Physiological traits associated with recent advances in yield of Chinese wheat

[spa] China representa alrededor del 20% de la población mundial y esta proporción se mantendrá similar en las próximas décadas y por tanto la mejora en la dieta incrementará el consumo de trigo. Aunque los rendimientos de grano en trigo han ido aumentando en las últimas tres décadas, la alimentación de casi 1400 millones de personas en las próximas décadas supone un reto significativo. Para satisfacer esta demanda, es fundamental estudiar qué rasgos agronómicos y fisiológicos pueden contribuir a un mayor rendimiento potencial en trigo. Para lograr este objetivo, los trigos de la provincia de Henan, una de las regiones productoras de trigo de China, se han estudiado en esta tesis. Los objetivos de este estudio fueron identificar la combinación de rasgos agronómicos, morfológicos y fisiológicos que han contribuido a las mejoras sustanciales en el rendimiento potencial de los trigos de invierno chinos recientemente comercializados y evaluar técnicas de fenotípado que pueden ayudar a acelerar los nuevos avances en la selección de trigos chinos. El rendimiento potencial de los genotipos modernos chinos ha aumentado como resultado de un incremento del índice de cosecha (HI), el número de granos por unidad de superfície, y la biomasa aeria total, mientras que el peso de mil granos ha sido menos afectada. Por el contrario, la mayoría de los genotipos de alto rendimiento están moderadamente adaptados a condiciones de estrés y son altamente sensibles a las cepas de roya amarilla en condiciones Mediterráneas de alto rendimiento, lo que indica que la adaptación al estrés no ha sido una prioridad en la selección recientemente realizada en China en condiciones de rendimiento potencial. El “ideotipo” adaptado al estrés consiste en plantas más altas con una mayor biomasa aérea verde, sobretodo durante la etapa reproductiva, junto con un mejor estado hídrico, la capacidad de absorber agua durante el llenado del grano y una mayor eficiencia en el uso del nitrógeno relacionada con una captación y utilización más eficiente de los fertilizantes nitrogenados. Por otra parte, la fotosíntesis neta (Pn) y la conductancia estomática (gs) en las hojas bandera no parecen estar relacionadas con el aumento del rendimiento potencial, mientras que el CO2 total fijado por toda la espiga parece tener un papel claro en el aumento del rendimiento. Estudios de composición isotópica de carbono (δ13C) y oxígeno (δ18O) han sugerido que el aumento de la eficiencia del uso del agua está implicado en el aumento de rendimiento potencial. Sin embargo, dicho aumento no se logró a través de una disminución de la gs. Por el contrario, los genotipos de alto rendimiento potencial tienen una mayor eficiencia en el uso del nitrógeno (NUE), una mayor capacidad de removilización del N y de absorción de agua durante el llenado del grano. Estas mejoras se lograron mediante la optimización del balance fuente / sumidero de N en la espiga, que es principalmente el resultado de la liberación de N procedente de la degradación de Rubisco durante el llenado del grano.[eng] China represents around 20% of world population and this proportion will remain similar in the coming decades, whereas an improvement in diet will increase the consumption of wheat. Although wheat grain yields have been increasing in the last three decades, the challenges of feeding nearly 1.4 billion people will be significant in the next few decades. To satisfy this demand, it is paramount to study what agronomical and physiological traits may contribute to higher yield potential in wheat. Towards this goal, wheats from Henan Province, which is one of the wheat baskets of China, have been studied in this thesis. The objectives of this study were to identify the combination of agronomical, morphological and physiological traits that have contributed to the substantial improvements in yield potential of recently released Chinese winter wheats and to test phenotypical approaches that may help to speed further breeding advances in Chinese wheats. The yield potential of modern Chinese genotypes has grown as a result of an increase in harvest index (HI), grain number per unit area, and total above-ground biomass, whereas thousand kernel weight has been less affected. By contrast, most of the high yield genotypes are moderately adapted to stress conditions and highly susceptible to yellow rust strains in high-yielding Mediterranean conditions, indicating that stress adaptation has not been a priority in recent Chinese breeding for yield potential conditions. The stress adapted “ ideotype” consists of taller plants with a higher green aerial biomass, particularly during the reproductive stage, together with a better water status, the capacity to take up water during grain filling and a higher nitrogen use efficiency that is related to a more efficient uptake and utilization of N fertilizer. Moreover, the net photosynthesis (Pn) and stomatal conductance (gs) in flag leaves do not appear to be related to increases in yield potential, while total CO2 fixed by the whole ear appears to have a clear role in the yield increase. Studies of carbon (δ13C) and oxygen (δ18O) isotope composition have suggested that higher water use efficiency is involved in raising yield potential. However, such an increase was not achieved through a decrease in gs. By contrast, the high yield potential genotypes have higher nitrogen use efficiency (NUE), N remobilization capacity and uptake capacity during grain filling. These improvements were achieved by optimizing the ear N source/sink balance, which is mainly the result of N released from Rubisco degradation during grain filling. Besides detecting the physiological traits contributing to raising yield potential, testing for effective phenotyping tools to assess stress tolerance is important in breeding. This is the case for biotic stresses, such as yellow rust, where the use of low cost phenotyping approaches may help to select rust tolerance in the breeding pipeline. The use of conventional (i.e. red/blue/green, RBG) images provided an affordable approach to detect genotypic tolerance to yellow rust. Some colour characteristics, including hue, green fraction, greener fraction, a, and u have proved to be more efficient than other more conventional phenotyping approaches

On Development of Information Communications in Human Society

Information is very important. Information is also very complicated, making that people have no common understanding and conclusion for the nature of it up today. There are too many papers and some books to describe information; however it is rather difficult to find the description and analysing for the whole history of information from the advent of human beings to the present day. Two parts of information in prehistoric period and the time interred divinization are described. Every part is separated according to several succeeded stages for description. It is near impossible to describe in detail such entire historical facts of information in human society in a paper, so the description and discussion is focused on their comprehensiveness and integrity. By knowing and analysing all these solid historical facts of information, some relative issues e.g. “did information age really exist in the development of material civilization in human society” can be recognized easily

Among Ectasia Patients with Coexisting Coronary Artery Disease, TIMI Frame Count Correlates with Ectasia Size and Markis Type IV Is the Commonest

Background. Coronary artery ectasia (CAE) occurs in 0.3 to 5.3% of patients undergoing coronary angiography. TIMI frame count (TFC) is an index of coronary flow that correlates with flow velocity. In ectasia patients, there is delayed coronary flow with increased TFC. Methods. We evaluated angiograms of 789 patients for presence of CAE, coronary artery disease (CAD), and Markis type of CAE. We measured ectasia size and length and their correlation with TFC in ectatic right coronary arteries (RCA) of patients with CAE and CAD. Results. 30 patients had CAE (3.8%). Of these 16.7% had isolated CAE, while 83.87% had CAE and CAD. Among CAE and CAD patients, the RCA was most involved (70.4%), and Markis type IV CAE was the commonest (64%). In isolated CAE, the RCA, LAD, and LCx were equally involved (33.3%). Patients with CAE and CAD had significantly higher TFC compared to controls, P=0.035. There was a positive correlation of moderate strength, between ectasia size and TFC, r(17) = 0.598, P=0.007. Ectasia length was not significantly correlated with TFC, rho (17) = 0.334, P=0.163. Conclusion. Among patients undergoing angiography, CAE has a prevalence of 3.8% and Markis type IV is the commonest. Larger ectasias are associated with slower coronary flow