Molly
Molly 3.0
1/24/2007 - Molly 3.0 makes the program much easier to use. Improvements include:
- Diets are now stored in Microsoft Access File (feeds.mdb) which streamlines much of the diet and feed computer code
- The model automatically loads upon startup (no more loading and unloading of the model from the model menu)
- Saving time course of variables is much easier. Duplicates have been eliminated and only data from the most current simulation is shown. Variable names and numbers can be saved to a bland delimited text file which can then be imported into Excel, etc.
- Data can be saved to plot multiple simulations on 1 plot within the program
- Body weights, milk production and nitrogen data can be shown in kg or in lb
- Mouse over any abbreviation for a tooltip label in a pop up box giving the definitions and units of the term.
DESCRIPTION OF SOFTWARE
Molly is a dynamic mechanistic computer simulation model of a dairy cow described in the book Modeling Ruminant Digestion and Metabolism, 1995 by R.L. Baldwin (See publication link). Molly is composed of differential equations that describe metabolism of nutrients using Michaelis-Menton type equations. Molly predicts energy metabolism, nitrogen flow, milk production (including volume, fat and protein), amino acid metabolism (methionine/cysteine, histidine, lysine) and body composition changes over a given time period. Molly is written in a Fortran based language using the ACSL Software (see Publications link).
The Molly software is a windows program (developed by Heidi Rossow) which runs the Molly computer model in a Windows environment. The ACSL software is not required to run simulations. Included in this software are a feed library and the ability to create (not formulate) and save diets, plot simulations, and export data to an Excel spreadsheet. Simulation results are presented in diagrams and a dictionary is included.
DOWNLOAD MOLLY INSTALLATION INSTRUCTIONS .txt file
SAMPLE CLASSROOM HANDOUTS TO SUPPLEMENT PROGRAM USE:
- Dictionary of Terms
- Directions for Introductory Lab (running simulations and making diets)
- Step by Step Directions for BST Lab
- Screenshots of sample simulations (copies bmp files to c:\program_files\molly\screenshots)
This program will take a long time to unpack the bmp files (7 MB)