Study of heterosis in single-cross hybrids of sunflower

    This study was conducted to estimate the genetic variability and heterosis of 40 F1 hybrids of sunflower for seed yield and its components over two seasons (summer and winter) in 2007 at Sennar Research Station Farm in central Sudan. The plant material consisted of 14 sunflower parents            (4 females and 10 males) and their 40 F1-hybrids. The experiment was arranged in a randomized complete block design with three replicates. The traits measured were days to 50% flowering, plant height, head diameter, number of seeds per head, one thousand seed weight and seed yield.  Hybrids showed high genetic variability for all traits studied than their parents which suggested some degree of hybrid vigor. The direction and magnitude of heterosis varied from cross to cross. Over two seasons, the average mid-parent heterosis in preferred direction and magnitude depicted that the hybrid SA2 x SR41 followed by SA3 x SR41 for days to flowering, SA1 x SR14 for plant height, SA2 x SR14 for head diameter, SA2 x SR13 followed by SA3 x SR13 for number of seeds per head, and SA3 x SR7 for one thousand seed weight. With regard to seed yield, the best hybrids with positive average heterosis were SA3 x SR41 (53.42%), SA4 x SR45 (52.75%), SA4 x SR1 (52.25%) and SA3 x SR10 (40.63%) which also combined with high seed yield of 1581 kg/ha, 1479 kg/ha, 1474 kg/ha, and 1457 kg/ha, respectively. These hybrids (involving the female line SA3 or SA4 and the male lines (SR10, SR13, SR41 and SR45) can be used in our breeding program in an attempt to develop local sunflower hybrid (s) with high seed yield and other important agronomic traits and for testing their yield potential and stability across locations and seasons.  أجريت هذه الدراسة بهدف تقدير التباين الوراثي و قوة الهجن  للإنتاجية ومكوناتها لأربعين هجين مفرد من محصول زهرة الشمس، نتجت من تهجين أربعة أمهات ذات عقم ذكرى سايتوبلازمى مع عشرة آباء معيدة للخصوبة. أجريت التجربة بمحطة بحوث سنار فى وسط السودان بالقطاع المروي لموسين             (صيف وشتاء2007). أستخدم تصميم القطاعات العشوائية الكاملة بثلاثة مكررات. كانت الصفات المدروسة هى عدد الايام حتى 50% إزهار، طول النبات، قطر القرص، عدد البذور بالقرص، وزن الآلف حبة، وانتاج البذور. أظهرت النتائج فروقات معنوية لكل الصفات في الموسمين مع تفوق الهجن وتباينها وراثياً مقارنة بالآباء. وفي التحليل المشترك لحساب قوة الهجين لكل الصفات كنسبة زيادة أو نقصان من متوسط الأبويين، ظهر أنّ الهــجينينSA2 x SR41  وSA3 x SR 41 هما الأفضل للإزهار والنضج المبكر، الهجين SA1 x SR14 لطول النبات، الهـجين SA2 x SR14 لقطر القرص ، الهجينين SA2 x SR13  و SA3 x SR13 لعدد البذور بالقرص، الهجين SA3 x SR7 لوزن الألف بذرة. أما بخصوص إنتاجية البذور أظهرت بعض الهجن نسبة قوة هجين موجبة SA3 x SR41 ) (53.42%، (52.73% ) SA4 x SR45،   SA4 x SR1   (52.25%)و SA3 x SR10 ((40.63% وإنتاجية بذور تقدر بـ 1581 كيلوجرام للهكتار، 1479 كيلوجرام للهكتار، 1474 كيلوجرام للهكتار و1459 كيلوجرام للهكتار علي التوالي. ويستنتج من هذه الدراسة ان الهجن التي يدخل في تركبيها الأم SA3 أو الأم SA4 مع الآباء SR41 ، SR45، SR13      و SR10 هى هجن متفوقة لإنتاجية البذور والصفات الأخرى ، ويمكن استخدام تلك الأمهات والآباء في تطوير هجن محلية مفردة من محصول الزهرة واختبار ثبات إنتاجيتها عبر المواسم والمواقع المختلفة

Correlation Between the Total Small Bowel Length and Anthropometric Measures in Living Humans : Cross-Sectional Study

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Combining ability analysis for seed yield and its components in sesame

    Sesame (Sesamum indicum L.) experiments, were carried out in central Sudan during the rainy season of 2009 at two locations (Abu Naama and Sinnar). The hybridization plan consisted of seven male and seven female parents giving 49 crosses following line x tester arrangement. Treatments were arranged in a randomized complete block design with three replicates. The crosses and their parents were sown on the 7th of July for all the experiments at both locations. The traits measured were days to 50% flowering, days to maturity, plant height, number of capsules per plant, number of seeds per capsule, capsule length, 1000-seed weight and seed yield. Analysis of variance revealed that genetic variability was highly significant for all the characters studied at both locations and across them. Combining ability analysis showed that additive gene effects were important for inheritance of days to 50% flowering, plant height, number of capsules/plant, number of seeds per capsule, capsule length, 1000-seed weight, days to maturity and seed yield, whereas non-additive gene effects were important for number of seeds/capsule, indicating that the inheritance of this trait is due to specific combining ability (SCA). Combining ability analysis showed that parents, L7, L5, T2, T5 and T6 were good combiners for high seed yield as well as for most of the other traits measured in this study. Assessment of SCA effects for seed yield at Abu-Namma revealed that hybrid T4 x L4 had a maximum positive SCA effect and a high per se performance followed by T2 x L2, T5 x L5 and T6 x L3, while at Sinnar T6 x L6 had the highest positive SCA effects followed by T6 xL3, T1 x L5 and T2 x L6. However T6 x L3, T1 x L5, T4 x L2 and T2 x L1 exhibited the highest SCA effects across sites. The present study suggested hybrids T6 x L3, T1 x L5 and T4 x L2 to be tested in multi-location trials for commercial utilization, while, parents L7, L5, T2 and T6 can be used in recurrent selection.    أجريت هذه التجارب في السودان أثناء الفصل الممطر عام 2009 في أبو نعامة وسنار بإتباع تحليل سلالة x مختبر line x tester analysis)) والذي شمل سبعة آباء ذكورmale parents)) وسبعة أباء اناث  (female parents) معطية 49 هجيناً. أستخدم تصميم القطاعات العشوائية الكاملة بثلاث مكررات. زرعت التجارب في يوم 7 يوليو 2009 في كلا الموقعين. الصفات التي تمت دراستها شملت عدد الأيام حتى 50% إزهار، عدد الأيام حتى النضج، طول النبات، عدد الكبسولات في النبات، عدد البذور في الكبسولة، طول الكبسولة، وزن 1000 بذرة وإنتاجية البذور. أظهر تحليل التباين وجود فروق معنوية لكل الصفات المدروسة في الموقعين. أظهر تحليل القدرة علي التالف أن تأثيرات الفعل الإضافي للجين كانت أهم لتوريث صفات عدد الأيام حتى 50% إزهار، طول النبات، ارتفاع أول كبسولة، ارتفاع أول فرع، عدد الفروع في النبات، عدد الكبسولات في النبات، طول الكبسولة، عدد الأيام حتى النضج، وزن 1000 بذرة و إنتاجية البذور كما كانت تأثيرات الفعل الجيني غير الإضافي مهمة في توريث صفة عدد البذور في الكبسولة وهذه النتيجة تشير بان السيادة وتفاعلات التفوق تتحكم في تلك الصفة. أظهرت تأثيرات القدرة العامة للاتحاد إن الآباء L7  T5, T2, L5,و  T6كانت الأفضل قدرة على الاتحاد لإنتاج البذور بالإضافة لأغلب الصفات الأخرى في التحليل المشترك. الهجن التي أظهرت أعلى قوة  هجين في أبونعامة T5 x L5, T2 x L2, T4 x L4 وT6 x L3 ، بينما في سنار T6 x L6, T6 x L3, T2 x L6 و T1 x L5وعبر الموقعين  T6 x L3, T1 x L5, ,T4xL2 وT2 x L1. وجد أن هناك ارتباطاً موجباً لإنتاجية البذور لكل من وزن 1000 بذرة ، عدد الكبسولات في النبات وعدد الأيام حتى النضج. اقترحت الدراسة الحالية إن الهجنT1 x L5, T6 x L3  وT6 x L7 لإنتاج البذور أما الآباء T4، T1 ، L6و T6  فيمكن استخدامهم في التهجين الرجع

Vegetative description of three Aquilaria (Thymelaeaceae) saplings in Malaysia

Plants` reproductive parts are most important for species identification. However, trees such as Aquilaria species take many years to mature and produce flowers and fruits. Inconsistent and infrequent flowering periods may cause additional hindrance to classical identification. In this study, descriptions were made based on vegetative parts such as leaf, branch and bark for saplings of three Aquilaria species found in Malaysia. It was found that A. hirta sapling can be recognized through the densely hairy twigs, young shoots and axillary buds, undersurface of leaf, margin, petiole and midrib besides the strongly raised midrib, and usually unbranched habit; A. malaccensis through the many branches and white spots along main axis, entire leaf margin, slightly hairy leaf undersurface and midrib, and glabrous petiole; Aquilaria sp.1 from the lower branches that are nearly perpendicular to the stem and wavy leaf margin. These vegetative characters can serve as a basis for the correct identification of Aquilaria saplings when growers need to confirm their planting materials

Co-processing of drugs and co-crystal formers and its effect on pharmaceutical dosage-form performance. Co-crystallization of urea/ 2-methoxybenzamide, caffeine/ malonic acid, caffeine/ oxalic acid and theophylline/ malonic acid systems: Solid-state characterization including imaging, thermal, X-ray and Raman spectroscopic techniques with subsequent evaluation of tableting behaviour

This dissertation has focused on the solid-state characterization of different co-crystal system as well as the effect of co-crystallization of these systems on pharmaceutical dosage form performance. Urea/ 2-MB, caffeine/ malonic acid, caffeine/ oxalic acid and theophylline/ malonic acid co-crystals were prepared using co-grinding- and co-precipitation techniques. In addition, the synthesis of co-crystals through two novel methods has been demonstrated. This includes compaction and convection mixing. The solid-state characterization of the co-crystals has been carried out using XRPD, Raman spectroscopy, DSC, TGA, hot-stage microscopy and SEM. After preparation of co-crystals, tablets have been produced from co-ground-, co-precipitated-, and physical mixtures using Compaction Studies Press (Kaleva), and the data were recorded to compare between the different mixtures, regarding compactibilty, compressibility and deformational properties. The DSC results showed that the physical mixtures of all systems, formed co-crystals during heating process. For systems of urea/ 2-MB, caffeine/ malonic acid and theophylline/ malonic acid, the co-ground mixture produced tablets with higher tensile strength compared with either co-precipitated or physical mixture. However, for caffeine/ oxalic acid system, the tensile strengths of compacts produced from the physical mixture were greater than those obtained from either co-ground or co-precipitated mixtures. The Heckel data suggested that urea/ 2-MB, caffeine/ malonic acid and theophylline/ malonic acid systems are Type 1 materials, as an extensive linearity during compression was indicative of a plastic deformation mechanism, while the caffeine/ oxalic acid system was Type 2 materials. However, the co-precipitated mixture of urea/ 2-MB system was the least compressible, as it possessed the greatest value of yield pressure (85 MPa) and the highest elastic recovery (7.42%). The co-precipitated mixture of both of caffeine/ malonic acid and theophylline/ malonic acid systems was the most compressible with small yield pressure values of (44 & 80 MPa) and elastic recovery of (7.2% & 6.56%), respectively. The co-ground mixture of caffeine/ oxalic acid possessed the highest value of yield pressure (166 MPa) and thus the lowest compressibility among other mixtures. Furthermore, the addition of microcrystalline cellulose and α-lactose monohydrate has affected the crystallinity as well as the tableting properties of the co-crystals. After the addition of excipients, the tensile strength of compacts was about 2 times higher than any other mixture. Finally, urea/ 2-MB and caffeine/ malonic acid co-crystals were successfully synthesized through convection mixing and compaction.Islamic University of Omdurman and the Ministry of Higher Education in Suda

The utilization of sodium lignosulphonate extracted from Egyptian rice straw in leather tanning process

Massive quantities of rice straw are burned annually in Egypt and caused environmental hazards. The present study investigated the utilization of rice straw to produce sodium lignosulphonate (SLS) as a water-soluble derivative of lignin in leather tanning and evaluate its usage as a tanning or re-tanning material as well as its effect on leather quality. The results of testing SLS as a leather tanning agent were unsatisfactory due to its slight effect on shrinkage temperature of leathers, unlike its use as a re-tanning material. Four concentrations of SLS (0%, 5%, 10%, and 20%) were used in re-tanning forty of sheep wet-blues. The results showed that using SLS as a re-tanning agent with concentration till 10% from pelts weight enhances some organoleptic properties, such as fullness and general appearance together with slight improvement in physical properties of leathers. Moreover, the addition of SLS with concentration 20% led to an excessive swelling in the collagen fibers as shown from depicted scanning electron micrographs and decreased trends of physical properties

Blockage Prediction for Mobile UE in RIS-assisted Wireless Networks: A Deep Learning Approach

Due to significant blockage conditions in wireless networks, transmitted signals may considerably degrade before reaching the receiver. The reliability of the transmitted signals, therefore, may be critically problematic due to blockages between the communicating nodes. Thanks to the ability of Reconfigurable Intelligent Surfaces (RISs) to reflect the incident signals with different reflection angles, this may counter the blockage effect by optimally reflecting the transmit signals to receiving nodes, hence, improving the wireless network's performance. With this motivation, this paper formulates a RIS-aided wireless communication problem from a base station (BS) to a mobile user equipment (UE). The BS is equipped with an RGB camera. We use the RGB camera at the BS and the RIS panel to improve the system's performance while considering signal propagating through multiple paths and the Doppler spread for the mobile UE. First, the RGB camera is used to detect the presence of the UE with no blockage. When unsuccessful, the RIS-assisted gain takes over and is then used to detect if the UE is either "present but blocked" or "absent". The problem is determined as a ternary classification problem with the goal of maximizing the probability of UE communication blockage detection. We find the optimal solution for the probability of predicting the blockage status for a given RGB image and RIS-assisted data rate using a deep neural learning model. We employ the residual network 18-layer neural network model to find this optimal probability of blockage prediction. Extensive simulation results reveal that our proposed RIS panel-assisted model enhances the accuracy of maximization of the blockage prediction probability problem by over 38\% compared to the baseline scheme

An Investigation of Inference of the Generalized Extreme Value Distribution Based on Record

In this article, the maximum likelihood and Bayes estimates of the generalized extreme value distribution based on record values are investigated. The asymptotic confidence intervals as well as bootstrap confidence are proposed. The Bayes estimators cannot be obtained in closed form so the MCMC method are used to calculate Bayes estimates as well as the credible intervals. A numerical example is provided to illustrate the proposed estimation methods developed here. Keywords: Generalized extreme value distribution, Record values, Maximum likelihood estimation, Bayesian estimation