurium-challenged pigs, but it is not known if Salmonella Typhimurium-challenged pigs would benefit from a longer adaptation period to functional amino acids.

The mechanism of meat tenderization is well-recognized, but the impact of oxidative stress of skeletal muscle and its influence on factors critical to meat quality, as well as the impact of oxidative stress and its relationship toward the muscle transcriptome, has yet to be understood.

A recent study in the Journal of Animal Science conducted five experiments to evaluate factors influencing starch availability estimates of steam-flaked corn. This information is valuable because measuring enzymatic starch availability is commonly used as a quality control method to ensure steam-flaked corn manufacturing consistency in commercial cattle feeding operations, but starch availability estimates can be variable.

The use of radioactive isotopes to measure de novo lipogenesis in pigs has been well established; unlike radioactive isotopes, stable isotopes present little or no risk to human and animal subjects, but in vivo approaches to estimate de novo lipogenesis using stable isotopes have not been reported in pigs.

Bovine hepatocytes were first treated with different doses of metformin, then exposed to BHBA levels commonly observed in cows experiencing ketosis. Various methods, including western blot, real-time quantitative PCR, chromatin precipitation, and immunofluorescence, were used to assess the activation of various pro- and anti-inflammatory pathways in hepatocytes.

Alfalfa is a commonly used forage for horses with high nutritional requirements, but some of its utility as a highly digestible feed source may be negatively affected by lignin content. Lignin is a complex phenolic polymer that increases plant rigidity and growth, but negatively interacts gastrointestinal microbial populations, limiting the total tract digestibility of the forage.

Esfandyari and Jensen conducted a Bayesian analysis of growth performance records of Danish beef herds to calculate residual feed intake and demonstrated its statistical utility in genetic selection of beef bulls over a period of 392 days.

In poultry, the accuracy genomic prediction has historically remained relatively stable when animal with known genotypes and phenotypes were added to the breeding population, but was dramatically reduced when no new animals were included, and as a result the response to selection was smaller than expected.

Creatine stores high-energy phosphate bonds in muscle and is synthesized in the liver through methylation of guanidinoacetic acid; supplementation of guanidinoacetic acid may therefore increase methyl group requirements, which may affect methyl group utilization.

GreenFeed, is an acceptable method to measure fecal output. The research team hypothesized that there would be adequate agreement in fecal output estimated using titanium dioxide as an external marker dosed between the GreenFeed and hand feeding in stanchions.

Research recently published in the Journal of Animal Science aimed to use beef heifers to evaluate the effect of maternal nutrient restriction and melatonin supplementation during late gestation on uteroplacental blood flow, vaginal temperatures, and fetal morphometrics during compromised pregnancy. It was hypothesized that maternal nutrient restriction during late gestation would decrease uteroplacental blood flow and melatonin supplementation during the daytime, which would mitigate the adverse effects of compromised pregnancy.

A paper recently published in the Journal of Animal Science evaluated whether different reproductive stages of sows altered thermal preference and if current recommendations required updating. It was hypothesized that the reproductive stage would alter thermal preference in sows. This study is the first to look at temperature preference differences based on the reproductive stage of sows.

A paper recently published in the Journal of Animal Science aimed to find the start date of genomic selection for a set of economically important traits in pigs, Angus cattle, and broiler chickens by comparing trends obtained using best linear unbiased prediction and single-step genomic best linear unbiased prediction.

The research team from Kansas State University hypothesized that guanidinoacetic acid supplementation to Metdeficient cattle would induce a methyl group deficiency and that methionine supplementation would reduce the methyl group deficiency. Additionally, it was thought that guanidinoacetic acid might improve nitrogen retention when methionine was supplemented.

Maternally influenced traits include genetic factors that impact birth and weaning. Cultivating a better understanding of the heritability of maternally influenced traits may improve estimated breeding values (EBV), genetic selection and ultimately productivity.