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Hintergrund: Das Fachgebiet Allgemeinmedizin überschneidet sich inhaltlich mit nahezu jeder anderen medizinischen Fachrichtung. Im hausärztlichen Alltag sind internistische Erkrankungen ebenso relevant wie dermatologische, gynäkologische oder sozialmedizinische Beratungsanlässe. [zum vollständigen Text gelangen Sie über die oben angegebene URL]

At onset of milk production and in early lactation highly producing dairy cows are most susceptible for inflammatory diseases due to functional suppression of immune cells. Intensive supervision of the animals is essential and implementation of new technologies to on-farm routines will be the next step to provide automation and improvement of herd health monitoring programs. Objective of our study was to identify and validate immunological biomarkers in milk that indicate extra-mammary inflammatory diseases to characterize the general health status of highly-producing dairy cows. In total 89 healthy and 75 diseased animals (German Holstein cows) were included. Diseases were distinguished by either systemic (extra-mammary) occurrence or those affecting the mammary gland (mastitis) and further classified by their severity. For protein biomarker discovery we used a top-down approach to narrow down a broad range of secreted gene products of the milk cell transcriptome (microarray) and proteome to a few promising candidates which were validated using real-time PCR and ELISA. The most promising biomarker candidates were statistically evaluated. Receiver operating characteristic analysis revealed haptoglobin, secretory component, lactoferrin and vascular endothelial growth factor showing the highest discriminatory capability for diseased vs. healthy cows. Values for sensitivity at a specificity of 94% were 82% for haptoglobin, 59% for secretory component,55% for lactoferrin and 67% for vascular endothelial growth factor. Statistical evaluation by multinomial logistic regression and k-nearest neighbor method confirmed haptoglobin as the best single-use biomarker. In combination with secretory component or lactoferrin an increase in overall sensitivity or specificity, depending on the classification method, could be achieved. The application of the validated health biomarkers in combination with an easy high-throughput detection system would offer a solution to adapt dairy herd management to changing requirements on animal welfare, farming efficiency, milk supply, and food safety in modern agriculture.

We consider the evolution of a system composed of $N$ non-interacting point particles of mass $m$ in a container divided in two regions by a movable adiabatic wall (adiabatic piston). In this talk we discuss the thermodynamic limit where the area $A$ of the container, the number $N$ of particles, and the mass $M$ of the piston go to infinity keeping $\frac{A}M $ and $\frac{N}M $ fixed. We show that in this limit the motion of the piston is deterministic. Introducing simplifying assumptions we discuss the approach to equilibrium and we illustrate the results with numerical simulations. The comparison with the case of a system with finite $(A, N, M)$ will be presented. We consider the evolution of a system composed of $N$ non-interacting point particles of mass $m$ in a container divided in two regions by a movable adiabatic wall (adiabatic piston). In this talk we discuss the thermodynamic limit where the area $A$ of the container, the number $N$ of particles, and the mass $M$ of the piston go to infinity keeping $\frac{A}M $ and $\frac{N}M $ fixed. We show that in this limit the motion of the piston is deterministic. Introducing simplifying assumptions we discuss the approach to equilibrium and we illustrate the results with numerical simulations. The comparison with the case of a system with finite $(A, N, M)$ will be presented., 7 pages, 3 figures, submitted to Physica A

We consider the evolution of a system composed of $N$ non-interacting point particles of mass $m$ in a cylindrical container divided into two regions by a movable adiabatic wall (the adiabatic piston). We study the thermodynamic limit for the piston where the area $A$ of the cross-section, the mass $M$ of the piston, and the number $N$ of particles go to infinity keeping $A/M$ and $N/M$ fixed. The length of the container is a fixed parameter which can be either finite or infinite. In this thermodynamic limit we show that the motion of the piston is deterministic and the evolution is adiabatic. Moreover if the length of the container is infinite, we show that the piston evolves toward a stationary state with velocity approximately proportional to the pressure difference. If the length of the container is finite, introducing a simplifying assumption we show that the system evolves with either weak or strong damping toward a well-defined state of mechanical equilibrium where the pressures are the same, but the temperatures different. Numerical simulations are presented to illustrate possible evolutions and to check the validity of the assumption., 33 pages, 4 figures, to appear in J. Stat. Phys