Biology of Stress in Farm Animals: An Integrative Approach

This book contains the contributions to a workshop on stress in farm animals held on April 17-18,1986 at the Pietersberg Con­ ference Centre Oosterbeek. The workshop was financed by the Commis­ sion of the European Communities from its budget for the coordina­ tion of Community Agricultural Research and the Agricultural Uni­ versity of Wageningen (The Netherlands). Its aim was to bring together experts from different disciplines all having in common that in one way or another they were involved in stress research. Such a multidisciplinary encounter should not only provide an interesting description of present day knowledge on stress, but also promote a more integrated view on stress phenomena as they occur in higher vertebrates. In the course of this workshop the following fields of research were related to stress: endocrinology, immunology, pathology, neurobiology, ethology and theoretical bio­ logy. Each of these relationships was introduce& by one speaker presenting a concise state of the art. The same relationship was elaborated by a second speaker implementing the available knowledge as far as possible to the farm animal situation. Therefore in this book each discipline is represented by a duo and introduced by some integrating remarks.

Contenu

Session I: Stress and Endocrinology.- Endocrine Aspects of Stress: Central and Peripheral Mechanisms.- Endocrine Aspects of Stress: Evaluation of Stress Reactions in Farm Animals.- Session II: Stress and Immunology.- Stress and the Immune System.- Effects of Behavioural and Physical Stressors on Immune Responses.- Session III: Stress and Pathology.- Physiology of Stress: A Behavioural View.- Organ Change and Damage during Stress. Morphological Diagnosis.- Session IV: Stress and Neurobiology.- The Neurobiology of Stress Response Control.- Applications of Neurobiological Studies to Farm Animal Welfare.- Session V: Stress and Behaviour.- Behavioural Aspects of Stress.- Behavioural Responses to Stress in Farm Animals.- Session VI: Stress Models and Theory.- The Relevance of Models of Motivation and Learning to Animal Welfare.- The Place of Behaviour in Physiology.- List of participants.