NIRS Forage and Feed Testing Consortium
"Dedicated to increasing the accuracy and knowledge of NIRS testing"
The Consortium Annual Meeting and NIRS
Conference was successful in the excellent presentations given by Sam Coleman,
Paolo Berzaghi, Dave Mertens, Don Sapienza, and Pat Hoffman. We were also happy to have the input of
nutritionists and other professionals such as Marcia Endres, John Anderson, Jim
Linn, Hans Jung, Bill Seglar, Randy Shaver, Paul Porter, Glen Broderick, Jim
Halgerson, Paul Peterson, and John Grabber. At this time, Don Sapienza has
compiled details and notes from the white paper discussions at the meeting into
a preliminary white paper draft. This
draft will be circulated to the participating nutritionists at the Annual
Meeting as well as several other animal nutritionists from around the country
for their opinions and input. The
result will be a summary of the state-of-the-art of NIRS instrumentation and
usage, including strengths as well as areas of future research and innovation.
This paper will be written for a wide audience in order to address issues of
NIRS performance that have surfaced in the past.
June, 2000
Instrument
Standardization and Monitoring Program
The NIRS Consortium is moving ahead with
an instrument standardization and monitoring program. At this time, Paolo has visited 5 out of the 6 alfalfa breeders
in Consortium membership in order to standardize their instruments to the new
Consortium Master Instrument located in Madison, WI. Paolo will review the
method of standardization used and determine if it is appropriate for the
remaining Consortium labs. The method used
includes the 30-sample characterization set for multiple products and a
specific standardization for forages using a 14-cell forage set. Alfalfa breeders will then receive a new
check cell set composed of one newly purchased ISI soybean check cell and a new
forage check cell packed and sealed by Paolo.
After reviewing how well the
standardization and check cell set-up goes for the alfalfa breeders, Paolo will
proceed with instrument standardization and set up of new check cells for the
remaining membership. Alfalfa breeder
set up is expected to be completed in June, with visits from Paolo to the
remaining membership beginning in July.
Members are asked to begin submitting
weekly instrument diagnostics by fax or email to Paolo, starting the week of
June 19th. The Consortium will establish a preliminary
database for each lab’s results.
Members are asked to submit results from running (1) the diagnostic test
and (2) the check cell results, on the Monday of each week. Paolo will review the results and report to
each lab. This method of instrument
monitoring will continue until mid to late summer when a website will be
completed in which Consortium members will submit this same information under
secure conditions and automatically receive pass/fail information and suggested
actions to take.
Attached are two documents entitled Instrument Monitoring (Example
1) and Instrument
Monitoring (Example 2) that are examples of a layout that will
appear on the reporting website when it is complete.
Please review the attached document
entitled Instrument
Standardization and Monitoring for specific rational and proposal
for standardization and for monitoring using 2 new check cells.
After reviewing the document Instrument
Standardization and Monitoring, please respond with your lab’s commitment
to participate in this program in the time frame outlined above (Paolo’s visits
beginning in July to commercial labs).
This program will require the purchase of a new ISI soybean check cell
by each lab. Please respond by email to
Patty within one week of receiving this news brief and the attached documents.
RUP Equation Work
Recently the Consortium has reached an
agreement with the UW Soil and Forage Analysis Lab and with Pat Hoffman to
update RUP equations. Originally, the
RUP work by Pat Hoffman was done for research purposes and required a large
number of sample incubations and chemistry analyses. Using the original methods, updating the RUP equations was considered
too costly and lengthy a process. A
simplified plan has been developed, however, that will achieve the RUP update
as well as streamline the in situ procedure.
Along these lines, the Consortium and UW
Soil and Forage Lab, with Pat Hoffman consulting, will also develop an RUP
calibration for fresh cut samples for alfalfa breeders. The timeline for beginning this in situ
procedure will be during July of 2000.
Release of the hay RUP equation is also
expected to take place shortly, as Paolo makes final arrangements.
For further
information on any of these topics, please contact Patty or Paolo.
Patty Laskowski
NIRS Consortium Business Manager
8396 Yellowstone Drive
Marshfield, WI 54449
Ph: 715-387-2523 ext. 3010
Fax: 715-387-1723
Email: mailto:pmlaskowski@facstaff.wisc.edu
Paolo Berzaghi
NIRS Consortium Instrument Specialist
1925 Linden Drive West
Madison, WI 53706
Ph: 608-264-5232
Fax: 608-264-5147