ABSTRACT. The objectives of this study were to develop and evaluate an efficient implementation in the computation of the inverse of genomic relationship matrix with the recursion algorithm, called the algorithm for proven and young (APY), in single-step genomic BLUP. We validated genomic predictions for young bulls with more than 500,000 genotyped animals in final score for US Holsteins. Phenotypic data included 11,626,576 final scores on 7,093,380 US Holstein cows, and genotypes were available for 569,404 animals.

ABSTRACT. The massive use of pesticides and herbicides to increment the agriculture production can produce severe environmental impacts. This implies the need of new methods to monitor and control the use of chemical agents.An alternative to traditional sampling methods is the use ofinsects to act as a biological distributed sensor in order to monitor the presence of pesticides in the neighbourhood. Specifically, several authors have proposed the use of the beehive as a distributed sensor. To evaluate critical changes in the beehive behaviour, the sound patterns are analysed.

Abstract: Using autumn-lambing ewes, this study investigated (i) the effects of diet on gonadotrophin secretion and responsiveness of the hypothalamic-pituitary-ovarian axis to exogenous GnRH during the early post-partum period; and (ii) whether ovulation prior to completion of uterine involution results in an increased incidence of aberrant ovarian cycles. Thirty-two ewes rearing 1.9±0.12 lambs were equally allocated to two dietary treatments at lambing (22 October ±0.2 day).

The accumulative effects of different levels of annual energy intake over the first two parities on four breeds of beef cow (small size and low milk potential, Aberdeen Angus; small size and high milk potential, Welsh Black; large size and low milk potential, Charolais; and large size and high milk potential, Simmental) were assessed for various production traits and calf performance.

The metabolic status and reproductive performance of four pure breeds of beef cow (small size and low milk potential, Aberdeen Angus; small size and high milk potential, Welsh Black; large size and low milk potential, Charolais; and large size and high milk potential, Simmental) were monitored during their first two parities. Heifers from each breed were allocated to one of two levels of annual energy intake relative to metabolic body weight (M075) (mean daily intakes equivalent to 705 and 820 kj/kg M0·75) in a factorial design.