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1 (±8.6) per cent. While students found both methods useful, they perceived the use of the smartphone to be significantly more useful (P less then 0.001). Free-text comments on the use of the smartphone were all positive and included 'useful', 'fun' and 'good teaching tool'. CONCLUSIONS This study shows that students positively received the use of the smartphone, which can be a useful tool to teach the equine ocular examination to undergraduate veterinary students. © British Veterinary Association 2020. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.BACKGROUND Neonatal sepsis is a leading cause of neonatal death during the first-week postfoaling. Smad cancer Despite recent advancements in the diagnosis and treatment of sepsis in the newborn foal, the non-specific clinical signs and subtle nature of this disease may result in delayed diagnosis until severe progression of the disease; thus, early detection of sepsis remains critical for a favourable outcome. This study aimed to identify early blood markers as predictive of sepsis on foals. METHODS Thirty-five foals were allocated into three groups healthy control foals (n=7) and foals born from mares with placentitis septic foals (n=9) and non-septic foals (n=19). Blood samples were obtained immediately after foaling and at 12, 24 and 48 hours. All samples were assessed for glucose, lactate, triglycerides, total cholesterol, urea, creatinine, total solids, fibrinogen, gamma-glutamyl transferase (GGT), serum amyloid A (SAA) and alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) concentrations. RESULTS At foaling, glucose and GGT concentrations were lower in septic foals (P less then 0.001). Of interest, SAA, AFP, creatinine and total cholesterol were higher in septic foals at parturition (P less then 0.05). At 12 hours, lactate, triglycerides and total cholesterol concentrations were higher in septic foals. When evaluated at 24 and 48 hours, higher concentrations of SAA and AFP were found in placentitis foals than in the control group. CONCLUSIONS Total cholesterol and lactate appear to be suitable markers for sepsis during the first 24 hours postpartum. Septic foals displayed altered energy metabolisms as determined by increased triglycerides and cholesterol concentrations, hypoglycaemia at birth and reduced activity of the GGT and increased lactate and urea concentrations. Sepsis was associated with high concentrations of SAA and AFP. © British Veterinary Association 2020. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.N6-methyladenosine (m6A) is an abundant post-transcriptional modification that can impact RNA fate via interactions with m6A-specific RNA binding proteins. Despite accumulating evidence that m6A plays an important role in modulating pluripotency, the influence of m6A reader proteins in pluripotency is less clear. Here, we report that YTHDF2, an m6A reader associated with mRNA degradation, is highly expressed in induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and down-regulated during neural differentiation. Through RNA sequencing, we identified a group of m6A-modified transcripts associated with neural development that are directly regulated by YTDHF2. Depletion of YTHDF2 in iPSCs leads to stabilization of these transcripts, loss of pluripotency and induction of neural-specific gene expression. Collectively, our results suggest YTHDF2 functions to restrain expression of neural-specific mRNAs in iPSCs and facilitate their rapid and coordinated upregulation during neural induction. These effects are both achieved by destabilization of the targeted transcripts. Published by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press for the RNA Society.Bacteria accumulate small, organic compounds, called compatible solutes, via uptake from the environment or biosynthesis from available precursors to maintain the turgor pressure of the cell in response to osmotic stress. The halophile Vibrio parahaemolyticus has biosynthesis pathways for the compatible solutes ectoine (ectABCasp_ect) and glycine betaine (betIBAproXWV), four betaine-carnitine-choline transporters (bcct1-bcct4) and a second ProU transporter (proVWX). All of these systems are osmotically inducible with the exception of bcct2. Previously, it was shown that CosR, a MarR-type regulator, was a direct repressor of ectABCasp_ect in Vibrio species. In this study, we investigated whether CosR has a broader role in the osmotic stress response. Expression analyses demonstrated that betIBAproXWV, bcct1, bcct3, bcct4 and proVWX are repressed in low salinity. Examination of an in-frame cosR deletion mutant showed expression of these systems is de-repressed in the mutant at low salinity compared to wild-typeticus can accumulate compatible solutes via biosynthesis and transport, which allow the cell to survive in high salinity conditions. There is little need for compatible solutes under low salinity conditions, and biosynthesis and transporter systems need to be repressed. However, the mechanism(s) of this repression is not known. In this study, we showed that CosR played a major role in the regulation of multiple compatible solute systems. Phylogenetic analysis showed that CosR is present in all members of the Vibrionaceae family as well as numerous Gamma-Proteobacteria Collectively, these data establish CosR as a global regulator of the osmotic stress response that is widespread in bacteria, controlling many more systems than previously demonstrated. Copyright © 2020 American Society for Microbiology.Gastrointestinal (GI) or gut microbiota play essential roles in host development and physiology. These roles are influenced partly by microbial community composition. During early developmental stages, ecological processes underlying the assembly and successional changes in host GI community composition are influenced by numerous factors including dispersal from the surrounding environment, age-dependent changes in the gut environment, and changes in dietary regimes. However, the relative importance of factors to gut microbiota are not well understood. We examined effects of environmental (diet and water sources) and host early ontogenetic development on diversity and compositional changes in gut microbiota of a primitive teleost fish, the lake sturgeon (Acipenser fulvescens), based on massively parallel sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene. Fish larvae were raised in environments that differed in water source (stream vs filtered groundwater) and diet (supplemented vs non-supplemented Artemia). We quantified gut microbial community structure at three stages (pre-feeding, one, and two weeks after exogenous feeding began).