• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.13 no.11
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• pp.1619-1637
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• 2000

A review was undertaken to obtain information on the range of beak-trimming methods available or under development. Beak-trimming of commercial layer replacement pullets is a common yet critical management tool that can affect the performance for the life of the flock. The most obvious advantage of beak-trimming is a reduction in cannibalism although the extent of the reduction in cannibalism depends on the strain, season, and type of housing, flock health and other factors. Beak-trimming also improves feed conversion by reducing food wastage. A further advantage of beak-trimming is a reduction in the chronic stress associated with dominance interactions in the flock. Beak-trimming of birds at 7-10 days is favoured by Industry but research over last 10 years has shown that beak-trimming at day-old causes the least stress on birds and efforts are needed to encourage Industry to adopt the practice of beak-trimming birds at day-old. Proper beak-trimming can result in greatly improved layer performance but improper beak-trimming can ruin an other wise good flock of hens. Re-trimming is practiced in most flocks, although there are some flocks that only need one trimming. Given the continuing welfare scrutiny of using a hot blade to cut the beak, attempts have been made to develop more welfare friendly methods of beak-trimming. Despite the developments in design of hot blade beak-trimmers the process has remained largely unchanged. That is, a red-hot blade cuts and cauterises the beak. The variables in the process are blade temperature, cauterisation time, operator ability, severity of trimming, age of trimming, strain of bird and beak length. This method of beak-trimming is still overwhelmingly favoured in Industry and there appears to be no other alternative procedures that are more effective. Sharp secateurs have been used trim the upper beak of both layers and turkeys. Bleeding from the upper mandible ceases shortly after the operation, and despite the regrowth of the beak a reduction of cannibalism has been reported. Very few differences have been noted between behaviour and production of the hot blade and cold blade cut chickens. This method has not been used on a large scale in Industry. There are anecdotal reports of cannibalism outbreaks in birds with regrown beaks. A robotic beak-trimming machine was developed in France, which permitted simultaneous, automated beak-trimming and vaccination of day-old chicks of up to 4,500 chickens per hour. Use of the machine was not successful because if the chicks were not loaded correctly they could drop off the line, receive excessive beak-trimming or very light trimming. Robotic beak-trimming was not effective if there was a variation in the weight or size of chickens. Capsaicin can cause degeneration of sensory nerves in mammals and decreases the rate of beak regrowth by its action on the sensory nerves. Capsaicin is a cheap, non-toxic substance that can be readily applied at the time of less severe beak-trimming. It suffers the disadvantage of causing an extreme burning sensation in operators who come in contact with the substance during its application to the bird. Methods of applying the substance to minimise the risk to operators of coming in contact with capsaicin need to be explored. A method was reported which cuts the beaks with a laser beam in day-old chickens. No details were provided on the type of laser used, or the severity of beak-trimming, but by 16 weeks the beaks of laser trimmed birds resembled the untrimmed beaks, but without the bill tip. Feather pecking and cannibalism during the laying period were highest among the laser trimmed hens. Currently laser machines are available that are transportable and research to investigate the effectiveness of beak-trimming using ablasive and coagulative lasers used in human medicine should be explored. Liquid nitrogen was used to declaw emu toes but was not effective. There was regrowth of the claws and the time and cost involved in the procedure limit the potential of using this process to beak-trim birds.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.291-298
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• 2008

For many years beak trimming has been a controversial subject, particularly since the 1980's when the practice came under close scrutiny by animal welfare groups. In Australia it is considered an essential practice, averting losses of AUD$17.5m annually by reducing mortality from cannibalism. While mortality in flocks from cannibalism can be reduced from 25% of the flock to virtually nil, the beak trimming procedure is considered traumatic for the bird. This study examined if chronic pain in the beak was evident in birds 10, 20 and 60 weeks after being trimmed at hatch and in another group of birds, 8 and 52 weeks after being re-trimmed at 14 weeks. Chronic pain was assessed by measuring pecking behaviour and beak sensitivity responses. Pecking behaviour studies completed after beak trimming and re-trimming showed no evidence to indicate that birds were suffering severe chronic pain in the beak. Beak trimmed pullets pecked more at the cage and had more toe pecks, yet overall pecks made at the feed and the environment were no different than untrimmed controls. While the beak sensitivity studies provided evidence that the beak of birds trimmed at hatch and also re-trimmed at 14 weeks may be more sensitive there was no evidence that re-trimming resulted in a more sensitive beak than birds trimmed at hatch only. These studies have shown that birds which are beak trimmed and re-trimmed return to apparently normal feeding and pecking behaviour in the long term. However, there was limited evidence that beaks of trimmed birds have an altered threshold to potentially painful stimuli.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.443-448
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• 2008

Beak trimming in laying hens is a routine practice in which about 1/3-1/2 of the upper and lower beak is removed with the aim of reducing cannibalism. This experiment aimed to identify if this procedure causes pain by examining self-administration of an analgesic (carprofen) and pecking behaviour in 80 laying pullets beak-trimmed by two different methods at one day of age using hot-blade cauterisation or infra-red cauterisation. We also tested a control treatment, pullets with intact beaks, and a positive control treatment of pullets beak trimmed at 10 weeks of age which were expected to experience some pain due to recent severing of the underlying nerves in the beak. At 11 weeks of age birds trimmed at 10 weeks of age pecked more (p<0.001) gently ($0.6{\pm}0.06N$) at a disc attached to a force-displacement transducer than birds trimmed at 1 day of age with an infra-red machine ($0.9{\pm}0.1N$) or a hot blade ($1.1{\pm}0.07N$) and intact birds ($1.2{\pm}0.1N$). Maximum force of pecks recorded was also lower (p<0.001) in birds trimmed at 10 weeks of age than birds trimmed at 1 day of age with an infra-red method or a hot blade and intact birds. However, the pecking force in birds trimmed at 10 weeks of age was not increased by providing them with analgesic-treated feed, though birds that ate more carprofen had a higher maximum force of peck (p = 0.03). Pecking force in birds beak-trimmed at 1 day of age was the same as the pecking force of intact birds, and was unaffected by feeding pullets carprofen. A method of self-administration of an analgesic had previously revealed that chickens in neuromuscular pain arising from lameness consumed more of a feed containing carprofen than healthy chickens. However, we found no evidence that beak-trimmed pullets consumed more carprofen-treated feed than pullets with an intact beak. It should be noted that the three beak trimming methods resulted in an average 34% reduction in beak length, considered a light trim, and is perhaps not representative of commercial birds where greater portions of the beak are removed. We conclude that although carprofen has been reported to have an analgesic effect on neuromuscular pain in chickens, it appears to have no analgesic effect on potential neuropathic pain arising from the nerves severed by a light beak trim.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Telematics and Electronics
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.91-95
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• 1990

We study the process for the reduction of bird's beak at LOCOS processing with changing the representative coefficients, oxide thickness, silicon nitride thickness, oxidetion temperature and field oxide thickness that induced the condition of bird'beak. In order to eliminate the gate oxide defects induced by selective oxidation, we used additional sacrific oxidatio. Finally we obtained the length of bird's beak to be 5000\ulcornerby SEM.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Telematics and Electronics A
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• v.31A no.12
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• pp.106-114
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• 1994

The local oxidation of silicon (LOCOS) technology, which uses a silicon nitride film as an oxidation mask and a pad oxide beween the silicon nitride and the silicon substrate, has been widely used in integrated circuits for process simplicity. But, due to long brid's beak length, there are difficulties in scabilities. Many advanced isolation techniques have been wuggested for the feduction of bird's beak length. In this paper, we presented reduced bird's beak length using the polybuffered oxide and the silicon nitride as the sidewall. Also, investigating the electrical behavior of the parasitic Al-gate MOSFET on LOCOS, we proved the validity for new isolation process.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 1987.07a
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• pp.416-419
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• 1987

The miniaturization of Bird's Beak generated at the field oxidation has been studied by adding polysilicon layer between the silicon nitride and pad oxide stack, which is the basic structure of Conventional LOCOS. The size and shape of Bird's Beak were intensively observed by SEM, and also the electrical characteristics of Bird's Beak-reduced LOCOS structure were compared with those of Conventional LOCOS. The length of Bird's Beak was reached up to $0.20-0.28{\mu}m$, while about to $0.50-0.53{\mu}m$ in conventional LOCOS, resulting in 60% reduction.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.112-115
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• 2011

To stabilize the electric characteristic of Silicon Thin Film Transistor, reducing the current leakage is most important issue. To reduce the current leakage, many ideas were suggested. But the increase of mask layer also increased the cost. On this research Bird's Beak process was use to present element. Using Silvaco simulator, it was proven that it was able to reduce current leakage without mask layer. As a result, it was possible to suggest the structure that can reduce the current leakage to 1.39nA without having mask layer increase. Also, I was able to lead the result that electric characteristic (on/off current ratio) was improved compare from conventional structure.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 1987.07a
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• pp.429-432
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• 1987

A new LOCOS (Local Oxidation of Silicon) process using a thin nitride film directly deposited on the silicon substrate by LPCVD has been developed in order to reduce the bird's beak length. SEM studies showed that nitride thickness of 50nm can decrease the bird's beak length down to 0.2um with 450nm field oxide. No crystalline defects are observed around the bird's beak after the Wright etch. A 30% improvement in current density was obtained when this new method was applied to MOS transistors (W/L*2.9/20.4) compared to conventional LOCOS process (bird's beak length=0.7um). Other various electrical parameters improved by this new simple LOCOS process are reported in this paper.

• Korean Journal of Poultry Science
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• v.50 no.4
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• pp.213-229
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• 2023

This study aimed to investigate the effects of beak trimming and crossbreeding-combinations on the productive performance and stress response levels of Korean native chickens. The study divided 248 individuals from six crossbreeding-combinations into two groups: one underwent beak trimming, and the other did not. The survival rate, body weight, egg production rate, egg quality, feather damage score, HSP-70 gene expression level, H/L ratio, and intracellular DNA damage rate were measured and analyzed. The results showed that the beak-trimmed group had significantly higher survival rates and hen-housed egg production compared to the non-beak-trimmed group (P<0.05). Feather damage and DNA damage rates were significantly lower in the beak-trimmed group (P<0.05). On the other hand, there were no significant differences between the two groups in adult body weight, hen-day egg production, egg quality, HSP-70 gene expression level, and H/L ratio. Among the crossbreeding-combinations, there were significant differences in survival rate, body weight, feather damage score, egg quality, and DNA damage rate (P<0.05), while egg production rate, HSP-70 gene expression level, and H/L ratio showed no significant differences. There was an interaction between beak trimming and crossbreeding-combinations in some traits. In conclusion, beak trimming in Korean native chickens has a positive impact on productive performance, and in terms of stress response, beak trimming may not act as a stress factor or may even reduce stress after the growing period. Furthermore, there were differences in productive performance and stress response levels among crossbreeding-combinations, but the effects of beak trimming were similar across these combinations.

• Research in Plant Disease
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.159-161
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• 2003

Leaf spot diseases were found on safflower (Carthamus thinctorius) leaf in several fields located in Euisong-Gun, Gyengbuk province in Korea. The infected leaf rate of the diseases in surveyed area were different each years from 2001 to 2003 such as about 5%, 10%, and 30%, repectively. The typicla symptoms of diseases appeared first as small, light brown spots on leaves. And then spot turn dark brown and magnified. And yellow decoloration zone appeared surrounding dark brown spots. Mycological characteristics of Alternaria carthami, isolated from safflower mature leaf spot were dark gray colonies, conidiophores simple erect, septated, 40~80 ${\mu}m$ length; conidia solitary, straight, body size fo without beak length 40~100${\mu}m$, 10~15${\mu}m$ thick, Number of transverse septa 4~10 and longitudinal septa 4~7 ; beak with 2~4 septa, 30~65${\mu}m$ length. And A. alternata, isolated from old leaf were gray~dark gray colonies, conidiophores simple or branched, 20~110 ${\mu}m$ length; conidia long chaines, short conical or cylindrical beak, 2~6 transverse septa and several longitudinal septa, body size of without beak length 30~60 ${\mu}m$, 10~20 ${\mu}m$ thick ; beak length 5~35 ${\mu}m$. These are the first report on the leaf spot of safflower caused by Alternaria carthami, A alternata in Korea.