A Survey of Non-crop Plants as Alternative Hosts to Raspberries for Drosophila suzukii (Spotted Wing Drosophila)

The spotted wing fruit fly (SWD), Drosophila suzukii (Matsumura) (Diptera: Drosophilidae), is a pest of small fruit crops. Unlike most other Drosophila species, this insect can oviposit into ripe fruits, rendering them unmarketable. Drosophila suzukii is spreading quickly throughout the continental United States including South Dakota, and causing serious damage to horticultural crops, particularly those within the fruit industry. This study determines the D. suzukii host plant both commercial crops and native plants, and defines non-crop host plants by season in South Dakota. Further, it confirms the occurrence of the fly in southeastern South Dakota and identifies high-risk infestation areas in raspberry crops. Results show peak captures of adult populations in the middle of the summer (July) and through the autumn season. Lonicera tatarica Linneaus (honeysuckle), Celtis occidentalis L. (hackberry), Morus alba L. (mulberry), Rhamnus cathartica L. (buckthorn) and Symphoricarpos albus L. (snowberry) are non-crop host plants and had the highest yield of D. suzukii adults from summer to autumn. This indicates that late season fruit crops or varieties could be at risk of D. suzukii fruit injury in this area. Non-crop and commercial late fruit crops, including fall-bearing raspberries are generally harvested when D. suzukii populations remain high in this region. The number of captured adult insects was related between female and male populations of the sampled sites based on their total number flies. The number of females was generally higher than the number of males during the season. This survey also reports non-crop host plants in eastern South Dakota, suggesting that they affect crop risk for higher numbers of D. suzukii. Finally, the presence of these non-crop host plants is likely important for understanding D. suzukii management strategies

Maritime Challenges in Crisis Times

The world today is extremely well connected and heavily dependent on maritime trade. The shipping market is the result of global production and as such is subject to cyclical changes, incidents and expansions. As part of such a market, maritime transport is vulnerable to external factors, such as international trade, political situations, financial trends, technological developments and legislation, which may directly or indirectly affect demand in the sector or similar. The negative effects of these changes are reflected in lower freight rates, lower daily rental prices and reduced prices of new or used boats. Maritime crisis have significantly affected income, wages, number of employees and similar. In this regard, the crisis management process plays a key role in reorienting strategies and structural reorganization. In order to ensure the development of the maritime sector, it is necessary to constantly invest in the growth of transport capacities, deepen ports, build new terminals and modernize existing ones. It also requires the advanced transport development and application, technological, technical, economic, organizational and commercial measures, in order to adapt to the environment. The efficiency of the maritime sector generally strengthens the country’s international and political position, as its activities are linked to international economic cooperation, attracting foreign investment, membership in international organizations and other key factors

Carbon dioxide methanation over hydrotalcite-based nickel catalysts

Global warming and energy shortage have driven modern society to search for alternative and sustainable energy sources to replace with the fossil fuels. Innovative solutions are required for mitigating CO2 emissions to the atmosphere and storing H2 due to the intermittency of the renewable energy sources. With this thesis, it is possible to cover both of these concerns at the same time while utilizing CO2 to produce CH4 as a synthetic fuel that could also be transported into already existing infrastructures or as a chemical compound that could store H2. Hydrotalcite-based nickel catalysts were synthesized via various techniques such as wet impregnation, co-precipitation and sol-gel with different nickel contents utilising a one-pot synthesis approach. The main approach of utilizing catalysts was with the washcoating of the newly synthesized catalysts inside the reactor tubes with a diameter of 4 mm and a length of 17.5 cm. Catalytic performance of the catalysts was investigated for the hydrogenation of carbon dioxide under atmospheric pressure in a temperature range of 250-500oC. These synthesized catalysts were compared with a Ni/Al2O3 catalyst, which was prepared as a benchmark, in terms of CO2 conversion-to-CH4. Additionally, throughout this thesis, the effect of many parameters to the performance of the catalysts had been studied, including but not limited to, nickel content, GHSV, catalyst amount, reduction temperature and the addition of Ce as well as Zr. Furthermore, the stability of the catalysts was investigated through long-term tests. The CO2 methanation was already initiated below 220oC (XCO2=10.2 %, SCO2=98.4 %) which was ~100oC lower than that over Ni/Al2O3 and reached 80% conversion of CO2 at 300oC with 99.9 % selectivity of CH4 on 15 w% Ni/Mg/Al HT by co-precipitation method. When further increment in the temperature, at 350oC a complete conversion (99.5 %) of CO2 was achieved with ~100 % of CH4 selectivity. The catalysts were also utilised as packed-beds, among those 5 w% Ni/Mg/Al HT by sol-gel showed the highest activity at 300oC, 95.0% conversion of CO2 with 99.8% CH4 selectivity. The performance of the catalysts reduced with an increase in GHSV, while enhanced catalytic activity results obtained in the presence of excess amount of H2 in the feeding gas mixture. Furthermore, additional catalyst amount which was assured by repeating washcoating cycles significantly improved the activity results. Finally, long-term tests proved a good stability of the catalysts. This superior performance of hydrotalcite-based nickel catalysts could decrease the reaction temperature of CO2 methanation to lower temperatures and replace the usage of expensive Ru-based catalysts and conventional Ni catalysts supported on various oxides

MONITORING OF SWEET CHESTNUT BLIGHT ON PERMANENT PLOTS

U radu su prikazani rezultati analize praćenja zdravstvenog stanja pitomog kestena na trajnim pokusnim plohama, osnovanim na područjima uprava šuma podružnica Zagreb i Sisak. Osnovano je pet trajnih pokusnih ploha: Sljeme, Markuševac, Bistra, Vučjak Tješnjak i Šamarica. Motrenje raka kore obavlja se od 2002. godine. Rezultati pokazuju povećanje broja zaraženih i suhih stabala, kao i broja rakastih tvorevina u odnosu na broj zaraženih stabala te ukupan broj stabala iz čega se može zaključiti kako je rak kore pitomog kestena u progresiji. Razvoj bolesti potenciran je i sveukupnim lošim stanjem kestenovih sastojina.The paper presents the results of an analysis of monitoring the health status of Sweet chestnut on permanent experimental plots, established in the areas of the Forest Administration Branch Offices of Zagreb and Sisak. Five permanent experimental plots were established: Sljeme, Marku{evac, Bistra, Vu~jak Tje{njak and [amarica. Monitoring of blight/canker has been carried out since 2002. The results show an increased number of infected and dry trees, and the number of canerous formations in relation to the number of infected trees and the total number of trees, from which it can be concluded that Sweet chestnut blight/canker is in progression. Development of the disease is also potentiated by the overall poor condition of the chestnut stands

DNA Barcoding of Fungi in the Forest Ecosystem of the Psunj and Papuk Mountains in Croatia

The saprotrophic, endophytic, and parasitic fungi were detected from the samples collected in the forest of the management unit East Psunj and Papuk Nature Park in Croatia. The disease symptoms, the morphology of fruiting bodies and fungal culture, and DNA barcoding were combined for determining the fungi at the genus or species level. DNA barcoding is a standardized and automated identification of species based on recognition of highly variable DNA sequences. DNA barcoding has a wide application in the diagnostic purpose of fungi in biological specimens. DNA samples for DNA barcoding were isolated from infected tree tissues, fungal fruiting bodies or fungal cultures. The ITS or ITS2 sequences of the fungal DNA were sequenced and aligned with the reference sequences in GenBank (NCBI) using BLAST. The size of ITS and ITS2 sequences were 512-584 bp and 248-326 bp, respectively. The sequences showed a high identity of 97.21%-100% at 98%-100% coverage with reference sequences in GenBank (NCBI). The exception was the species Amphilogia gyrosa that showed 95.65% identity at 100% coverage. Two fungi were determined at genus level: Cladosporium sp., and Cytospora sp., while 11 fungi were determined at species level: Alternaria alternata, Aureobasidium pullulans, Amphilogia gyrosa, Capronia pilosella, Cryphonectria parasitica, Exidia glandulosa, Epicoccum nigrum, Penicillium glabrum, Pezicula carpinea, Rosellinia corticium, and Stereum hirsutum

Imidazoline Antihypertensive Drugs: Selective I1-Imidazoline Receptors Activation

Involvement of imidazoline receptors (IR) in the regulation of vasomotor tone as well as in the mechanism of action of some centrally acting antihypertensives has received tremendous attention. To date, pharmacological studies have allowed the characterization of three main imidazoline receptor classes, the I1-imidazoline receptor which is involved in central inhibition of sympathetic tone to lower blood pressure, the I2-imidazoline receptor which is an allosteric binding site of monoamine oxidase B (MAO-B), and the I3-imidazoline receptor which regulates insulin secretion from pancreatic beta-cells. All three imidazoline receptors represent important targets for cardiovascular research. The hypotensive effect of clonidine-like centrally acting antihypertensives was attributed both to a2-adrenergic receptors and nonadrenergic I1-imidazoline receptors, whereas their sedative action involves activation of only a2-adrenergic receptors located in the locus coeruleus. Since more selective I1-imidazoline receptors ligands reduced incidence of typical side effects of other centrally acting antihypertensives, there is significant interest in developing new agents with higher selectivity and affinity for I1-imidazoline receptors. The selective imidazoline receptors agents are also more effective in regulation of body fat, neuroprotection, inflammation, cell proliferation, epilepsy, depression, stress, cell adhesion, and pain. New agonists and antagonists with high selectivity for imidazoline receptor subtypes have been recently developed. In the present review we provide a brief update to the field of imidazoline research, highlighting some of the chemical diversity and progress made in the theoretical studies of imidazoline receptor ligands

Eikozanoidi u terapiji astme

Many novel types of asthma therapeutic procedures have been investigated in the past decade. A vast amount of work in the 5-LO inhibitor and LT1-receptor antagonist area has resulted in a various of compounds being identified for clinical trails, and several compounds are used in the clinic. The impact of the LT1-receptor antagonist and 5-LO inhibitors on alergy therapy will be significant, if these compounds have an antiinflammatory effect within their mechanism. The area with possibly the most promise is selective inhibitors of phosphodiesterase enzymes (PDEs). Selective inhibitors of three isoenzymes of PDEs (PDE III, IV and V) may be possess both activity; bronchodilatory and anti-inflammatory effects. This results imply that this agents may lead to a re-examination and further subclassification of various types of asthma diseases