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Simple Summary: Shitou geese are the exclusive representative of a large-sized goose breed in China, typically exhibiting gray feathers but also possessing a recessive white plumage. However, the precise mechanism underlying the formation of this white plumage coloration in Shitou geese remains unclear. Here, a transcriptome sequencing analysis was conducted to identify candidate genes and microRNAs (miRNAs) that may be associated with the white plumage color in Shitou geese. A number of pigmentation genes and miRNAs were identified as candidates that may regulate white plumage color formation in Shitou geese. This result may be important for understanding the genetic mechanism underlying the formation of white plumage color in Shitou geese. The Shitou goose, a highly recognized indigenous breed with gray plumage originating from Chaozhou Raoping in Guangdong Province, China, is renowned for being the largest goose species in the country. Notably, during the pure breeding process of Shitou geese, approximately 2% of the offspring in each generation unexpectedly exhibited white plumage. To better understand the mechanisms underlying white plumage color formation in Shitou geese, we conducted a comparative transcriptome analysis between white and gray feather follicles, aiming to identify key genes and microRNAs that potentially regulate white plumage coloration in this unique goose breed. Our results revealed a number of pigmentation genes, encompassing TYR, TYRP1, EDNRB2, MLANA, SOX10, SLC45A2, GPR143, TRPM1, OCA2, ASIP, KIT, and SLC24A5, which were significantly down-regulated in the white feather follicles of Shitou geese. Among these genes, EDNRB2 and KIT emerged as the most promising candidate genes for white plumage coloration in Shitou geese. Additionally, our analysis also uncovered 46 differentially expressed miRNAs. Of these, miR-144-y may play crucial roles in the regulation of feather pigmentation. Furthermore, the expression of novel-m0086-5p, miR-489-y, miR-223-x, miR-7565-z, and miR-3535-z exhibits a significant negative correlation with the expression of pigmentation genes including TYRP1, EDNRB2, MLANA, SOX10, TRPM1, and KIT, suggesting these miRNAs may indirectly regulate the expression of these genes, thereby influencing feather color. Our findings provide valuable insights into the genetic mechanisms underlying white plumage coloration in Shitou geese and contribute to the broader understanding of avian genetics and coloration research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This study was conducted to investigate the effect of water-extraction process on the removal of major elements and heavy metals in the fly ash from Municipal Solid Waste Incinerator (MSWI), and their thermal stability in the following melting process. The water-extraction was first applied to extract soluble elements and heavy metals from the fly ash from MSWI at different liquid-to-solid rates (L/S) of 2, 5, and 10, respectively. The extracted fly ash and the raw fly ash were then melted at the temperatures of 1000–1350°C in an electrically heated furnace. The results showed that the compounds of Ca, Na, K, and Cl achieved high removal rates of 30.7–72.8% at L/S=10, respectively, Cr was the most extractable heavy metal with removal rate of 12.3% among the several heavy metals tested. The water-extracted fly ash had better stability as compared to raw one, which was indicated by lower weight loss and better immobilization ability of heavy metals such as Zn, Cu, and Pb in the melting process. The results showed that combing water-extraction and melting process could provide one of the alternatives for treating MSWI fly ash in China for reutilization. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The lipase obtained from Aspergillums niger was applied to promote the hydrolysis of food waste for achieving high biomethane production. Two strategies of lipase additions were investigated. One (Group A) was to pre-treat food waste to pre-decompose lipid to fatty acids before anaerobic digestion, and another one (Group B) was to add lipase to anaerobic digester directly to degrade lipid inside digester. The lipase was used at the concentrations of 0.1%, 0.5%, and 1.0% (w/v). The results showed that Group A achieved higher biomethane production, TS and VS reductions than those of Group B. At 0.5% lipase concentration, Group A obtained experimental biomethane yield of 500.1 mL/g VS add ed , 4.97–26.50% higher than that of Group B. The maximum B d of 73.8% was also achieved in Group A. Therefore, lipase pre-treatment strategy is recommended. This might provide one of alternatives for efficient biomethane production from food waste and mitigating environmental impact associated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The economic profitability of a boar station largely depends on semen quantity and quality traits. However, genetic analysis of semen traits has not yet been done in the boar population in China. In this study, we aimed to estimate genetic parameters for semen traits and the influence of seasons on these traits by using data of Duroc, Landrace and Yorkshire boars in South China. The following four semen traits were analysed: semen volume (ml; VOL), sperm concentration (10 6 /ml; DEN), sperm motility (MOT) and percentage of abnormal sperm (ABN). Genetic parameters and season effects were estimated simultaneously for each breed by using a multiple-trait (4 × 4) repeatability animal model. The four traits had a moderate heritability with average estimates of 0.23, 0.28, 0.26 and 0.17 across the three breeds, respectively. The estimates of genetic correlations among four traits differed in the three breeds. In particular, in Yorkshire, the four traits were nearly genetically independent. The season of collecting semen had a significant impact on these four semen traits except ABN in Duroc (Bonferroni adjusted p < 0.05/6). The moderate heritabilities indicate the possibility of effective selection of boars for semen traits. Different genetic correlations for the three breeds suggest that the selection strategy for the four traits should be investigated separately for each breed. Some necessary actions should be taken to reduce the influence of seasons on semen traits., (© 2019 Blackwell Verlag GmbH.)

In the past decades, crossbreeding has been widely used to improve productivity in plant and animal husbandry. With the rapid implementation of genomic selection (GS) in these industries and a decrease in the cost of genotyping, genomic prediction (GP) with data from crossbred populations is an emerging research interest. Using a crossbred population derived from a cross between White Recessive Rock (WRR) and Xinghua (XH) chickens (n = 473), the predictive ability and selection differential of conventional best linear unbiased prediction (BLUP) and 3 GP methods (GBLUP, RKHS, and BayesB) were compared. All chickens were genotyped by a 60 K SNP chip. Twenty traits containing body weight (BW) at 1 to 90 d of age, breast muscle weight (BMW), leg muscle weight (LMW), wing weight (WW), and average daily gain (ADG) of different periods were analyzed. The accuracy of GP was higher than that of conventional BLUP for 18 out of 20 investigated traits. The average selection differential on BW selected with GP methods was greater than that from conventional BLUP, with a proportion selected varied between 5 and 30%. Overall, the GP methods outperformed conventional BLUP for both predictive ability and selection effect in the tested crossbred chicken population. Using genomic data from crossbred populations could potentially benefit the decision making for the purpose of marketing or breeding within crossbred population., (© 2019 Poultry Science Association Inc.)

Batch anaerobic digestion was employed to investigate the efficient start-up strategies for the liquefied food waste, and sequencing batch digestion was also performed to determine maximum influent organic loading rate (OLR) for efficient and stable operation. The results indicated that the start-up could be well improved using appropriate wastewater organic load and food-to-microorganism ratios (F/M). When digestion was initialized at low chemical oxygen demand (COD) concentration of 20.0 gCOD L(-1), the start-up would go well using lower F/M ratio of 0.5-0.7. The OLR 7.0 gCOD L(-1) day(-1) was recommended for operating the ASBR digestion, in which the COD conversion of 96.7 ± 0.53% and biomethane yield of 3.5 ± 0.2 L gCOD(-1) were achieved, respectively. The instability would occur when OLR was higher than 7.0 gCOD L(-1) day(-1), and this instability was not recoverable. Lipid was suggested to be removed before anaerobic digestion. The anaerobic digestion process in engineering project ran well, and good performance was achieved when the start-up and operational strategies from laboratory study were applied. For case application, stable digestion performance was achieved in a digester (850 m(3) volume) with biogas production of 1.0-3.8 m(3) m(-3) day(-1).