GEKO POWER.

Iam one those people who dont like wall geckos,they give me the creeps,haaaaaaaaaaaaaagh. The gekos are useful as far as im concerned to control insects,but who will prefer gekos as natural insecticides instead of chemicals?hmmm ,i thought so.I believe everything was made for a purpose,and that" all things bright and beautiful,all creatures great and small,all things bright and wonderful, the LORD made them all." so i always look out for the good and usefulness in every creature. This has opened me up to a lot inventions/interventions in the animal world that are of value to the world, did you know that there is power in the gecko feet ,strong enough to hold a weight of 900 pounds without sliding? did you know that adhesive tapes are made from gecko feet that ca be used and re used without any residue? did you know that bonds made from the gecko feet can attach a flat screen on the wall? whaooo,the geko power is fantastic,imagine the possibilities of this type of bond in surgery? my guess is it will replace dermabond soon THE GEKO POWER; For years, biologists have been amazed by the power of gecko feet, which let these 5-ounce lizards produce an adhesive force roughly equivalent to carrying nine pounds up a wall without slipping. Now, a team of polymer scientists and a biologist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have discovered exactly how the gecko does it, leading them to invent "Geckskin," a device that can hold 700 pounds on a smooth wall. Doctoral candidate Michael Bartlett in Alfred Crosby's polymer science and engineering lab at UMass Amherst is the lead author of their article describing the discovery in the current online issue of Advanced Materials. The group includes biologist Duncan Irschick, a functional morphologist who has studied the gecko's climbing and clinging abilities for over 20 years. Geckos are equally at home on vertical, slanted, even backward-tilting surfaces. "Amazingly, gecko feet can be applied and disengaged with ease, and with no sticky residue remaining on the surface," Irschick says. These properties, high-capacity, reversibility and dry adhesion offer a tantalizing possibility for synthetic materials that can easily attach and detach heavy everyday objects such as televisions or computers to walls, as well as medical and industrial applications, among others, he and Crosby say. This combination of properties at these scales has never been achieved before, the authors point out. Crosby says, "Our Geckskin device is about 16 inches square [16 square inches] about the size of an index card, and can hold a maximum force of about 700 pounds while adhering to a smooth surface such as glass." Beyond its impressive sticking ability, the device can be released with negligible effort and reused many times with no loss of effectiveness. For example, it can be used to stick a 42-inch television to a wall, released with a gentle tug and restuck to another surface as many times as needed, leaving no residue. Previous efforts to synthesize the tremendous adhesive power of gecko feet and pads were based on the qualities of microscopic hairs on their toes called setae, but efforts to translate them to larger scales were unsuccessful, in part because the complexity of the entire gecko foot was not taken into account. As Irschick explains, a gecko's foot has several interacting elements, including tendons, bones and skin, that work together to produce easily reversible adhesion. Now he, Bartlett, Crosby and the rest of the UMass Amherst team have unlocked the simple yet elegant secret of how it's done, to create a device that can handle excessively large weights. Geckskin and its supporting theory demonstrate that setae are not required for gecko-like performance, Crosby points out. "It's a concept that has not been considered in other design strategies and one that may open up new research avenues in gecko-like adhesion in the future." The key innovation by Bartlett and colleagues was to create an integrated adhesive with a soft pad woven into a stiff fabric, which allows the pad to "drape" over a surface to maximize contact. Further, as in natural gecko feet, the skin is woven into a synthetic "tendon," yielding a design that plays a key role in maintaining stiffness and rotational freedom, the researchers explain. Importantly, the Geckskin's adhesive pad uses simple everyday materials such as polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS), which holds promise for developing an inexpensive, strong and durable dry adhesive. The UMass Amherst researchers are continuing to improve their Geckskin design by drawing on lessons from the evolution of gecko feet, which show remarkable variation in anatomy. "Our design for Geckskin shows the true integrative power of evolution for inspiring synthetic design that can ultimately aid humans in many ways," says Irschick. The work was supported by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) through a subcontract to Draper Laboratories, plus UMass Amherst research funds. ________________________________________ Story Source: The above story is based on materials provided by University of Massachusetts Amherst. ________________________________________ Journal Reference: 1. Michael D. Bartlett, Andrew B. Croll, Daniel R. King, Beth M. Paret, Duncan J. Irschick, Alfred J. Crosby. Biomimetics: Looking Beyond Fibrillar Features to Scale Gecko-Like Adhesion (Adv. Mater. 8/2012). Advanced Materials, 2012; 24 (8): 994 DOI: 10.1002/adma.201290037

Quails and incubators.

Raising quails can be fun and financially rewarding,irrespective of the aspect you decide to focus on. The production of fertile eggs hence day old chicks,production of table eggs,sale of mature quail birds ,processing for sale in markets and superstores and sale of their waste as fertilizer. There are various types of incubators in the market to fit every need,and are very affordable,check out these ones; come on board,join the quail multimillionaires.

BREEDING QUAILS.

Breeding Quails. The male-female rate should be 1:2.5 which means 4 quail cockerels to 10 quail hens. The individual males and females placed separately and put the cockerels into the hen’s cages periodically. This way you will achieve high fertility rate and the breeding quality can also be well monitored. It’s a good practice on a small scale breeding. Incubating quail eggs. The domesticated quail don’t sit on their eggs hence incubators are necessary. An alternative choice is to place the eggs under a broody hen for hatching. If you choose this option you will need to remove any other egg types from under the broody hen . Collect the eggs 3-5 times a day to reduce infection rate. Select healthy looking eggs with strong looking shell, inspect them thoroughly looking for any cracks or other damage. Do NOT wash the quail eggs, this will remove their porous protective coating and they’ll become vulnerable against bacterial infections. It’s also advisable to perform a candling check. This will show you any possible cracks, the health of the yolks and the size of the airspace. If you get an egg Candler make sure you get the high intensity one because the standard Candler will not shine through the dark shell of the quail egg. Store the quail eggs in a dry, cool place on egg trays with pointed end down. The storing temperature should be between 13 – 17 degrees Celsius and the relative humidity around 70 - 80 %. Care is essential that the temperature does not rise above 18°C, or the development of the little embryos will start and your hatching quail eggs become useless. Do NOT store hatching quail eggs in the fridge; it’s too cold for them. The eggs should be fumigated after collection but some breeders do the fumigation when the quail eggs are placed in the incubator for hatching. The room where you set your incubator up should be of a steady constant temperature. The incubator must be clean and disinfected. Make sure you run the incubator for about a day with correctly set temperature and humidity before you place the quail eggs inside. Using a fan assisted incubator with automatic turning facility is ideal. If you get a fan assisted incubator you will not have any cold spots, with automatic turning facility you won’t forget to turn the eggs, so you’re half way there to achieve a successful hatching rate. If your incubator is not equipped with an automatic egg turning system turn the eggs manually 3-4 times day. Egg turning is very important to keep the little chick embryos in the middle of the egg and prevent them from sticking to the inside of the shell. There are only two major other things you have to watch out for, and that is to maintain the correct temperature which in the case of the quail is 37.8°C (100.04°F) and the humidity level of 45-55%. Even if you have a fully automatic digitally controlled incubator it’s recommended to place an extra temperature and humidity meter into the incubator in the way that you can check the values through the viewing window just to make sure that your incubator is at required temperature. The correct temperature level is very important. Under-incubating (temperature too low) will result in late hatching and over-incubating (temperature too high) will result in early hatching. None of them is beneficial, you will lose a lot of quail chicks if it happens. On the 7th day you can perform an egg candling to see how many eggs are fertile. At this stage you should already recognize the quail embryo inside the egg. Discard any “empty” quail eggs to prevent the transfer of infections onto the healthy eggs and carry on incubating for another 8 days. On the 15th day stop the turning mechanism or if you’ve been turning the eggs manually stop the turning and lower the temperature slightly to 37.5°C (99.5°F). At this stage raise the humidity level to above 80%. This will soften the shell and help the little quail chicks getting out easier. If your incubator has a separate hatching tray then put your quail eggs on the hatching tray. Quail chicks will begin to hatch from the 16th day of incubation, but most of them should hatch on the 17th day. Any quail chicks that hatch after the 18th day will probably die. If you achieve 75% of hatching rate or above, its a job well done . Important!!!!!! Quail chicks MUST come out on their own and don’t help them /DON’T CRACK SHELL. If they need help they are not strong enough to live and will die within a day or two. Keep the chicks in the incubator until they become dry and fluffy, then place them into the pre-heated brooder. Don’t rush this or they will catch a cold, get curled up feet and die. The quail chick can be left in the incubator for up to 24 hours after hatching.

DOGS THAT DETECT CANCER: PIONEERING A HEALTH. REVOLUTION.

Dogs are used for various purposes,from companion animals,to drug-detection. They are currently been trained to detect cancer,also trained to alert patients in cases of seizures or hypoglycemia. The process was highlighted by JENNY STOCKS IN MAIL ONLINE, The dogs that can detect cancer: pioneering a health revolution. Daisy the Labrador is hard at work on a project that could change your life and mine. In her smart red jacket, she wanders around a metal carousel in a small center outside Milton Keynes, sniffing at the different scents that are attached to its 12 spokes. Then she stops. She’s found what she’s looking for and looks expectantly up at her handler — she knows that when she recognizes this specific smell, she will soon get an edible reward. Wonder dog: Daisy the Labrador with Jenny Stocks who's holding new recruit Alice While Daisy enjoys the process (and her dog biscuits) her actions are more than just a game — they have huge implications for all of us. Because what this seven-year-old dog is sniffing is a selection of samples from a local hospital. And she has just located the only one that came from a cancer patient. Daisy, quite simply, is being taught to sniff out cancer. She is one of the world’s first bio-detection dogs — trained animals that may one day revolutionize medical diagnosis. We all know that dogs have far more powerful noses than humans — indeed their sense of smell is up to 100,000 times better than ours. That skill has, of course, been put to good use for decades, in the form of drug-sniffing dogs at ferry terminals and airports as well as the Army’s bomb detection canines. But, in recent years, a dedicated team of researchers has been developing what is potentially an even greater breakthrough. Earlier this year, German research discovered that dogs could sniff out lung cancer from breath samples of sufferers. The four dogs in the study learned to get it right 71 per cent of the time, far too high to be mere coincidence. Closer to home came the story of British pensioner Maureen Burns, who made headlines when her collie-cross Max started sniffing her breath and nudging her right breast — where it turned out she had a tiny cancerous tumour developing that doctors hadn’t yet picked up. New technology: The research might create new ways of detecting cancer (picture posed by model having a mammogram) A dog that can smell cancer before doctors can diagnose it? If it sounds far-fetched — a case of wishful thinking rather than genuine canine skill — then there is solid scientific theory behind it. It’s believed that cancers produce volatile chemicals that dogs can be trained to smell, which could have dramatic implications for early diagnosis of the disease. Does this mean that at some point in the future, every hospital and GP’s surgery could be equipped with a ‘sniffer dog’ to pounce on anyone who has cancer? No. For now, researchers are simply hoping to prove that if they demonstrate categorically that cancer does have a generic smell, then scientists could work towards creating a machine (known as an ‘electronic nose’) to perform the same function as a dog’s wet nose can: screening breath or urine samples to search for ‘cancer scent’ with even greater ability than specially-trained dogs. Unlike painful biopsies, this would undoubtedly make the process of diagnosis less invasive and far quicker — and more likely to be picked up earlier. As Claire Guest, a specialist in human and animal behavior and the doctor responsible for the British research into cancer sniffer-dogs says: ‘One of the largest misunderstandings we face is that people think we are trying to say that dogs are better than machines — we’re not. ‘There are already machines which act as ‘electronic noses’ that are designed to identify chemicals such as cocaine, and this is what we are trying to do with cancer. A dog's sense of smell is up to 100,000 times better than ours ‘Of course, no dog is going to be 100 per cent — but at the moment there is no machine out there that can do what the dogs are doing. Cancer detection is extremely invasive, so imagine if it could be picked up simply by a urine sample or blowing into a tube?’ Dr Guest has invited me along to spend the day at the headquarters of her trailblazing charity, Medical Detection Dogs, so that I can witness these ‘doctor dogs’ in action. Not only does the center train dogs to sniff cancer, it’s also responsible for training ‘medical alert’ dogs which live with people who have health problems. They have taught 22 dogs to recognize when a diabetic’s blood sugar gets low and alert them to stop hypoglycemia, aid by working out when an attack of sleep paralysis is about to start — and may soon be able to teach dogs to tell when someone with a severe allergy is about to have an allergic episode. This all relates to the same idea — that dogs can recognize the minutest changes in smell when certain processes happen in the human body. ‘We are only at the start of working out everything that dogs can detect,’ Dr Guest says. ‘It would seem that almost any medical event has an odor change. The clever thing is that the dogs are able to work out what the norm is, and when it changes.’ While only a small group of people (mostly diabetics) have benefited from the services of the medical alert dogs so far, it is the charity’s cancer research work that could really make a difference to millions, and I’m here to see what the fuss is all about. On arrival at the center in Buckinghamshire, I’m greeted by a pack of dogs of all shapes and sizes, scampering around on a patch of grass outside like any other beloved pets out for a walk in the sunshine. Shouldn’t life-saving dogs behave a little more seriously? Rob Harris, the training co-coordinator, assures me that this ‘down-time’ is essential. ‘This is their time to come out and refresh their noses. It’s a great place for them to run around,’ he says. The dogs don’t spend every day at the center, but usually come in two or three times a week. They either live with charity workers or full-time dog walkers — none spends its days kenneled. At present, there are ten ‘cancer dogs’ in the training program me, but they’re never all here at once. Today, it is Daisy the Labrador that will demonstrate her skills, but hurtling around her at playtime is Ozzie, an 18-month-old border collie (he has even been to Crufts), Kizzy, a three-year-old cockerspaniel, and two new recruits, Alice, a six-month-old golden retriever, and Midas, seven months old, a Hungarian Vizsla (a breed of sleek red hunting dog). Lifetime project: Dr. Claire Guest who is responsible for the British research into cancer sniffer-dogs has spent almost 20 years working with Hearing Dogs for the Deaf (pictured) Watching over them is the ‘veteran’ of the center, nine-year-old brown Cockerspaniel Tangle. He was one of the original dogs that took part in the first cancer sniffing research in the world when he was little more than a puppy in 2002. So how did it all come about? Dr Guest, it turns out, had long suspected that dogs may have cancer-detecting qualities. Having worked for almost 20 years for Hearing Dogs For The Deaf, she had come across several stories about dogs that had started to display peculiar behavior when their owners had developed early-stage cancer. ‘There seemed to be lots of anecdotal evidence — even a colleague of mine, Gill, told me about how her pet Dalmatian had started licking and sniffing a mole on her leg when she was in her 20s,’ recounts Dr Guest, ‘She couldn’t even be in the same room as the dog. ‘Eventually, she decided to go to the GP to have it removed — and a biopsy revealed it was malignant melanoma, the most aggressive form of skin cancer.’ Dr Guest teamed up with respected surgeon Dr John Church (whose other research has involved bringing back the use of maggots for cleaning wounds) in 2002 to try to prove this phenomenon was more than just coincidence. The results of their study, in which the dogs were 56 per cent accurate, sparked interest around the world. Since then, Dr Guest has been improving methods to make the dogs more accurate (using rewards has brought about the biggest change, perhaps not surprisingly). So far, bladder cancer has been the focal point for testing, but the charity is about to launch a new trial into prostate cancer to broaden their research Time to see it in action. Daisy’s trainer Rob takes me into a white room with the metal carousel in the centre. From a cardboard box, he removes 12 plastic pots, each filled with just 0.5ml of urine. ‘The dogs work with a mix of samples donated by local hospitals,’ he says. ‘Some of the patients are healthy, some have other diseases and one has cancer.’ So far, bladder cancer has been the focal point for testing, but the charity is about to launch a new trial into prostate cancer to broaden their research. Rob knows which sample is the cancerous one — the dogs are simply learning to recognize the scent, rather than diagnosing cancer. He admits that at this stage, no one really knows what compounds in the samples the dogs are detecting — only that it must be there. ‘It’s difficult because, essentially, we are working backwards — we don’t know yet what it is that they can smell, but finding out they can smell something gets us one step closer to identifying it.’ He attaches one vial to each spoke of the carousel, which can be spun around (to avoid the clever dogs working out where the cancer sample is put each time simply by the position). With all 12 in place, Daisy enters with Dr Guest. She is fed a treat (donated Royal Canine food) and then Dr Guest calls: ‘Seek!’ Daisy weaves around the carousel, stopping for half a second at each vial to sniff before she carries on. Then she reaches the sixth position. She stops, sits and stares back at Dr Guest. Only when she hears a ‘click’ from a training device in his hand does she hurry over to her trainer for another reward. So did she get it right? Of course she did — and another four rounds show she is spot on every time. It is staggering to watch. ‘They transform as soon as their red ‘bio-detection’ coats are on — it’s like a uniform,’ says Rob. How on earth did Daisy, and the other cancer dogs, learn to do this? The first step, according to Dr Guest, is picking the right dogs. The dogs need to be very nose-driven — many dogs that live with humans become more reliant on their eyes ‘We look for highly driven dogs that enjoy hunting for the sake of it,’ she explains. ‘Working Labradors, spaniels and collies are often well-suited. 'They need to be very nose-driven — many dogs that live with humans become more reliant on their eyes.’ The dogs tend to come from rescue canters or are donated by breeders who support the charity’s work. When they first show up, often as puppies, they are put through obedience training — dogs can’t be sniffer trained until they can follow and obey voice commands. Next, they start simple scent work and problem-solving — I’m shown a training toy the centre uses which looks like a child’s wooden block game, but different treats can be hidden under the blocks for the puppy to find. After about 14 to 16 months (although they don’t put a time limit on it), the centre moves on to advanced sniffer training using urine samples and the handheld ‘clicker’ which is pressed if the dog identifies the correct cancer sample. ‘It pinpoints the exact time when the dog is doing something you like, and then you reward them afterwards,’ says Dr Guest. ‘They learn that the behavior associated with the click leads to the treat.’ To begin with, they are given ‘high reward’ treats like a piece of smelly cheese or tripe — but as they become more used to it, they move on to more simple dog biscuits and food, or even a tennis ball. These are dogs, after all. Having spent a day at the center, there’s no disputing the incredible talent of these dogs and their trainers. So will they be the key to identifying cancers earlier than any doctor can? It’s early days yet. But so far, the signs are that man’s best friend could turn out to be an even greater asset to mankind.

ANIMALS CAN DETECT CHARACTER OF HUMANS.

Animals-human relationship.Animals can easy detect humans that are mean from those that are loving and caring and respond to them accordingly.A recent document in NATURE,and reported by Helen Shen; capuchin monkey can detect meanies from kind, loving humans. Monkeys stay away from mean people. Capuchin monkeys show biases against humans who deny help to others. After watching humans interact, capuchin monkeys similar to this French Guiana male tended to shun persons who had acted selfishly. When does a monkey turn down a free treat? When it is offered by a selfish person, apparently. Given the choice between accepting goodies from helpful, neutral or unhelpful people, capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella) tend to avoid individuals who refuse aid to others, according to a study published in Nature Communications “Humans can build up an impression about somebody just based on what we see,” says author James Anderson, a comparative psychologist at the University of Stirling, UK. The capuchin results suggest that this skill “probably extends to other species”, he says. Anderson chose to study capuchins because of their highly social and cooperative instincts. Monkeys in the study watched as a person either agreed or refused to help another person to open a jar containing a toy. Afterwards, both people offered a food pellet to the animal. The monkey was allowed to accept food from only one. When help was given, the capuchins showed little preference between the person requesting help and the one providing aid. But when help was denied, the seven monkeys tended to accept food less often from the unhelpful person than from the requester. Picking partners To try to understand the monkeys’ motivations, Anderson and his team tested different scenarios. The animals showed no bias against people who failed to help because they were busy opening their own jar. But they tended to avoid people who were available to help but did not do so. “Explicit refusal to help is a signal that you’re dangerous, that you’re negative,” says Kiley Hamlin, a developmental psychologist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. Similar biases have been shown in chimpanzees and in 3-month-old humans Hamlin says that the capuchin study suggests that being able to identify undesirable social partners has ancient evolutionary roots. Sarah Brosnan, an ethologist at Georgia State University in Atlanta, says that this type of study is usually done with great apes and “it’s really interesting to see this in a monkey”. The findings suggest that social inference may occur in animals that vary widely in brain size and cognitive ability, she explains. But Jennifer Vonk, a comparative psychologist at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan, and an author of the chimpanzee study, cautions against assuming that the monkeys understand much about human character. “You really don’t know what they’re inferring,” she says. In conditions in which both people were given jars, the biases against unhelpful people were weaker, she explains, so stronger tests are needed to rule out possible preferences of the monkeys for people who control objects of interest, such as toys. Still, Vonk says that she is interested in seeing whether other social animals — dogs, for instance — and even non-social species, such as bears, guide their behaviour by watching social interactions. Journal name: Nature

QUAIL! QUAIL!! QUAIL!!!

QUAILS! QUAILS!! QUAILS!!!. Quails are easy to raise as they require little space and are easy to handle. The birds consume less feed but have high feed conversion ratio, with high laying intensity. The quail birds though small are money making machines, every part of them yields money. The birds can be raised for meat, table eggs, fertile eggs, their waste can be processed and sold as fertilizer, and the feathers can also be processed and used as ornaments. Let’s look at the various stages: the females start laying about 6weeks, Let’s assume you keep 300 birds, they will lay 300 eggs a day that is 10 crates a day. This egg laying intensity is to our advantage, as the bird’s consume 25g of feed/day. The birds can be processed at about 8 weeks; they can be smoked and packed for sale. HOUSING. Quails are raised in house or out in the yard.The cages can be wooden or made from iron. The floor is made of wire so that droopings are collected under the cages.The floor is slanted so that eggs are rolled to the front of the cages for easy collection. Feeding. The birds are given good quality feed and water is made available always.vitamins and minerals can be added to the water once a while,but this is of utmost value in hot weather.The birds can be given worms and some green as supplements to the feed.

ROLE OF VET IN NATION BUILDING.

Vet do have roles to play in animal-human health,animal production,researches to further shed light on the animal-human interaction and how to strike a balance to ensure a better world.The importance of animal-human interaction was also discussed by GILBERT S.KAHN IN THE HUFF POST. HE SAID" It has been well-documented that the human-animal connection provides a powerful healing bond. Service and therapy dogs really do enhance our quality of life. A common situation that develops among the elderly is the repercussion of a pet's illness. Often times, this event leads to the pet needing to leave the home. An additional outcome may be that the person ends up in a nursing home with little animal contact, which has been shown to improve their quality of life as well as, at times, their health. The human-animal connection extends into other areas as well. We have a moral obligation to study our companion animals on this planet; it's a practical issue that the animals that serve us, feed us, and take care of us be healthy. In doing so, we must redefine the veterinarian's role. Vets will always be needed to treat cats and dogs. But it is their ability to link animal science to human well-being, advance food production and safety, and provide critical defense from global pandemics that needs to be better understood. It is far and away today's and tomorrow's veterinarians who are best suited to tackle important issues such as these.