Aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) produced by Aspergillus flavus is known to have carcinogenic and teratogenic effects on animal health. Accidental feeding of AFB1-contaminated rice straw may be detrimental to dairy cattle. White-rot basidiomycetous fungus Pleurotus ostreatus can grow on different agronomic wastes by synthesizing different ligninolytic enzymes. These extracellular enzymes are capable of degr...

Bulk density is one of the important engineering property of biomass having significant impact on the supply logistics and processing in ethanol production facilities using lignocellulosic materials. Bulk density of most of the comminuted biomass significantly increased by tapping. Switchgrass, wheat straw and corn stover were chopped in a knife mill at different operating conditions including ...

Soil erosion is a growing challenge for agricultural production in Northern China. To explore the effect of variation in stubble height and mulching biomass on soil erosion caused by wind, we conducted a field experiment using a quadratic rotation combination design. Results showed that the quantity of straw mulch was the dominant factor affecting soil erosion, and stubble height was of seconda...

The experiment was conducted for a period of 75 days to study the effect of treatment of straw with urea or with urea and a urease containing chick pea seed meal and midden soil on chemical composition of treated rice straw, feed intake of the animals, nutrients digestibility, body weight gain, and feed conversion efficiency. For the study twelve indigenous growing bulls aged approximately 20 m...

The present study was conducted to 1) identify the natural source of feed contamination by zearalenone (ZEN), which was suspected to have caused persistently increased urinary ZEN concentrations in one of our experimental cattle herds, and 2) evaluate the effects of intervention against this source of contamination. As an experimental model, a fattening Japanese Black cattle herd showing persis...

Introduction Common ragweed (Ambrosia artemisiifolia L.) or simply ambrosia is an annual shrub of North American origin. It has been present in Europe since ~1860 (HEGI, 1908) arriving probably through polluted clover seed grains and hay and straw from North America. Highly infested regions in Europe are the French Rhone valley, the Italian Po valley and some former Yugoslavian states, as well ...

Use of alkali-pretreated rice straw and untreated rice straw as substrates for enzyme production under solid-state cultivation was investigated. Cellulase produced from untreated rice straw showed higher activity of FPase, CMCase, β-glucosidase, and xylanase at 6.25 U/g substrate, 111.31 U/g substrate, 173.71 U/g substrate, and 433.75 U/g substrate respectively, as compared to 1.72 U/g substrat...

An important issue in the use of expert sys­ tems is the so-called brittleness problem. Ex­ pert systems model only a limited part of the world. While the explicit management of uncertainty in expert systems mitigates the brittleness problem, it is still possible for a system to be used, unwittingly, in ways that the system is not prepared to address. Such a situation may be detected by the met...

The objective of this study was to evaluate properties of experimental particleboard panels manufactured from wheat straw that had been pretreated with acetic anhydride, soapy solution, hot water, or steam. Wheat straw particles were mixed with commercially manufactured wood particles at a ratio of 60%. Control straw particleboards with non-treated straw and wood particles were also produced. T...

Based on the carbon-nitrogen cycles and greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation and emission processes related to straw return and burning, a compound greenhouse gas budget model, the "Straw Return and Burning Model" (SRBM), was constructed to estimate the net mitigation potential of straw return to the soil in China. As a full GHG budget model, the SRBM addressed the following five processes: (1) soil...