The aim of this study was to determine the blood ionized calcium (Ca) levels and acute-phase blood glucose kinetics in goats with mastitis induced by an intramammary challenge of lipopolysaccharide (LPS). Five goats were subjected to intramammary challenge of either LPS (10 µg) or saline (control). Some clinical manifestations (rectal temperature, pulse rate, respiration rate, ruminal motility, physical activity, and dehydration) were observed, and blood was collected for the measurement of several parameters [ionized and total Ca levels, blood glucose level, pH, and white blood count (WBC)] at 0 (just before challenge), 1–4, 6, 8, 12 and 24 hr post-challenge in both the LPS and control phases. Milk was collected at 0 (just before challenge), 4, 8, 12 and 24 hr post-challenge to measure the somatic cell count (SCC) and N-acetyl-beta-D-glucosaminidase (NAGase) activity. In the LPS phase, increased rectal temperature, significantly decreased ionized Ca and total Ca levels and WBCs were observed compared with those at 0 hr, although there were no differences in all parameters between phases. LPS infusion significantly increased SCCs in milk and NAGase activity. The present results demonstrated that, during the acute phase of mastitis induced by intramammary challenge by LPS at a concentration sufficient to cause general symptoms in goats, a decreased blood ionized Ca level occurs, but not hypoglycemia.

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Microcellular injection molding is an attractive method. However, their surface imperfections have been a major problem hindering wide industrial applications. Several methods have been proposed to improve the surface appearance of foams. In this study, we proposed a method to improve the surface appearance of polypropylene (PP) foams from the material property perspective, especially with regard to crystallization and viscosity. The basic idea of the surface improvement is to reduce the size of bubbles generated at the flow front, delay the solidification behavior of the polymer at the mold interface, squeeze the bubbles existing at the mold-polymer interface, and redissolve the bubbles into the polymer by holding pressure. Blending a low-modulus PP delays the crystallization of the polymers at the skin layer and solidification, taking enough time to squeeze the bubbles smaller. A sorbitol-based gelling agent, bis-O-([4 methylphenyl]methylene)-D-Glucitol, was used to increase the viscosity at a low strain rate to reduce the size of the bubbles generated at the flow front during the filling stage. The foam injection molding experiments demonstrated that the proposed method effectively improved the surface appearance of the foams. In particular, the surface appearance of the foams became almost equivalent to that of solid samples using low-modulus PP.

No abstract