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This study examined maternal depressive symptoms, social support, parenting, and adult attachment as mediators explaining the relation between maternal childhood maltreatment and child behavior in offspring. We assessed a community sample of 96 mother-child dyads. At child age 16 months, mothers self-reported maltreatment history, adult attachment, depressive symptoms, and social support, and maternal sensitivity was assessed via 2 hr of direct behavioral observation. Maternal reports of child behavior were collected at 5 years. Single and parallel mediation models were constructed. Only maternal depressive symptoms mediated the relation between maternal maltreatment history and children's internalizing problems. Maternal sensitivity emerged as a suppressor variable. With respect to the relation between maternal maltreatment history and children's externalizing problems, when entered singly, maternal depressive symptoms, social support, and avoidant attachment emerged as mediators. When examined in parallel, only maternal depressive symptoms and avoidant attachment accounted for unique mediating variance. Findings have implications with respect to important maternal factors that might be targeted to reduce the probability of maladaptive child behavior.

The objective of this study was to determine the apparent and true intestinal digestibility of total and individual AA, and to estimate the efficiency of whole-body AA retention from individual and total absorbed AA. Four Nellore animals (241.3 kg initial BW) and four crossbred Angus × Nellore (263.4 kg initial BW) cannulated in rumen and ileum were randomly allocated in two 4 × 4 Latin squares. The experiment lasted four 17 d periods, with 10 d for adaptation to diets and another 7 d for data collection. The diets consisted of increasing CP levels: 100, 120, or 140 g/kg of DM offered ad libitum, and restricted intake diet with 120 g CP/kg DM (experiment 1). In experiment 2, forty-four bulls (22 Nellore and 22 crossbred F1 Angus × Nellore) with 8 months and initial shrunk BW 215.0 ± 15.0 kg (Nellore = 208.0 ± 12.78 kg; Angus × Nellore = 221.9 ± 14.16 kg) were used. Eight of those animals were slaughtered at the beginning of the experiment. The remaining 36 bulls were allocated in a completely randomized design with six replicates, in a 2 (genetic groups) × 3 (CP contents) factorial scheme. The amount of essential AA (EAA) and nonessential AA (NEAA) reaching the small intestine increased linearly (P < 0.05) in response to CP content. The apparent digestibility of EAA was not affected (P > 0.05) by CP content, with exception for histidine (P = 0.07, linear effect), leucine (P = 0.01, linear effect), and methionine (P = 0.05, linear effect). Differences existed among AA when compared the apparent digestibility of NEAA. The apparent digestibility of alanine (P = 0.05), aspartic acid (P = 0.07), glutamic acid (P = 0.02), glycine (P = 0.05), proline (P = 0.02), and serine (P = 0.04) responded quadratically to CP content increase. However, the apparent digestibility of cystine and tyrosine was not affected (P > 0.05) by increasing dietary CP. The true intestinal digestibilities of total, essential, nonessential AA, lysine, and methionine were 75.0%, 77.0%, 74.0%, 77.0%, and 86%, respectively. The true intestinal digestibility of total microbial AA was 80%. The efficiency of utilization of total AA for whole-body protein deposition was 40%. The efficiency of utilization of lysine and methionine was 37% and 58%, respectively. It was concluded that the AA flow to the omasum increases in response to dietary CP content. In addition, there are differences among AA in the efficiency that they are used by beef cattle.

The objective of this meta-analysis study was to develop and validate equations estimated from in situ and in vitro methods to predict in vivo ruminal digestibility of organic matter (OM) of beef cattle diets. The database was composed of individual data of 23 diets from six experiments. Information collected from these studies was: in vivo digestibility and degradation parameters of OM calculated from in situ and in vitro incubations. The values of estimated times for the in situ and in vitro incubations to access in vivo digestibility of OM, and differences between degradation at 24, 48 and 72 h (in situ and in vitro) and in vivo digestibility were analysed in a model that included the fixed effects of forage neutral detergent fibre level. Thereafter, a multiple stepwise regression was carried out using OM digestibility as a dependent variable and degradation parameters (A = water-soluble fraction; B = potentially degradable water-insoluble fraction; and kd = degradation rate of fraction B) as independent variables. Equation validation was performed using data from a seventh experiment that have the same methods than previous studies. Stepwise regression results showed that the kd contributed significantly in most of the algorithms derived to predict in vivo digestibility. Validation analysis showed that equations developed from both in vitro and in situ incubations accurately estimated the in vivo digestibility of OM (P > 0.05). Our results suggest that equations developed to estimate OM digestibility showed both precision and accuracy; however, in situ method presented better results than in vitro.

The purpose of the present study was to examine the role of posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) in predicting substance use and substance-related problems in a sample of older youth and emerging adults involved with child welfare. The sample was drawn from the Maltreatment and Adolescent Pathways (MAP) longitudinal study ). Participants were 253 youth and emerging adults (ages 15-20; M=16.87, SD=1.04; 61.4% female and 38.6% male) who were involved with child welfare. Multiple regression analyses were conducted to examine the impact of PTSS using subscales from the Trauma Symptom Checklist for Children (TSCC; Briere 1996). Outcome variables were past year alcohol, marijuana and illicit drug use; as well as alcohol and drug problems. Controlling for gender, age, child welfare status and child maltreatment, both dissociation and anger emerged as significant predictors of substance use and related problems. The implications of these findings for older youth and emerging adults exiting the child welfare system are discussed.The maltreatment of children is an international public health concern, with clear and significant consequences for maltreatment survivors throughout the lifespan. Definitions of Int

The use of beef semen on dairy cows has been increasing steadily since 2017. We aimed to describe dairy management practices toward the use of beef semen by surveying farmers in California, the largest US dairy producer. In January 2020, we mailed a printed version of the beef semen use survey to 1,017 dairy producers in California, who also had the option to answer the survey online. The questionnaire consisted of 33 questions that were categorized into three sections: general herd information (n = 10), beef semen management (n = 17), and sexed dairy semen management (n = 6). The response rate was 13.9% (n = 141). Regression models were used to evaluate the associations between the dairy-beef crossbred sale price, use of beef semen, and use of sexed dairy semen vs. herd characteristics. The mean ± SD herd size was 1,693 ± 1,311 milking cows. Most dairies (81%) reported using beef semen on dairy cows. Among respondents, 78% reported extra profit as the main advantage of using beef semen, followed by control of heifer inventory (69%), genetic improvement (37%), and other factors (8%). Most respondents (58%) started using beef semen in the past 3 years and 34% of the respondents were breeding more than 30% of all the eligible cows with beef semen. Angus semen was the most used (reported by 89% of the respondents), followed by Limousin (12%), Wagyu (10%), Charolais (7%), others (5%, Limflex, Stabilizer, and Hereford), and Simmental (4%). Reproductive performance was an important criterion to select cows to receive beef semen and 45% of the respondents reported starting breeding cows with beef semen from the third breeding, 18% on the fourth breeding, and 21% on the fifth or greater breedings. The region of California (a proxy for type of production system) contracts with a calf ranch and the herd breed explained 76.7% of the observed variation in the day-old dairy beef crossbred calf price. Survey results demonstrated the widespread use of beef semen in dairies and the main breeding strategies adopted by dairy farmers.