Search

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of adding Brevibacillus laterosporus (B. laterosporus) PBC01 to aquarium water on water quality, including Aeromonas spp. counts, growth performance, digestive enzyme activities, and antioxidant activity of the crucian carp Carassius auratus. One hundred and twenty healthy crucian carp (13.56 ± 0.2 g) were reared for 56 days in four different treatments with three replications, as the control group (clean water) and three test groups with PBC01 at levels 5 × 103 CFU/ml, 5 × 104 CFU/ml, and 5 × 105 CFU/ml added to the rearing water. As a result, B. laterosporus in rearing water can lower the concentrations of nitrogen and the number of Aeromonas spp. to varying degrees. As the B. laterosporus concentration increased, the effect became more significant. Crucian carp reared in water supplemented with B. laterosporus showed marked growth performance in comparison with the control group. In addition, rearing water supplemented with B. laterosporus improved antioxidant status in the serum and liver of crucian carp, and increased the intestinal digestive enzyme activity. In conclusion, certain amounts of B. laterosporus PBC01 used as a probiotic supplement in the aquarium water can promote crucian carp growth and improve the health status of these fish. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study was focused on evaluating the effects of Bacillus methylotrophicus SY200 in broiler production. A total of 120 healthy 7-day-old broiler chicks were randomly assigned to four dietary treatments, which included basal diet supplemented with 0%, 0.10%, 0.25%, or 0.50% (w/w) B. methylotrophicus SY200 preparation (1.0 × 109 cfu/g), regarded as negative control group (NC), low-dose group (BML), medium-dose group (BMM), and high-dose group (BMH), respectively. Each treatment was fed the corresponding experimental diet for 35 days. Results showed that dietary supplementation of B. methylotrophicus SY200 could improve broiler weight gain, especially the finisher phase. Further studies suggested that a certain amount of B. methylotrophicus SY200 enhanced the broiler antioxidant status and improved the morphological development of jejunum. Besides, dietary supplementation of B. methylotrophicus SY200 especially in 0.50% levels significantly increased the relative weight of immune organs and Newcastle disease virus antibody titer, similarly, increased mRNA expression levels of claudin-1, claudin-3, zonula occluden-1, and zonula occluden-2 were observed in the jejunum of BMM group. Moreover, B. methylotrophicus SY200 also showed beneficial effects in improving broilers microbiota homeostasis by increasing the number of beneficial bacteria. Conclusively, B. methylotrophicus SY200 could effectively improve the antioxidant status, modulate the intestinal structure, enhance the intestinal mucosal barrier function, and regulate the immune function of broilers, which finally improves the performance of the chicken in the finisher period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To evaluate the application effect of antimicrobial peptides Gal-13 (AMP Gal-13) instead of antibiotic feed additives, 90 7-day-old Ross 308 broilers were randomly divided into 3 groups. Group A was fed a basic diet as the control, and Groups B and C were supplemented with AMP Gal-13 (100 mg/kg and 200 mg/kg, respectively). After a 35-day feeding experiment, the weight and average daily gain (ADG) of the broilers in Group B were significantly higher than those of the broilers in Group A. The Enterococcus sp. and Escherichia coli counts in the ileum and cecum in Group A were significantly higher than those in Groups B and C, while the Lactic acid bacteria (LAB) and Bifidobacterium sp. counts were significantly lower. The amylase activity of the jejunum in Group B was significantly higher than that in Group A. The villus length (VL): crypt depth (CD) ratios of the jejunum and ileum in Group B were significantly higher than those in Group A. The glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px) activities in the liver and serum in Groups B and C were significantly higher than those in Group A, while the malondialdehyde (MDA) activity was significantly lower. The titers of Newcastle disease virus (NDV)–specific antibodies were elevated significantly in Group B at the age of 42 days. Additionally, the weights of the spleen and thymus were significantly increased. The expression levels of Il-2, Il-6, Tgf-β4, Tnf-α, and Mif in the spleen in Groups B and C were significantly downregulated to different degrees; Il-4 expression in Group B was significantly upregulated, while Ifn-γ expression in Group C was significantly upregulated. The results suggested that adding AMP Gal-13 to the diet could improve intestinal digestion, the antioxidant capacity, and immune function, ultimately promoting the growth of broilers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a latch design with single node immunity to single event upsets during the hold state is proposed. This structure is based on the original Quatro latch and have two more redundant storage nodes. Compared with the reference, this structure is able to recover if any of these nodes is struck by ion particles during the hold state and it also has improved multiple node upset performance. Simulations and laser experiment results have validated its effectiveness of SEU resilience by having a larger laser energy threshold for upset and lower SEU error counts compared with the reference. The power, area, and delay penalties are 86%, 48%, and 64% respectively; they are as a consequence of six more transistors added to the latch. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The DICE flip-flop has been rendered ineffective in deep-submicron technology nodes (e.g. 65 nm and 28 nm) due to charge sharing when exposed to single event strikes. This paper presents a new single event upset tolerant flip-flop design by applying the hardening technique on DICE at the layout level. This approach is an alternative to existing Layout Design through Error-Aware Transistor Positioning (LEAP); it also re-places transistors in master and slave DICE latches in the zigzag fashion in the layout. Both computer simulations and heavy-ion experimental results demonstrate that our proposed layout design has no single event upset errors under normal strikes until LET = 37 MeV·cm2/mg compared to the traditional DICE structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to the intrinsic lack of restoring paths, dynamic logic circuits have significant single-event susceptibility, and thus, they are not preferred in applications requiring high reliability when compared to static logic. However, in high speed applications, this circuit family is still very attractive. This papers presents two layout-based single-event resilient dynamic logic designs. The resultant SET pulse is suppressed because of charge-sharing in the layout-level. Simulation results verify that they enjoy higher single event tolerance. Experimental results validate the fact that approximately 20 ~ 30 % of magnitude reduction in cross-section is achieved in both designs. On the other hand, the increase in single-event performance is achieved at the expense of power and area overheads of 10 and 15 %, respectively, using our layout style in 130 nm CMOS bulk technology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]