The domestic pig (Sus scrofa), an important species in animal production industry, is a right model for studying adipogenesis and fat deposition. In order to expand the repertoire of porcine miRNAs and further explore potential regulatory miRNAs which have influence on adipogenesis, high-throughput Solexa sequencing approach was adopted to identify miRNAs in backfat of Large White (lean type pi...

Improvements in the porcine genetic map and availability of resource families to study performance traits in pigs have made it possible to re-examine previous findings that linked certain traits to genes or chromosomal regions. Previous studies suggested that chromosomes 4 and 7 may be associated with growth and performance traits. To confirm these previous results, an interval mapping-regressi...

An experiment was conducted to determine the effect of roughages on the utilization of dietary nitrogen, energy and fiber by gravid swine. Water consumption, backfat depletion, pregnancy weight gain, and reproductive performance were used as response criteria. Metabolism assays, employing 18 crossbred sows (second or third parity), were initiated at days 0 (prior to breeding), 30 and 80 postcoi...

As herd sizes have increased in the last decades, computerized monitoring solutions, which provide fast, objective and accurate evaluations of the herd status, gain more and more importance. This study analyzes the feasibility of a Time-of-Flight-camera-based system for gathering body traits in dairy cows for use under cow barn conditions. Recording, determination of body condition score on a 5...

A total of 120 barrows (maternal line PIC 1050) with an initial BW of 105.7 lb were used in an 83-d trial to study the effects of dried distillers grains with solubles (DDGS) and extruded expelled soybean meal (EESM) on growth performance and fat quality. Pigs were blocked by weight and randomly allotted to one of six treatments with two pigs per pen and 10 pens per treatment. Diets were: a cor...

Purebred Durocs (n = 207) were used to develop a model to predict loin intramuscular fat percentage (PIMF) of the longissimus muscle in live pigs. A minimum of four longitudinal, real-time ultrasound images were collected 7 cm off-midline across the 10th to the 13th ribs on the live animal. A trained technician used texture analysis software to interpret the images and produce 10 image paramete...

and Implications Results of this study indicate that real-time ultrasound can be useful in predicting intramuscular fat (IMF) in the longissimuss muscle of live swine. The addition of tenth rib backfat measurements and sex as independent variables to IMF prediction equations increases prediction accuracy. Improvements in data collection and image analysis should further enhance prediction accur...