WASHINGTON -- The U.S. Department of Agriculture and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced today that an international consortium of researchers has published the genome of domestic cattle, the first livestock mammal to have its genetic blueprint sequenced and analyzed.

The West Virginia Department of Agriculture (WVDA) is investigating the death of approximately 20 head of cattle in the southern part of the state, and the current prime suspect is toxin contained in reed canarygrass.

The New Zealand Food Safety Authority (NZFSA) has launched its plan to reduce the incidence of Salmonella in food. There are 1,274 cases reported to public health units a year, or 30.2 cases for every 100,000 New Zealanders. NZFSA’s Salmonella risk management strategy spells out a specific programme of work aimed at reducing the incidence of foodborne salmonellosis.

Nine months after Canada's deadly listeria outbreak, there are still questions to be answered about what went wrong. But one thing is clear: the agency in charge of protecting consumers from contaminated food must do a better job.

SACRAMENTO -- State regulators this week finalized looser pesticide rules that environmentalists say will slow efforts to clean the Valley's smoggy air. The Department of Pesticide Regulation will allow more emissions from "fumigants" -- pesticides that are injected into soil to kill pests and disease.

Reporting from Fort Lauderdale, Fla. -- Twenty-one horses that died mysteriously before a U.S. Open polo match received a supplement that probably caused their deaths, a top player for a Venezuelan-owned team told a newspaper, prompting the Food and Drug Administration to join the investigation Wednesday.

A father and mother in Washington state are outraged after their 5-year-old son was sent home from school, allegedly forced to carry a package of human feces along with an embarrassing note from his kindergarten teacher. "This little turd was on the floor in my room," said the note from Susan Graham, an instructor at Apple Valley Elementary School in Yakima, Wash.

Charles Jones describes his 6-year-old son's peanut allergy as "sort of a black cloud everywhere we go." Watson Jones' family never knows where peanut particles might lurk. In the scooper at the ice cream parlor? In the pesto at the pizzeria? On the monkey bars at the playground?

URBANA -- Sales of home-baked goods at Urbana's Market at the Square will no longer be allowed, according to officials with the Champaign-Urbana Public Health District. And that decision is upsetting some longtime vendors and city officials.