This study was undertaken to determine the effects of two commercially available brown onion varieties, "Cavalier" and "Destiny", supplemented at two different levels, on blood lipid and oxidative ...status using the pig as a model. Twenty-five female cross-bred pigs were allocated to one of five dietary treatments that consisted of a high-fat control diet with no onion added, a low onion dose of 10 g onion MJ(super -1) DE and a high dose of 25 g onion MJ(super -1) DE for each variety of onion. Supplementation with "Destiny" onion resulted in a 21% (p < 0.05) reduction in the averaged fasted and postprandial plasma triacylglyceride (TG) measurements taken over the six-week period in comparison with the control pigs. The average fasting and postprandial plasma cholesterol concentrations were significantly reduced by 5.5 and 12.4% in pigs that consumed the low and high dose of "Destiny" onion, respectively (p < 0.010), while "Cavalier" was only effective at lowering cholesterol levels by 10% at the lower dose of supplementation. Inhibition in the rate of serum lipoprotein oxidation, measured as lag time, was increased by 23% (p < 0.05) in plasma obtained from pigs that consumed "Cavalier" compared with the control and "Destiny" onion diets. These data indicate that onion consumption level may provide a dietary means of manipulating some of the risk indices associated with coronary heart disease, but the responses varied with type and dose of onion.
Pyrethroids are now the fourth most used group of insecticides worldwide. Employed in agriculture and in urban areas, they are detected in waterways at concentrations that are lethally and ...sublethally toxic to aquatic organisms. Highly lipophilic, pyrethroids accumulate in sediments and bioaccumulate in fishes. Additionally, these compounds are demonstrated to act as endocrine disrupting compounds (or EDCs) in mammals and fishes, and therefore interfere with endocrine signaling by blocking, mimicking, or synergizing endogenous hormones through direct receptor interactions, and indirectly via upstream signaling pathways. Pyrethroid metabolites have greater endocrine activity than their parent structures, and this activity is dependent on the enantiomer present, as some pyrethroids are chiral. Many EDCs studied thus far in fish have known estrogenic or antiestrogenic effects, and as such cause the inappropriate or altered expression of genes or proteins (i.e., Vtg–vitellogenin, Chg–choriogenin), often leading to physiological or reproductive effects. Additionally, these compounds can also interfere with other endocrine pathways and immune response. This review highlights studies that focus on the mechanisms of pyrethroid biotransformation and endocrine toxicity to fishes across a broad range of different pyrethroid types, and integrates literature on the in vitro and mammalian responses that inform these mechanisms.
Livestock production is the world’s dominant land use, covering about 45% of the Earth’s land surface, and much of it in harsh and variable environments that are unsuitable for other purposes. ...Climate change (CC) can impact the amount and quality of produce, reliability of production, and the natural resource base on which livestock production depends. Climate is an important factor of agricultural productivity and CC is expected to severely impact livestock production systems. Furthermore, global demand for animal protein will rise as populations become more affluent and eating habits change. Therefore, animal production plays (and will continue to do so) a key role in the food supply chain. While the increasing demand for livestock products offers market opportunities and income for small, marginal, and landless farmers, livestock production globally faces increasing pressure because of negative environmental implications, particularly because of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Agriculture is one sector which is important to consider as it both impacts CC as well as is influenced by CC. Higher temperatures, potentially caused by GHG, would likely result in a decline in dairy production, reduced animal weight gain, reproduction, and lower feed-conversion efficiency in warm regions. Incidence of diseases among livestock and other animals are likely to be affected by CC, since most diseases are transmitted by vectors such as ticks and flies (development stages of ticks and flies are often dependent on ambient temperature). Cattle, goat, horses, and sheep are also vulnerable to an extensive range of nematode worm infections, most of which have their development stages influenced by climatic conditions. CC will have far-reaching consequences for dairy, meat, and wool production systems that rely primarily on grass and rangelands and this will likely detrimentally affect vulnerable pastoral communities which are engaged in extensive livestock production systems in drylands. Although the direct effects of CC on animals are likely to be small (as long as temperature increases do not exceed 3°C), CC will affect animals indirectly through physiological stress and thermoregulatory control, nutrition, and disease stress. Because livestock products are an incredibly important human food, and because animal farming is a significant source of income for millions of farmers, it is necessary to identify CC mitigation strategies and solutions.
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