Farm Animal Metabolism and Nutrition

Preface

ix

There is, once more, a need for an advanced
textbook in animal biochemistry and nutri-
tion that covers the specialist requirements
of final year undergraduates and new post-
graduate students. The existing books have
long become out of date, and currently my
students are directed to reviews published
within the proceedings of various
symposia and workshops. However, this
approach is less than satisfactory as the
reviews are distributed in diverse books
and journals that are both physically and
financially out of reach of these students.
Increasingly these days, libraries resort to
restricted lending of journals containing
up-to-date reviews and, furthermore, the
common practice of holding single copies
of conference proceedings is of limited
value to the large groups of students we
have to teach. Moreover, students still have
the problem of consulting different issues
of journals and conference proceedings to
acquire a comprehensive picture.
In Farm Animal Metabolism and
Nutrition, I have attempted to overcome
most if not all of these limitations by pro-
viding a graduated and structured series of
critical reviews by international experts, at
an affordable price. Current programmes
for final year undergraduate and MSc
courses at Edinburgh form the basis of the
topics selected for this book. In addition,
my choice of subjects has been based on

experience in teaching final year students

at Edinburgh who have at times expressed

difficulty with or particular interest in

specialist topics. The needs of our commer-

cial clients have not been ignored either, as

will be seen from my choice of authors and

review topics. In the rapidly changing and

expansive fields of farm animal metabolism

and nutrition, the limitations of existing

general texts are all too evident. No single

author can be expected to keep abreast of

innovation in all aspects of these fields. I

have attempted to overcome these problems

by selecting authors who are actively pub-

lishing refereed papers and who have an

enviable track record in their respective

specialisms. Furthermore, my collaborating

authors have been selected from major

teaching and research establishments

around the world.

Farm Animal Metabolism and

Nutritionis divided into three sections to

reflect major developments. The first sec-

tion comprises eight chapters within the

theme of ‘Absorption and Metabolism of

Nutrients’. The second section on ‘Feed

Evaluation Methodologies’ contains six

chapters, while the third section on ‘Intake

and Utilization’ is based on five chapters.

Every book attracts both favourable com-

ments and criticism. Fortunately for me,

most reviews of my previous titles have

been positive, and these have been much