Measuring the Market Efficiency of Potato Supply Chain in Punjab, Pakistan

Potato is a popular vegetable crop in Pakistan, both for consumers and growers. It is the most extensively consumed staple meal after wheat and rice, and comes in a variety of forms, including cooked, boiled, fries, chips, and snacks. A supply chain is the network of all the individuals, organizations, resources, activities and technology involved in the creation and sale of a product. Potato supply chain in Pakistan includes farm suppliers, producers, village dealers, commission agents, processors, exporters, and retailers, just like other agricultural products. This specific study was aimed to characterize and map the potato supply chain linkages between actors, processes and activities moreover, to calculate marketing efficiency at different level(s) of supply chain. The findings revealed the difference in potato supply chain among various chain actors. There was a lack of information among supply chain actors, consumers desire is not fulfilled by the supply chain actors. Potato supply chain actors faced problem because of no information sharing system. Farmers should use agricultural management techniques like crop rotation that increase crop productivity. Select a quality seed, and each actor in the supply chain must share information. Supply chain actors upgrade their practices for more profit to farmers and desired quality to consumers. &nbsp

Portable haptic device for lower limb amputee gait feedback: assessing static and dynamic perceptibility

Loss of joints and severed sensory pathway cause reduced mobility capabilities in lower limb amputees. Although prosthetic devices attempt to restore normal mobility functions, lack of awareness and control of limb placement increase the risk of falling and causing amputee to have high level of visual dependency. Haptic feedback can serve as a cue for gait events during ambulation thus providing sense of awareness of the limb position. This paper presents a wireless wearable skin stretch haptic device to be fitted around the thigh region. The movement profile of the device was characterized and a preliminary work with able-bodied participants and an above-knee amputee to assess the ability of users to perceive the delivered stimuli during static and dynamic mode is reported. Perceptibility was found to be increasing with stretch magnitude. It was observed that a higher magnitude of stretch was needed for the stimuli to be accurately perceived during walking in comparison to static standing, most likely due to the intense movement of the muscle and increased motor skills demand during walking activity

Impact of Bank Specific and Macroeconomic Factors on Banks Profitability: A Study on Banking Sector of Pakistan

This research focuses and examines the association among profitability of banks, along with bank specific and macroeconomic factors of Pakistan. With the help of financial data of thirty-two Pakistani banks over the period of 2011-2015. Pooled OLS (POLS)/Random Effect, Breusch and Pagan Lagrangian Multiplier Test for Random Effects estimations and Hausman Test for Fixed vs Random effects estimations used for further empirical analysis and interpretations. Further to explore the relationship of profitability indicator ROA along with Earning per Share (EPS), SIZE, Cash Equivalents, Spread Ratio and Capital Ratio as bank specific (banking/microeconomic indicators), while on the other hand Inflation, Interest Rate and GDP as external macroeconomic factors. Statistical results to this study established confirmation that EPS, SIZE, Capital Ratio and GDP have a significant impact on the ROA of banking sector in Pakistan. The calculated results of the study are of worthy to mutually academics and banking financial policy makers

Effectors of filamentous plant pathogens: Commonalities amid diversity

Fungi and oomycetes are filamentous microorganisms that include a diversity of highly developed pathogens of plants. These are sophisticated modulators of plant processes that secrete an arsenal of effector proteins to target multiple host cell compartments and enable parasitic infection. Genome sequencing revealed complex catalogues of effectors of filamentous pathogens, with some species harboring hundreds of effector genes. Although a large fraction of these effector genes encode secreted proteins with weak or no sequence similarity to known proteins, structural studies have revealed unexpected similarities amid the diversity. This article reviews progress in our understanding of effector structure and function in light of these new insights. We conclude that there is emerging evidence for multiple pathways of evolution of effectors of filamentous plant pathogens but that some families have probably expanded from a common ancestor by duplication and diversification. Conserved folds, such as the oomycete WY and the fungal MAX domains, are not predictive of the precise function of the effectors but serve as a chassis to support protein structural integrity while providing enough plasticity for the effectors to bind different host proteins and evolve unrelated activities inside host cells. Further effector evolution and diversification arise via short linear motifs, domain integration and duplications, and oligomerization

Epidemiology and Control of Congo Fever in Sacrificial Animals of Pakistan

The cases and deaths due to Crimean-Congo haemorrhagic fever (CCHF) [49] virus commonly known as Congo virus (fatality rate 15%) have been reported throughout Pakistan from the last five years especially during religious occasion, Eid-ul-Azha. The annual increase in death rates due to CCHF demonstrate the importance of awareness of Congo fever at academia as well as public level. The symptoms of Congo fever which appear one to nine days after tick bite, include sudden high fever, muscle aches, abdominal pain, headache, dizziness, sore eyes, jaundice, mood swings, confusion, aggression, and sensitivity to light. The other signs include sore throat, joint pain, vomiting, diarrhea, hemorrhages, and bleeding from skin and large intestine. The Infection has been reported in many species of wild as well as domestic animals including hares, cattle, sheep, goats, dogs, mice and hedgehogs. At least 31 species of Hyalomma, Boophilus, Rhipicephalus, Dermacentor (Ixodidae: hard ticks) act as vector of CCHF in which transovarial, transstadial and venereal transmission occurs. The virus attacks the immune system of the host and influences the immune cells. The Congo fever virus can be isolated from blood, plasma and many body tissues (kidneys, liver, spleen, lungs, brain and bone marrow). Mice inoculation, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) can be used for detection of the infection. Furthermore, IgM and IgG antibodies against CCHFV can also be detected and quantified. Education of general public, tick control with acaricides, use of anti-CCHFV immunoglobulin, usage of approved repellents to prevent tick bites, wearing neutral-coloured garments, application of a permethrin spray to the clothing, avoiding tall grasses and shrubs, applying sunscreen, avoiding direct contact with the blood or tissues of animals are the factors for successful prevention of the infection

Boron application in clay-loam soil for improved growth, yield and protein contents of mungbean in water-stresses

Boron is considered important to improve the drought resistance, yield and protein contents of pulses. Two years of field experiment was conducted to evaluate the effect of boron application and water stress given at vegetative and flowering stages on growth, yield and protein contents of mungbean during spring 2014 and 2015. The experiment was laid out in randomized complete block design with split-plot arrangement giving more emphasis to boron. The experiment comprised three water stress levels (normal irrigation, water stress at vegetative stage and water stress at reproductive phase) and four boron levels (0, 2, 4 and 6 kg ha-1). Final seed yield was significantly increased by different levels of boron application both under normal and water stressed conditions. The increase in yield was mainly due to greater plant height, number of pods bearing branches, number of pods per plant, number of seeds per pod and 1000-grain weight. Boron application at 4 kg ha-1 caused 17%, 10% and 4% increase in grain yield under normal irrigation, stress at vegetative stage and water stress at reproductive phase, respectively. Protein contents were also increased (9-16%) at same boron treatment. Most parameters showed a marked decrease at higher dose (6 kg ha-1) of boron. In conclusion, the boron application at rate of 4 kg ha-1 in clay-loam soil performed the best to enhance mungbean growth, yield and seed protein both under normal and water stressed conditions

Inhibition in production of cellulolytic and pectinolytic enzymes of Colletotrichum gloeosporioides isolated from dragon fruit plants in response to submicron chitosan dispersions

In vitro and in vivo antifungal potential of submicron chitosan dispersions (SCD) was studied in order to investigate the effect of SCD on cell wall degrading enzymes of Colletotrichum gloeosporioides and to control anthracnose of dragon fruit under field conditions. Four concentrations of chitosan (0.5, 1.0, 1.5 and 2.0%) were used to prepare submicron dispersions with droplet sizes of 200, 400, 600, 800 and 1000 nm. The highest inhibition in cellulolytic and pectinolytic enzymes was observed with 600 nm droplet size of 1.0% chitosan concentration. In case of in vivo studies,the area under disease progress curve (AUDPC) showed a reduction of approximately 66% of disease incidence (DI). The lower level of production of cell wall degrading enzymes in response to SCD resulted in less disease on dragon fruit plants and sustained in increasing the effective resistance against the irresistible disease of anthracnose

The Relative Efficiency of Commercial Banks in Pakistan with Respect to Size and Ownership Structure During and After Global Financial Crisis

Purpose: This study has been carried out to find out the relative efficiency of the commercial banks in Pakistan over a five- year period from 2006 to year 2010 using Frontier Approach of efficiency. The commercial banks included in this research paper are public sector banks, privatized banks, domestic private banks, and foreign banks. In addition to overall efficiency comparison of the commercial banks, this study has also tested the effect of size and ownership structure of the commercial banks in Pakistan on their efficiency.  Data/Design/Methodology/Approach: Out of 44 banks, 21 commercial banks have been chosen, which, in terms of deposits, account for about 94 percent of total deposits of the banking sector (Rs.5,124,308 million) as on December, 2010. Secondary data of the banking firms have been gathered from their audited financial statements. Intermediation approach has been used by employing Data Envelopment Analysis. The relative efficiency of the commercial banks has been investigated in context of intermediation approach which transforms labor and capital into advances/loans and investments. Findings: Over all a very few commercial banks have achieved 100% efficiency. It is, however found that privatized and domestic private banks have shown better efficiency in terms of financial intermediation as compared to public sector and foreign banks. The size of the banks has a very slight effect on the relative efficiency of the banks. The global financial crisis has affected the efficiency of some of the commercial banks but for a small period of time. Originality: This paper is an attempt to find out the relative efficiency of the commercial banks during the mentioned period which lies during the Global Financial Crisis. Its findings would be of great value for every stratum of society including bankers, business community, academicians, and government and of course, the investors

An N-terminal motif in NLR immune receptors is functionally conserved across distantly related plant species

The molecular codes underpinning the functions of plant NLR immune receptors are poorly understood. We used in vitro Mu transposition to generate a random truncation library and identify the minimal functional region of NLRs. We applied this method to NRC4-a helper NLR that functions with multiple sensor NLRs within a Solanaceae receptor network. This revealed that the NRC4 N-terminal 29 amino acids are sufficient to induce hypersensitive cell death. This region is defined by the consensus MADAxVSFxVxKLxxLLxxEx (MADA motif) that is conserved at the N-termini of NRC family proteins and ~20% of coiled-coil (CC)-type plant NLRs. The MADA motif matches the N-terminal a1 helix of Arabidopsis NLR protein ZAR1, which undergoes a conformational switch during resistosome activation. Immunoassays revealed that the MADA motif is functionally conserved across NLRs from distantly related plant species. NRC-dependent sensor NLRs lack MADA sequences indicating that this motif has degenerated in sensor NLRs over evolutionary time