Data of 46 water balance measurements were collected from dry and lactating Holstein cows in the controlled climatic chamber, which maintained at 20°C and 60% relative humidity, to evaluate between drinking water intake (DWI), feed water intake (FWI), total water intake (TWI) and some variables in cows. Orchardgrass silage, alfalfa silage and corn silage were offered in dry cows, and alfalfa or orchardgrass silage and concentrates were given as a TMR in ratio of 60:40 in lactating cows. DMI and milk production were highly related to DWI and TWI of lactating cows. DWI in dry and lactating cows increased and FWI decreased as dietary DM increased, but there was a very weak correlation between dietary DM and TWI. In both dry and lactating cows, positive correlations were obtained between dietary CP or K and TWI, especially highly correlations between dietary K and TWI. There were strong positive correlations between N intake, K intake or urine volume and TWI rather than DWI in dry and lactating cows. These results suggest that dry and lactating cows accelerate DWI to excrete large amounts of K or N into urine in excess of their needs, but TWI is more suitable to evaluate the effects of dietary CP or K on water intake and urine volume in dairy cows.

Monitoring behavior of grazing animals is important for the management of grazing systems. We developed a new automatic classification system for eating, ruminating and resting activities of cattle using a three-axis microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) accelerometer. We fitted the accelerometer to a Holstein cow in a tie-stall barn and to a Japanese Black cow at pasture, and measured their underjaw accelerations at 1-s intervals. The behavior of the animals was also videorecorded. The raw acceleration data was processed to create 12 variables: the mean, variance and inverse coefficient of variation (ICV; mean/standard deviation) per minute for the x-, y-and z-axis and the resultant. Quadratic discriminant analysis (QDA) was employed to classify eating, ruminating and resting activities, using 11 combinations of the variables as explanatory variables. In all axes and their resultant, approximately 99.6% of the raw acceleration values ranged between -19.6 m s -2 (-2 G) and 19.6 m s -2 (2 G), with an amplitude tendency of eating > ruminating > resting. Seven combinations of the variables produced total percent correct discriminations exceeding 90% in both tie-stalled and grazing cows. Overall, the highest discriminant score was obtained in the combination of the 'Means and ICV'. Our results demonstrate that processing acceleration data with QDA is effective in statistically classifying eating, ruminating and resting activities of cattle.Behavior classification using accelerometer N. Watanabe et al.

A novel function for Smad7 is demonstrated in the establishment of cell polarity during cell migration in certain cell types. TGFβ type I receptors, Smad7, active p38, and APC are localized in the leading edge of polarized, migrating cells.

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