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The durability of sows would be affected by their leg soundness. Problems of leg or lameness is the second reason for culling especially in the first three parities. Observing the leg structure during the growth period of pigs is necessary in selection programs because traits related to leg structure have intermediate to low heritability. However, long-term tracking of changes in feet and leg structure of pigs using quantitative measuring methods has not been conducted. Such measuring methods have not yet been applied on farms so far. Thus, this study aimed to use stride length data from pressure mat to evaluate leg soundness in growing gilts. A pressure mat system was used in this study to collect stride length (SL) data and ground reaction force (GRF) data of 23 purebred gilts at 4.5, 6.0, and 7.5 months of age. The SL data obtained in each pig was used to calculate the symmetry index with the SL records of the left and right legs for both front and rear. Similarly, the GRF data enabled the calculation of GRF symmetry index of the left and right leg of a pig for both front and rear. The confusion matrix was applied to compute the accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity by comparing visual inspection of gilt culling or the SL symmetry index to the GRF symmetry index as the standard. The accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity of visual inspection of gilt culling versus GRF symmetry index at 7.5 months of age were 80%, 31%, and 100%, respectively. Meanwhile, the accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity of the SL symmetry index versus GRF symmetry index at 7.5 months of age were 96%, 85%, and 100%, respectively. At 6.0 months of age, such accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity of the SL were 89%, 67%, and 97%, respectively. But, at 4.5 months of age, such accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity of the SL were 87%, 50%, and 97%, respectively. These findings suggest that visual inspection for leg soundness of gilt has limited capability to identify pigs with an asymmetry gait which might cause current and future leg problems. But the SL symmetric index shows better potential for that purpose that it will be a suitable objective measure to replace visual inspection for leg soundness in pigs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Methods to detect the presence of coliform bacteria in drinking water usually involve a series of complex cultivating steps that are time-consuming and subject to external influences. For this reason, the new 16S rRNA probe has been developed in this study as an alternative detector PCR-ELISA technique that does not involve the culture of bacteria and that is able to detect, identify, and quantify the representative coliform species present in water samples. Our results indicate that this technique is both rapid (detection time of 4 h) and accurate (1.4% error rate). The limit of detection (LOD) was 5 CFU/100 ml for total coliforms, which meets the standards set by most countries for drinking water. Our comparative study demonstrated that this PCR-ELISA method is superior to current conventional methods in terms of detection time, LOD, and accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]