Performance of Napier Grass (\u3ci\u3eCenchrus purpureus\u3c/i\u3e L.) Genotypes Grown under Limited Soil Moisture

Napier grass (Cenchrus purpureus Schumach L.) is an important perennial forage native to Africa and grown in many tropical and subtropical countries. It is considered as a short-term drought tolerant forage which is a useful trait in areas that are characterized by low precipitation during the dry season. To exploit the potential of this grass and identify water use efficient (WUE) genotypes, a field drought stress trial was conducted at Bishoftu, Ethiopia. Eighty-four Napier grass genotypes were planted in a p-rep design in four replications. The genotypes were evaluated for forage performance during the dry season of 2019 and 2020 based on agro-morphological traits under two soil moisture regimes- moderate water stress (MWS) and severe water stress (SWS). The results indicated the existence of significant diversity among the genotypes for agro-morphological traits and photosynthetic performance. Consistently high biomass producing genotypes with enhanced water use efficiency were observed across harvests in each soil moisture regime, which indicates the possibility of utilizing these genotypes for high biomass production under low soil moisture conditions after further validation in other environments

Quantitative Trait Loci for Vegetative Traits in Perennial Ryegrass (\u3cem\u3eLolium Perenne\u3c/em\u3e L.)

Physiological (EP) research in forage grasses relates traits such as leaf elongation rate (LER), leaf elongation duration (LED), and leaf appearance interval (ALf), to forage yield (Chapman & Lemaire, 1993). This paper reveals preliminary quantitative trait locus (QTL) discovery for eight EP traits in perennial ryegrass. It also investigates the potential role of multivariate analyses such as principal component analysis (PCA) in QTL analysis of EP data

Genetic Diversity among and within Accessions of a Lablab (\u3ci\u3eLablab purpureus\u3c/i\u3e) Collection Maintained in the ILRI Forage Genebank

Lablab (Lablab purpureus L.) is an important annual multi-purpose legume used as a vegetable for human consumption, as forage for livestock, and as green manure and a cover crop to improve soil fertility. It has a high feed value with good digestibility and high crude protein content. The International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) forage genebank holds a diverse set of 340 lablab accessions collected from different regions of the world. A total of 1,843 plants from 142 lablab accessions (1 to 29 plants per accession genotyped individually) were genotyped by the genotyping-by-sequencing (GBS) method of the DArTseq platform. The genotyping produced a total of 38,824 and 64,793 genome-wide single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) and SilicoDArT high-density markers, respectively. The short sequence reads corresponding to the markers were mapped on the mungbean (Vigna radiata) reference genome, with approximately 37% of the SNPs and 26 % of the SilicoDArTs able to be mapped. A subset of 1,000 robust markers was filtered by different criteria and used for the diversity analysis. Clustering analysis using the discriminant analysis of principal components (DAPC) detected five major groups, each with further subgroups. Analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA) showed a highly significant (P \u3c 0.00001) variation, explaining more than 73 % of the variance among the accessions. A significant variation (P \u3c 0.005) was also observed among plants within accessions, which explained about 27 % of the variation. The results of this study provide a useful guide for the management and rationalization of activities of the lablab germplasm collection at the ILRI genebank. The substantial genetic diversity observed in the collection reveals the potential of the population for further genetic studies

Response to Mass-Casualty Incidents and Outbreaks: A Prehospital Disaster Training Package Developed for the National Emergency Medical Service in Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone is a country highly prone to disasters, still recovering from the catastrophic 2014 Ebola epidemic. In 2018, the country launched its first National Emergency Medical Service (NEMS) aiming to strengthen the provision of essential health services to the population with the long-term goal of creating a resilient health system able to effectively respond to and recover from emergencies. The Center for Research and Training in Disaster Medicine, Humanitarian Aid, and Global Health (CRIMEDIM), together with the Italian NGO Doctors with Africa (CUAMM), under the direct supervision of the Ministry of Health and Sanitation (MoHS), developed a prehospital Disaster Training Package (DTP) to be delivered to all NEMS personnel to boost the prehospital management of mass-casualty incidents (MCIs) and outbreaks. The DTP included a first phase in which NEMS local trainers underwent a training-of-trainers (ToT) course, enabling them to deliver cascade trainings to 16 district ambulance supervisors, 441 paramedics, 441 ambulance drivers, and 36 operators working in the NEMS operation center. This on-going training package represents the first Disaster Medicine training course for prehospital health professionals in Sierra Leone

Segregation of vegetative and reproductive traits associated with tuber yield and quality in water yam (Dioscorea alata L.)

Water yam (Dioscorea alata L.) is an important source of food for millions of people in Africa, Asia, South America, Caribbean and the South Pacific islands. Genetic mapping populations of this species have been produced as part of efforts to raise the efficiency of breeding through development and use of molecular markers. In this study, an F1 mapping population (AM1) of D. alata, exhibited segregation for both tuber yield- and quality- related traits when evaluated in the field for 12 agronomic characters: days to shoot emergence, number of primary vines per plant, days to flowering, flower sex, flowering intensity, days to tuber initiation, number of tubers per plant, tuber yield per plant, tuber shape, bulbil formation, tuber browning and reaction to anthracnose (Colletotrichum gloeosporioides Penz) infection. The number of tubers/plant and the number of primary vines/plant were moderately positively correlated, while most of the other quantitative traits were weakly correlated with each other. There were more males (49%) than females (19.9%) identified in the population, however more than a quarter of the population (31%) did not flower and their sexes could not be determined. 20% of the progeny was resistant or tolerant to field infection by anthracnose. Population AM1 will be a valuable resource as a mapping population for genetic analysis and molecular marker development for tuber quality and several other agronomic traits in D. alata. Keywords: Flowering intensity, marker assisted breeding, mapping population, phenotypic variation and trait segregation, tuber yield and quality, water yamAfrican Journal of Biotechnology Vol 13(28) 2807-281

Development of mapping populations for genetic analysis in yams (Dioscorea rotundata Poir. and Dioscorea alata L.)

Progress is being made at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA, Ibadan, Nigeria) to develop molecular tools for marker-assisted selection that would complement and expedite conventional breeding approaches for genetic improvement of yams (Dioscorea spp.). F1 full-sib mapping populations were developed from crossing male and female parents of Dioscorea rotundata Poir. and Dioscorea alata L. that differ in specific traits of interest towards identification of molecular markers linked to those traits. Success in hybridization was validated based on DNA analysis with SSR markers on agarose gel. Traits for which the populations were developed included multiple tuber production, cooking quality and virus disease resistance in D. rotundata and anthracnose disease resistance, cooking quality and tuber oxidation in D. alata. Death of plants in the field and rotting of tubers in storage, possibly due to pests, diseases and other environmental factors were encountered, that led to the reduction in sizes of the populations. Low seed multiplication ratio necessitated two to three cycles of tuber multiplication of mapping population genotypes to achieve adequate numbers of seed tubers for field experimentation. These mapping populations are valuable tools for genetic analysis and molecular marker development in yam improvement programmes.Key words: Dioscorea alata, Dioscorea rotundata, hybrid identification, mapping population, simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers, trait mapping, yam, seed multiplication, seed losses