Characterisation and reproductive biology of four Physalis L. species from Ile-Ife, Nigeria

The nutritional, medicinal and economic values of many Physalis species have been established. However, some Physalis species in Nigeria have been used interchangeably or misidentified. Consequently, there is the need to re-affirm the taxonomic status of these species. Morphological characters and SDS-PAGE were employed to identify and reveal the genetic relationship that exits among the four Physalis species studied. Furthermore, pollen fertility, pollination and germination studies were carried out in order to compile relevant information on reproductive biology of these Physalis species. The results revealed that all the four species studied are annuals. Physalis peruviana has the longest life span. The mean height of the four species studied ranged from 48.08±6.11 to 97.20±6.51 cm with the highest recorded in P. peruviana. The morphological characters subjected to SLCA grouped P. pubescens and P. peruviana together and branched at higher levels of similarity (0.98). In addition, SDS-PAGE showed that P. peruviana, P. angulata and P. pubescens are distantly related to P. micrantha. High pollen stainability (80.6% - 92.6%) was recorded in all the Physalis species studied. Therefore, from this study, it can be concluded that all the four species studied are distinct species with a common origin and they are highly fertile

Solidworks Simulation of Mechanical Properties of Recycled Plastics/Nanocomposite Faces Sandwich Panels

Sandwich panels are lightweight, high strength materials desired by engineers for various applications. However, many contributions cited the replacement of the metallic surfaces with reinforced polymeric composites for additional weight reduction purpose but none observed for recycled plastics. Accordingly, this work plans to investigate the mechanical behavior of sandwich panels made of recycled plastic/Nano reinforced composites under tension, compression, and bending load using Solidworks simulation. The data were obtained from previous works, and the complementary data were collected using different approaches. All models revealed that polycarbonate (PC) skin dominated over polypropylene and high-density polyethylene due to the highest modulus of elasticity. However, the results indicated that the core unless reinforced the outer skins will be separated as a result of residual strain at interfaces. Consequently, the core of PC skin sandwich panel reinforced with two thin sheets which lead to improvement in loading endurance from 500 to 1500N without exceeding the allowable limits of the materials and leading to the birth of environmentally intimated material termed green sandwich panel

Evaluation of Some Microbiological and Physico-chemical Composition of Domestic Wastewater in Rivers and Bayelsa States

Aims: This research study aims at ascertaining the inhibitive contributions of these domestic effluents even as they flow from drains into the rivers. Study Design: The microbiological and physico-chemical composition of domestic wastewater in Rivers and Bayelsa States was achieved experimentally. Place and Duration of Study: The study was carried out in Rivers and Bayelsa states, Nigeria, between August 20016 and January 2017. Methodology: The waste water samples were aseptically collected from domestic points using 1 litre sterile polyethylene bottles filled with ice and was immediately taken to the laboratory for analysis to improve reliability of data and they were stored at 4°C for further analysis. Results: The physicochemical analysis of wastewater collected from 20 stations were investigated. These parameters were analyzed by standard methods. The color of the collected sewage water was pale yellow to black and was turbid in some selected stations. Unpleasant odor was observed in all selected stations. The pH of the wastewater varied from 6.0 to 7.3, while the water conductivity ranges from 650 to 2390 μScm-1. The maximum total suspended solid was 182 mg/l, and the maximum biological oxygen demand was 569.5 mg/l. The chemical oxygen demand of the selected stations varied widely (507.1 – 602.9 mg/l), and the dissolved oxygen content varied from 0.01 to 0.242 mg/l. The nitrate content was found to be maximum in station G (18.5 ppm), and the samples show high content of bacteria in all the stations. Conclusion: This study anchors on the need for effective sewage treatment of domestic, industrial and municipal effluent before they are discharged into the environment. This will help to meet up with the long-term challenges of environmental pollution, improve standard of living and health, and also enhance economic opportunities and good sustainable development

Karyotypic studies of four Physalis species from Nigeria

Mitotic chromosomes from root tips of four Nigerian Physalis species were investigated using standard cytogenetic methods. P. angulata has chromosome number of 2n = 48 with karyotypic formula of 2M + 5m + 16sm + 1st, while P. micrantha, P. peruviana and P. pubescens showed the same chromosome number of 2n = 24 with karyotypic formulae of 1M + 1m + 9sm + 1st, 4M + 6m + 1sm + 1st and 1M + 1 m + 2sm + 8st, respectively. The karyotypes show that P. angulata is more advanced when compared to the other three diploids studied

A Java Simulation-Based Performance Evaluation of Mobile Agent Platforms.

Mobile agents are emerging as a promising paradigm for the design and implementations of distributed applications .Manyof these Mobile Agent platforms have been developed, new one, and new versions of old agents, kept on appearing everyyear, so choosing the right or most suitable platform for a particular application area; based on their performance is achallenge for both the developers and the users. This paper carried out a qualitative comparison across three selected, Javabased Mobile Agent System, Aglet Tracy, and JADE. Two of them (Aglets and JADE) were selected for quantitativeevaluation on their time of transfer/retrieval of compressed data files. In our implementation, Aglet version 2.02 and JADE3.4.1 were used. A java simulation program was developed and used in measuring the performance of the two mobileagents, using transmission time and compressed time as performance metrics. In this paper work, a unique portnumber(2080) was chosen for the loading of classes and mobility of agents. Ten dummy data files (also refer to as Load orMessage) were created with sizes ranges from 100Kb to 1 Mb. A gzip compression tool was used to compress each of thesefiles and sent through the Aglet and JADE enabled network. The transmission time (in milliseconds) for each correspondingfiles size (in Bytes) in the two Mobile agents were recorded. We deduced from our qualitative results that, Tracy plug-infeatures give users room for reusability and extension. Aglets provide weak security and poorly scalable. JADE has astrong security, scalable and its multi agent feature will enrich its usage on the internet. Our quantitative results show thattransferring/retrieving of compressed data file is faster in JADE than in Aglets. The integrity of the files are also kept safe, inboth mobile agents, that is after decompressions they can still be reused.Keywords: Aglet, Gzip, JADE, Compression ratio, Mobile Agent Networ

INFLUENCE OF SOIL PROPERTIES ON PLANT NEMATODE POPULATION DENSITY UNDER Chromolaena odorata FALLOW

Relationships between soil abiotic factors and population densities of plant parasitic nematodes spe-cies under planted fallow of Chromolaena odorata was investigated for 2 years. Soil samples were collected at 0 – 30 cm depth to determine population of nematode species and soil physico-chemical properties was done at test initiation and afterwards at 6 months interval for 2 years. Four genera of plant parasitic nematode species (Meloidogyne spp., Pratylenchus spp, Helicotylenchus spp. and Xiphinema spp) and two free – living (Rhabditids and Dorylaimus spp.) were identified in the fallow. Soil organic Matter and soil N were significantly higher at 2 years than at 6, 12 and 18 months. Popu-lation density of plant parasitic nematode species significantly reduce as the fallow period extend reaching minimum at 2 years of fallow. Highest percentage reduction of 90.3 % was observed in popu-lation of Xiphinema at 2 years of fallow, followed by Pratylenchus with 51.5 % reduction in population and lowest reduction of 44 % was observed in Meloidogyne population. Negative and significant rela-tionship existed between soil physico-chemical properties and population density of plant parasitic nematode species indicated that soil characteristics play an important role in the abundance, distribu-tion and structure of nematode communities

ISOLATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF β-SITOSTEROL FROM ELAEAGNUS ANGUSTIFOLIA CULTIVATED IN IRAQ

Objective: The aim of our study was to investigate chemical constituents of leaves and seeds of Elaeagnus angustifolia since no phytochemical investigation had been done previously in Iraq.Methods: Phytochemical screening of the extracts obtained from the leaves of E. angustifolia indicated the presence of flavonoids (type of flavonols), saponins, alkaloids, steroids, and terpenoids. Thin-layer chromatography fingerprinting and the spraying reagent (concentrated H2SO4 and vanillin in ethanol) were used to identify the hexane extract containing phytosterols.Results: The different chromatographic and spectroscopic results revealed the presence of βâ€sitosterol isolated from E. angustifolia. Conclusion: The isolation and purification afforded white crystalline powder which was subjected to chemical and spectral identification by infrared and 1H-nuclear magnetic resonance. The compound was identified as βâ€sitosterol

PRODUCTION OF BIODIESEL FROM SOME VEGETABLE OILS

Biodiesel is becoming prominent among the alternatives to conventional petro-diesel due to economic,environmental and social factors. The quality of biodiesel is influenced by the nature of feedstock and theproduction processes employed. High amounts of free fatty acids (FFA) in the feedstock are known to bedetrimental to the quality of biodiesel. In addition, oils with compounds containing hydroxyl groups possesshigh viscosity due to hydrogen bonding. American Standards and Testing Materials, (ASTM D 6751)recommends FFA content of not more than 0.5% in biodiesel and a viscosity of less than 6 mm2/s. Thephysico-chemical properties of palm kernel oil and coconut oil were assessed for their potentials in biodiesel.The properties of palm kernel oil and coconut oil were compared with those of palm from literature whilethat of biodiesel were compared with petro-diesel, ASTM and European Standards (EN14214). Resultsshowed that high amounts of FFA in oils produced low quality biodiesel while neutralized oils with lowamounts of FFA produced high quality biodiesel. The quality of biodiesel from palm kernel oil and coconutoils was improved greatly by neutralising the crude oil

Effect of Financial Liberalization on the Performance of Informal Capital Market

This study examines the effects of financial liberalization on the corporate performance of informal capital market in Nigeria {Unity (IFE) NUT Cooperative Investment and Credit Society as a case study}. It employs the Ordinary Least Square method of multiple regression analysis for the period of ten years (2001-2010). Three models were formulated, the first, proxied financial liberalization variable (saving rate) with loan granted by informal capital market in Nigeria and saving mobilized by the market. The second, revealing a relationship between financial liberalization variable (lending rate) with deposit mobilised by informal capital market in Nigeria and loan granted by the market while the last, depicting relationship between financial liberalization variables (saving and lending rates), deposit mobilised with loan granted by informal capital market in Nigeria and net surplus of the market (being non-profit making institutions). This work concluded that financial liberalization has significant effect on deposit mobilised and loan granted by the market but did not have significant effect on their net surplus. It therefore, recommends that the market should be supervised, formulate policies that would enhance the performance of informal financial sector in Nigeria coupled with the reduction of the gap between lending and saving rates of banks. Keywords: Financial Liberalization, Informal Capital Market, Unity (IFE) NUT Cooperative Investment and Credit Society, Ordinary Least Square (OLS) Metho