Evaluation of Cotton Advanced Lines/Varieties for Genetic Diversity and Correlation Studies of Cotton Leaf Curl Virus Disease with Yield Contributing Traits in Cotton

Plant genetic diversity aids in the creation of new varieties that are more resistant to pests and unfavorable climatic conditions. In order to discover varied parents and assess their cross-performance, the current study was carried out. The findings showed a substantial positive connection (0.81) between green bolls, plant height (0.57), and open bolls, as well as a significant positive correlation (0.52) between open bolls. On the other hand, a highly significant negative connection was discovered between the number of open bolls (-0.59), number of green bolls (-0.72), plant height (-0.78), and major stem nodes (-0.70) for the cotton leaf curl viral disease. Principal component analysis (PCA) showed that PC-I and PC-II accounted for 66.6% of the total variance. Plant height and green bolls were found to be positively correlated by PCA biplot analysis, but main stem nodes and open bolls showed a negative link, particularly with cotton leaf curl virus diseases. Based on cluster analysis, genotypes were divided into four clusters. Of these, Cluster-IV stood out because to its strong resistance to the cotton leaf curl virus disease and high yield, making it a good candidate for further breeding efforts. Other clusters include Mac-07, MNH-875, CRP-257, Super Okra, MNH-Super Gold, and GT/Bt Okra. The research emphasizes how crucial it is to use a variety of statistical methods to evaluate genetic diversity and support improved breeding practices. The knowledge that is derived will be useful in creating hybrids for upcoming breeding programs

Circles of profit:A conceptual framework for economic and financial aspects in circular construction

Circular construction is an emerging paradigm aimed at addressing the sustainability concerns related to the construction industry. While technical and environmental aspects of circular construction receive ample attention, their economic dimension remains underexplored and is often limited to costs and micro-level factors, lacking a holistic perspective. In response, this study develops a multi-level conceptual framework to critically evaluate the economic and financial aspects of circular construction, through an Integrated Literature Review (ILR) of 45 academic and grey literature sources, complemented by interview data from actors involved in real-world circular construction projects. Four primary research clusters of economic and financial aspects are identified: (1) economic assessment methods, (2) benefits, barriers, risks, and enablers, (3) market guidelines and reports, and (4) circular business models. The findings reveal that economic and financial aspects are complex, extending beyond traditional cost and finance issues, and multilevel, shaped by supply chain dynamics, market forces and policy frameworks. As there is a high degree of interdependency among economic and financial aspects, any change can trigger cascading effects. Additionally, the study demonstrates how targeted interventions can mitigate multiple barriers and create positive feedback loops. The results contribute to the literature on the economic aspects of circular construction by broadening the traditional cost-focused approach and highlighting interconnected economic dynamics. Furthermore, the results advance the circular construction transition literature by illuminating relationships across multiple levels. Lastly, the study contributes to the literature on circular economy barriers and enablers by critically examining the underlying reasons behind existing barriers. By providing a structured approach to the economic and financial aspects of circular construction, the framework enables stakeholders to systematically identify and address barriers, costs, and uncertainties that often hinder its practical implementation.</p

Circling Towards Profit: A Circular Life Cycle Approach to Evaluate the Economic and Environmental Feasibility of Buildings and Construction

The concept of Circular Economy (CE) has undergone a significant evolution, extending beyond the traditional 3R paradigm (reduce, reuse, recycle) to embrace a more holistic perspective that incorporates additional aspects. Previous research indicates the profound impact of circularity on the economic as well as the environmental domains of sustainability. Despite numerous efforts to integrate circularity metrics with established environmental and economic evaluation methods, a comprehensive framework that cohesively synthesizes circularity with both economic and environmental in a single unified framework is notably missing. To address this gap, this paper introduces the Cost of Circularity Assessment Tool (CoCAT), an innovative and integrated framework. CoCAT incorporates the Whole Building Circularity Indicator (WBCI) along with Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Life Cycle Costing (LCC) to simultaneously evaluate the economic as well as the environmental feasibility of various circular solutions. WBCI serves as the key metric on which the rest of the analysis is developed. The effective integration of WBCI with LCA has previously been demonstrated, and this study extends the methodology to encompass LCC through a rigorous literature review and critical analysis. The paper methodically explains this unified framework, aligning CE-based methodologies for all three assessments within the CoCAT in line with the existing standards. Additionally, it provides guidance on conducting integrated inventory analysis, combined interpretation, and visual representation of results, with a focus on whole-building level assessment. The research reveals that such integration streamlines the assessment process, saving time and effort. CoCAT can be used by stakeholders, companies and LCA practitioners to identify trade-offs between increased circularity and its impacts on sustainability performance (environmental and economic) for informed decision-making

From circularity to sustainability:Advancing the whole building circularity indicator with Life Cycle Assessment (WBCI-LCA)

Circular construction is an emerging paradigm aimed at minimizing waste and reducing environmental impacts associated with the construction industry. To support this transition, building circularity indicators have been developed to assess the circularity of construction. While these indicators provide valuable insights into circularity, they lack the capacity to evaluate the environmental impacts of circular interventions. Addressing this gap, this paper presents a novel integration of the Whole Building Circularity Indicator (WBCI) with a comprehensive Cradle-to-Cradle Life Cycle Assessment (C2C-LCA), creating a unified WBCI-LCA framework for assessing circularity and Environmental Sustainability (ES) in circular construction. Applying the framework to a typical Dutch residential building and developing four circular scenarios, this study demonstrates how WBCI and C2C-LCA approaches can be effectively combined to examine the complex trade-offs between circularity and ES. The findings reveal that while increased circularity (from 0.309 to 0.488 in developed scenarios) reduces environmental impacts in most categories, it may also shift burdens across categories. For instance, biobased materials like CLT reduce global warming potential but increase eutrophication potential depending on the end-of-life scenario. This integrated approach demonstrates that WBCI and C2C-LCA effectively complement each other: WBCI captures essential circularity aspects like material circulation and component disassembly, while C2C-LCA provides insights into the environmental impacts of manufacturing, recycling, and transportation processes. These findings advance the literature on building circularity indicators by extending their applicability to C2C-LCA and contribute to the broader discourse on sustainability and circularity by providing empirical evidence on their interrelationship.</p

Whole building circularity indicator: A circular economy assessment framework for promoting circularity and sustainability in buildings and construction

Circularity is finding its feet in construction. Several Building Circularity Indicators (BCIs) have been developed to measure buildings’ Circular Economy (CE) potential, but none of them has been standardized. Currently, the BCIs methodologies lack consensus on CE definition and scope, Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), and various other technical aspects. New research is hardly building upon the existing works and this lack of incrementalism hinders the standardization process. The current research addresses these limitations by developing a comprehensive and innovative Whole-Building Circularity Indicator (WBCI). WBCI consolidates the existing advancements by including the best features of various methodologies (like VBCI, MCI, Flex 4.0, etc.) and covering a wide range of KPIs. It has been developed from a life cycle perspective, taking into account all material flows from the point of origin to disposal or waste treatment. The adopted methodology complements popular sustainability tools like Life Cycle Assessment (LCA). The validation is done through a case study of a typical Italian residential building. WBCI along with an existing popular tool is applied to the case study using the actual building data to validate and highlight the improvements made in the developed framework. The building performed poorly in terms of circularity, scoring 0.243 on a scale of 0 (fully linear) to 1 (fully circular). It is found that resource- intensive construction processes and longer service life can substantially affect CE performance. Recommendations for improving the building circularity are given. From the methodological point of view, results emphasize that WBCI is a multilevel framework capable of identifying the best-performing CE solution at the material, element, system, and whole-building levels. Contractors, consultants, and policymakers may leverage WBCI’s features to assess the circular performance of buildings at early stages. Researchers can also use the findings to further expand and standardize the BCIs

Whole building circularity indicator: A circular economy assessment framework for promoting circularity and sustainability in buildings and construction

Whole building circularity indicator: A circular economy assessment framework for promoting circularity and sustainability in buildings and constructio

Quantifying the cost of quality in construction projects: an insight into the base of the iceberg

AbstractConstruction projects are complex endeavors where achieving higher quality standards is challenging due to the intrinsic difficulties and dynamic quality management processes. Several quality management techniques exist to overcome quality concerns, such as the cost of quality (COQ). However, implementing COQ in building construction is challenging due to the absence of a comprehensive quality cost-capturing system. Several studies have tried to quantify different quality costs but are mainly focused on visible failure cost—the tip of the iceberg while the base of the iceberg has rarely been explored. This study develops and quantifies each component of the visible and hidden quality costs—the base of the iceberg. Accordingly, a modified prevention, appraisal, and failure model is developed and applied to the primary data of 25 building projects. The findings highlight the unfamiliarity and passive attitude of the involved construction firms towards quality, thus, incurring higher failure costs amounting to over 12% of the total project cost. Most of this cost remains hidden as traditional accounting systems cannot capture it. Such costs must be eliminated by implementing COQ systems as utilized in the current study. Further, a quality costing framework is established for building projects and applied to the local construction industry to reduce construction failures and improve the quality performance of building projects