Category: Uncategorized

For a century, researchers have tracked genetic traits to find out which cattle produce more and better milk and meat. Now, two University of Florida scientists will use artificial intelligence to analyze millions of bits of genetic data to try to keep cattle cooler and thus, more productive.

High-impact research is in full swing on the University of Florida’s powerful supercomputer, with faculty and students from across the State University System using HiPerGator ⁠— one of the smartest machines in the world — to advance critical work in areas including the environment, technology and medicine.

E. O. Wilson once referred to invertebrates as “the little things that run the world,” without whom “the human species [wouldn’t] last more than a few months.” Although small, invertebrates have an outsized influence on their environments, pollinating plants, breaking down organic matter and speeding up nutrient cycling. And what they lack in stature, they make up for in diversity. With more than one million known species, insects alone vastly outnumber all other invertebrates and vertebrates combined.

The patient arrived with a bladder stone, grimacing in pain and moping about.

He wouldn’t even chew his cud.

The patient, you see, was a goat. And while treated for his bladder stone — a common ailment in the small ruminants — he was also contributing to new research that aims to accurately measure pain not only in goats, but other domestic animals as well and even, one day, in people.