Crop phenotyping for wheat yield and yield components against drought stress

Water deficit is a most limiting factor for wheat in rain-fed agricultural systems worldwide. The effects of drought stress on some root features and yield and yield components in wheat (Trticum aestivum L.) were carried out in a factorial experiment based on completely randomized design, under greenhouse condition. The four experimental irrigation regimes, irrigation after 75% of the water was depleted (control), irrigation after 65% of the water was depleted (mild stress), irrigation after 55% of the water was depleted (moderate stress) and irrigation after 45% of the water was depleted (severe stress) were randomized for the main plots. The subplot treatments included eight wheat genotypes. Results showed that Interaction Drought stress with Variety had significantly affected on Total Root Volume and Dry Matter, Number of Tiller and also Shoot Dry Matter. Value of Total Root Volume and Dry Matter, Shoot Dry Matter and Number of Tiller in irrigated varieties were more than rainfed in whole of Drought stresses. N-87-20 variety had most amounts of Total Root Dry Matter, Total Root Volume (exception of control) in all of stresses and control. Root properties influence on yield and other morphological traits of wheat. Stress intensification increase root growth than plant organ so that wheat root can uptake water from soil to compensate damage caused by stress

Pro-asylum Advocacy in the EU: Challenging the State of Exception

Introduction. This chapter explores examples of how pro-asylum advocates challenge the harsh measures used to punish those who try to enter or reside in the EU illegally, taking examples from The Netherlands and the UK. We explore organized resistance to the ‘3-Ds’, which are so typical of EU-wide migration policies: destitution, detention and deportation. Together these are the backbone of policies of deterrence. Sections 2 and 3 explore how ‘global apartheid’ and the ‘state of exception’ within the EU connect. Giorgio Agamben (2005) first theorized the “state of exception” and Kohler, “global apartheid” (1978). The state of exception is the regional context for pro-asylum advocacy work, and global apartheid is the global context within which the EU-wide state of exception can be understood (Webber 2000; Migreurop 2009). In section 4, the ‘shared injustice frames’, or common worldviews, of pro-asylum advocacy networks in the EU, are briefly explored. Section 5 presents examples of pro-asylum advocacy work from the UK and the Netherlands. These examples draw on our own background experience and research. We explore how two pro-asylum advocacy organizations, one a loose network, the other a small NGO, have tried to organize to protect those seeking sanctuary against the 3-Ds. The right not to be deliberately made homeless, not to be imprisoned at will, and not to be forcibly expelled to dangerous countries, are thus the main focus of these organizations, and of section 5. In section 6, we briefly explore some positive recent developments, such as the ‘sanctuary campaign’ in the UK, but also how resistance to deterrence policies has had to go ‘underground’ in the face of criminalization in both the EU and elsewhere, such as Canada (Fekete 2009; Nyers 2003)

Conservation laws and evolution schemes in geodesic, hydrodynamic, and magnetohydrodynamic flows

Carter and Lichnerowicz have established that barotropic fluid flows are conformally geodesic and obey Hamilton's principle. This variational approach can accommodate neutral, or charged and poorly conducting, fluids. We show that, unlike what has been previously thought, this approach can also accommodate perfectly conducting magnetofluids, via the Bekenstein-Oron description of ideal magnetohydrodynamics. When Noether symmetries associated with Killing vectors or tensors are present in geodesic flows, they lead to constants of motion polynomial in the momenta. We generalize these concepts to hydrodynamic flows. Moreover, the Hamiltonian descriptions of ideal magnetohydrodynamics allow one to cast the evolution equations into a hyperbolic form useful for evolving rotating or binary compact objects with magnetic fields in numerical general relativity. Conserved circulation laws, such as those of Kelvin, Alfv\'en and Bekenstein-Oron, emerge simply as special cases of the Poincar\'e-Cartan integral invariant of Hamiltonian systems. We use this approach to obtain an extension of Kelvin's theorem to baroclinic (non-isentropic) fluids, based on a temperature-dependent time parameter. We further extend this result to perfectly or poorly conducting baroclinic magnetoflows. Finally, in the barotropic case, such magnetoflows are shown to also be geodesic, albeit in a Finsler (rather than Riemann) space.Comment: 23 page

A Typology of Digital Sharing Business Models: A Design Science Research Approach

The digitally enabled sharing economy, also called the “digital sharing economy” (DSE), has changed patterns of consumption by introducing new choices and channels for provision and receipt of services. The DSE encompasses sharing systems whose business models may vary distinctly from platform to platform. Although business models in the context of the sharing economy have been studied so far, we have observed that the current literature does not provide an approach that covers all the possible business models (in the broadest sense of the term) that (potentially) exist within the scope of the DSE. The present paper, therefore, aims to propose a typology of business models in the DSE that covers a wide space of models – even those which may not involve “business” in the commercial sense. This is achieved through an iterative inductive process based on a design science research approach. The typology can assist in positioning the current and future sharing systems in the DSE by systematically classifying their business models. It is intended to serve as a guiding tool for the sustainability assessment of platforms from both resource and socio-economic perspectives. The present study can also enable researchers and practitioners to capture and systematically analyse digital sharing business models based on a structured, actionable approach

The growth index of matter perturbations and modified gravity

We place tight constraints on the growth index γ by using the recent growth history results of 2 degree Field Galaxy Redshift Survey (2dFGRS), Sloan Digital Sky Survey luminous red galaxy (SDSS-LRG), VIMOS-VLT Deep Survey (VVDS) and WiggleZ data sets. In particular, we investigate several parametrizations of the growth index γ(z) by comparing their cosmological evolution using observational growth rate data at different redshifts. Utilizing a standard likelihood analysis we find that the use of the combined growth data provided by the 2dFGRS, SDSS-LRG, VVDS and WiggleZ galaxy surveys puts the most stringent constraints on the value of the growth index. As an example, assuming a constant growth index we obtain that γ= 0.602 ± 0.055 for the concordance Λ cold dark matter (ΛCDM) expansion model. Concerning the Dvali-Gabadadze-Porrati (DGP) gravity model, we find γ= 0.503 ± 0.06, which is lower and almost 3σ away from the theoretically predicted value of Finally, based on a time varying growth index we also confirm that the combined growth data disfavour the DGP gravity. © 2012 The Authors Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society © 2012 RAS

Constraints on growth index from LSS

We utilize the clustering properties of the Luminous Red Galaxies (LRGs) and the growth rate data in order to constrain the growth index (γ) of the linear matter fluctuations based on a standard χ2 joint likelihood analysis between theoretical expectations and data. We find a value of γ=0.56± 0.05, perfectly consistent with the expectations of the ΛCDM model, and Ω m0 =0.29± 0.02, in very good agreement with the latest Planck results. Our analysis provides significantly more stringent growth index constraints with respect to previous studies as indicated by the fact that the corresponding uncertainty is only ∼ 0.09 γ. © International Astronomical Union 2015

Generalized evolution of linear bias: A tool to test gravity

We derive an exact analytical solution for the redshift evolution of linear and scale-independent bias, by solving a second-order differential equation based on linear perturbation theory. This bias evolution model is applicable to all different types of dark energy and modified gravity models. We propose that the combination of the current bias evolution model with data on the bias of extragalactic mass tracers could provide an efficient way to discriminate between geometrical dark energy models and dark energy models that adhere to general relativity. © 2011 American Physical Society

Precision growth index using the clustering of cosmic structures and growth data

We use the clustering properties of Luminous Red Galaxies (LRGs) and the growth rate data provided by the various galaxy surveys in order to constrain the growth index γ) of the linear matter fluctuations. We perform a standard χ2-minimization procedure between theoretical expectations and data, followed by a joint likelihood analysis and we find a value of γ=0.56± 0.05, perfectly consistent with the expectations of the ΛCDM model, and Ωm0 =0.29± 0.01, in very good agreement with the latest Planck results. Our analysis provides significantly more stringent growth index constraints with respect to previous studies, as indicated by the fact that the corresponding uncertainty is only ∼ 0.09 γ. Finally, allowing γ to vary with redshift in two manners (Taylor expansion around z=0, and Taylor expansion around the scale factor), we find that the combined statistical analysis between our clustering and literature growth data alleviates the degeneracy and obtain more stringent constraints with respect to other recent studies. © 2014 IOP Publishing Ltd and Sissa Medialab srl