Two isolation methods were compared for isolation of Clostridium difficile from food animal feces. The single alcohol shock method (SS) used selective enrichment in cycloserine-cefoxitin fructose broth supplemented with 0.1% sodium taurocholate, followed by alcohol shock and isolation on tryptic soy agar supplemented with 5% sheep blood, and cycloserine-cefoxitin fructose agar. The double alcoh...

Benefits and risks of antimicrobial drugs, used in food-producing animals, continue to be complex and controversial issues. This review comprehensively presents the benefits of antimicrobials drugs regarding control of animal diseases, protection of public health, enhancement of animal production, improvement of environment, and effects of the drugs on biogas production and public health associ...

Alternatives to antibiotics are urgently needed in animal agriculture. The form these alternatives should take presents a complex problem due to the various uses of antibiotics in animal agriculture, including disease treatment, disease prevention, and growth promotion, and to the relative contribution of these uses to the antibiotic resistance problem. Numerous antibiotic alternatives, such as...

The genetic events associated with traditional selection have implications for the food safety of transgenic animals. Selection has been empirical, relying on the use of the best animals for breeding. Molecular techniques are now being used to identify the genes selected and to describe the differences between alleles that are important in selection to improve quantitative traits. The results o...

The connection between eating and healing is common in traditional folk medical systems, and the multiple possibilities resulting from the combination of biodiversity and culture confer a wealth and complexity in terms of knowledge of the flora and fauna as to their potential as food medicine. The growing awareness of the links between traditional therapeutic-alimentary uses of wildlife and con...

Leptin can act as a satiety factor and exert neuroendocrine effects, but most studies have been performed in fasted animals. We aimed to determine the effect of chronic under-nutrition on the response to a 3-day intracerebroventricular infusion of leptin with regard to food intake and the secretion of pituitary hormones. Ovariectomised ewes (n=6) had a mean (+/-s.e.m. ) bodyweight of 56+/-0.8 k...

To survive challenging environments, animals acquired the ability to evaluate food quality in the intestine and respond to nutrient deficiencies with changes in food-response behavior, metabolism and development. However, the regulatory mechanisms underlying intestinal sensing of specific nutrients, especially micronutrients such as vitamins, and the connections to downstream physiological resp...

1. The Food Safety/Public Health Paradigm 2. Economics of Veterinary Public Health 3. Origins of disease 3.1. Domestication and Distribution of Animals 3.2. Early Strategies for Disease Prevention 3.3. Animals as Food Sources 3.4. Control of Live Animals 4. The development of hygiene inspection 4.1. Contamination of Foods of Animal Origin 4.2. Methods to Guarantee Hygiene in Foods of Animal Ori...

1. The Food Safety/Public Health Paradigm 2. Economics of Veterinary Public Health 3. Origins of disease 3.1. Domestication and Distribution of Animals 3.2. Early Strategies for Disease Prevention 3.3. Animals as Food Sources 3.4. Control of Live Animals 4. The development of hygiene inspection 4.1. Contamination of Foods of Animal Origin 4.2. Methods to Guarantee Hygiene in Foods of Animal Ori...

Most people love animals and love eating meat. One way of reducing this conflict is to deny that animals suffer and have moral rights. We suggest that the act of categorizing an animal as 'food' may diminish their perceived capacity to suffer, which in turn dampens our moral concern. Participants were asked to read about an animal in a distant nation and we manipulated whether the animal was ca...