Enhancing drought tolerance in Indian mustard (Brassica juncea) through microbial inoculants under varying irrigation regimes

A field experiment was conducted during the winter (rabi) seasons of 2020–21, 2021–22 and 2022–23 at College of Agriculture, Sri Karan Narendra Agriculture University, Jobner, Rajasthan to identify the appropriate bacterial strains and irrigation levels to enhance drought tolerance and productivity in Indian mustard [Brassica juncea (L.) Czern.]. The experiment was laid out in a split plot design assigning irrigation treatments (no irrigation, 50% deficit irrigation and normal level of irrigation) in main plots and microbes (MRD-17, MKS-6, Biophos and Biophos+, CRIDAMI-I, CRIDA MI-II and control) in sub plots. Results demonstrated that normal level of irrigation (2 irrigations) yielded superior outcomes in terms of plant height, dry matter accumulation, yield attributes, viz. seed yield (1542 kg/ha), stover yield (3677 kg/ha), relative water content (70.72%), protein content (18.1%), oil content (38.7%), water use efficiency (7.50 kg/ha-mm), net returns (₹52529/ha) and B:C ratio (2.07). This was significantly higher compared to 50% deficit irrigation and no irrigation treatments. Among microbial inoculants, CRIDA MI-II exhibited the highest impact on growth and yield attributes, viz. seed yield (1312 kg/ha), stover yield (3262 kg/ha), protein content (17.2%), water use efficiency (5.88 kg/ha-mm), net returns (₹42294/ha) and B:C ratio (1.72). Notably, it was statistically comparable to the effects of CRIDA MI-I and Biophos and Biophos+ across most parameters. The comprehensive results of this study advocated the strategic implementation of both optimal irrigation practices and microbial inoculants as a sustainable approach to enhance productivity and drought tolerance in Indian mustard, particularly in the arid and semi-arid regions of Rajasthan

Efficacy of floral preservatives stored at different temperatures and time periods on lushness retention and vaselife of chrysanthemum (Dendranthema × grandiflora) cv. Thai Chen Queen

Different floral preservative treatments consisting of citric acid, 8HQ, sucrose and their combinations stored at different temperatures and duration (time periods) were used to reduce the foliage discoloration and to enhance the vase life of chrysanthemum (Dendranthema × grandiflora Ramat.) cv. Thai Chen Queen, at ICAR-IARI, New Delhi during 2012-14. Experiment was laid out in completely randomized block design with sixteen treatments and three replications. It was observed that all the preservative treatments significantly reduced foliage discoloration and increased the vase life over control (Distilled water). The preservative solution containing 400 ppm 8HQ+400 ppm citric acid+ 3% sucrose +one year old storage at low temperature (T14) resulted in maximum vase life (36.56 days), maximum chlorophyll content with zero wilting and leaf yellowing and reduced leaf browning. Minimum weight loss (9.48%) was recorded in 400ppm 8HQ+400ppm citric acid +3 month old storage at low temperature (T5). However, maximum volume of solution consumed (104.72 ml) was recorded in 400 ppm 8HQ+400 ppm citric acid+3% sucrose+6 month old storage at low temperature (T10), whereas maximum flower diameter (12.37cm) was recorded in 400ppm 8HQ+400 ppm citric acid+3% sucrose+3 month old storage at low temperature (T6)

Induction of dwarfing in bougainvillea cv Mahara by use of growth regulators

Bougainvillea (Bougainvillea spectabilis) is a very popular evergreen landscape plant in tropical and subtropical areas. Because of the vigorous growth habit, bougainvillea needs a lot of labor-intensive pruning when being used as a potted plant. PGRs could be alternatives to frequent pruning on bougainvillea to reduce labor costs. But, little research has been carried out on the use of plant growth retardants (PGRs) for controlling the growth and flowering. The present investigations were carried out to study the effect of growth regulators mainly; paclobutrazol, daminozide and maleic hydrazide on bougainvillea cv Mahara to induce dwarfing. The experiment was laid out in completely Randomized Block Design with 11 treatments and four replications. The rooted cuttings of bougainvillea were planted on 7 July 2012 in earthen pot (10” diameter) containing potting media consisting of sand: soil: FYM in a ratio of 1:2:1. The plants were pruned to a uniform height of 10+2 inches on 3rd September 2012. The growth regulators were applied in the form of foliar spray or drench and data was recorded for vegetative and flowering traits. After 14 weeks, it was observed that there was a significant reduction in plant height and plant spread when paclobutrazol was applied in the form of spray or drench. However, application of maleic hydrazide inhibited the plant growth, on the contrary increased plant height and plant spread over control (Distilled water spray) was observed with 5000 ppm Daminozide (B-9) application. Drench application of paclobutrazol @30 ppm resulted in highest flower index as compared to other treatments

Effect of different floral preservatives on reducing foliage discoloration and increasing vase life of chrysanthemum (Dendranthema × grandiflora) cv White Reagan

The experiment was conducted at the Division of Floriculture and Landscaping, Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi. To enhance the vase life and to reduce the foliage discoloration of chrysanthemum (Dendranthema × grandiflora Ramat.) cv. White Reagan, different floral preservative treatments consisting of cobalt chloride, salicylic acid, sodium nitro prusside, aluminium sulphate, 8- HQC and sucrose were used. Experiment was laid out in completely randomized block design with eleven treatment combinations and each treatment was replicated thrice. It was observed that maximum vase life, solution uptake, increase in flower size and minimum foliage discoloration was observed in flowers held in preservative containing 400 ppm 8-HQC and 1.5% sucrose, which was significantly superior over all other treatments

Standardization of protocol for in vitro multiplication of bougainvillea

Bougainvillea is commonly propagated by hardwood cuttings but this method is tedious and time consuming. Moreover, there are certain varieties where the rooting percentage is very low. For easy, quick and mass multiplication of such cultivars, tissue culture technique can be put to use. Tissue culture has been proved to be useful for successful multiplication in case of number of vegetatively propagated shrubs. Present investigation was carried out in order to standardize a protocol for in vitro multiplication of bougainvillea cultivar Mahara through axillary bud induction of nodal explants. Shoot tips and nodal sections with axillary buds were excised, surface-sterilized and then cultured on MS medium supplemented with plant growth regulators. Pre-treatment agitation of explants in Carbendazim (0.2%) + Diathane M-45 (0.2%) + 8-HQC (200 mg/l) for 2 hr followed by quick dip in ethyl alcohol (70%; v/v) for 30 sec and surface sterilization with HgCl2 (0.1%) for 5 min was found to be most effective in culture initiation with only 16.48% microbial contamination. For culture establishment, MS medium supplemented with BAP (5mg/L)+ NAA (0.5mg/l) was found to be the best with highest percentage of culture establishment (100%) and the fastest bud sprout (4.50 days). MS medium supplemented with BAP (5.0 mg/l)+ NAA (1.0mg/l) and GA3 (0.5 mg/l) gave the highest shoot proliferation. The best treatment for micro-shoot elongation was MS medium was supplemented with 1.5 mg/l GA3 which gave the highest elongation (2.34 cm). Highest in vitro rooting (70.52%) of micro-shoots was observed in the treatment where, half-strength MS medium was supplemented with IBA (1.0 mg/l)+ NAA (1.0 mg/l). Hardening of in vitro propagated plants of bougainvillea rooted plantlets was done for 21 days in glass jars filled with agro peat medium {A mixture of soilrite (1) + coco peat (1) + perlite (1)} supplemented with 1/2 strength liquid inorganic MS medium and covered with polypropylene lids. The hardened plantlets were successfully transferred to the glasshouse after a short period of in vitro acclimatization

Status of the PANDA barrel DIRC

The PANDA experiment at the future Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Europe GmbH (FAIR) at GSI, Darmstadt will study fundamental questions of hadron physics and QCD using high-intensity cooled antiproton beams with momenta between 1.5 and 15 GeV/c. Hadronic PID in the barrel region of the PANDA detector will be provided by a DIRC (Detection of Internally Reflected Cherenkov light) counter. The design is based on the successful BABAR DIRC with several key improvements, such as fast photon timing and a compact imaging region. Detailed Monte Carlo simulation studies were performed for DIRC designs based on narrow bars or wide plates with a variety of focusing solutions. The performance of each design was characterized in terms of photon yield and single photon Cherenkov angle resolution and a maximum likelihood approach was used to determine the π/K separation. Selected design options were implemented in prototypes and tested with hadronic particle beams at GSI and CERN. This article describes the status of the design and R&D for the PANDA Barrel DIRC detector, with a focus on the performance of different DIRC designs in simulation and particle beams

GeantV: Results from the prototype of concurrent vector particle transport simulation in HEP

Full detector simulation was among the largest CPU consumer in all CERN experiment software stacks for the first two runs of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). In the early 2010's, the projections were that simulation demands would scale linearly with luminosity increase, compensated only partially by an increase of computing resources. The extension of fast simulation approaches to more use cases, covering a larger fraction of the simulation budget, is only part of the solution due to intrinsic precision limitations. The remainder corresponds to speeding-up the simulation software by several factors, which is out of reach using simple optimizations on the current code base. In this context, the GeantV R&D project was launched, aiming to redesign the legacy particle transport codes in order to make them benefit from fine-grained parallelism features such as vectorization, but also from increased code and data locality. This paper presents extensively the results and achievements of this R&D, as well as the conclusions and lessons learnt from the beta prototype.Comment: 34 pages, 26 figures, 24 table

Cross-sections for nuclide production in 56Fe target irradiated by 300, 500,750, 1000, 1500, and 2600 MeV protons compared with data on hydrogen target irradiation by 300, 500, 750, 1000, and 1500 MeV/nucleon 56Fe ions

Cross-sections for radioactive nuclide production in 56Fe(p,x) reactions at 300, 500, 750, 1000, 1500, and 2600 MeV were measured using the ITEP U-10 proton accelerator. In total, 221 independent and cumulative yields of products of half-lives from 6.6 min to 312 days have been obtained via the direct-spectrometry method. The measured data have been compared with the experimental data obtained elsewhere by the direct and inverse kinematics methods and with calculations by 15 codes, namely: MCNPX (INCL, CEM2k, BERTINI, ISABEL), LAHET (BERTINI, ISABEL), CEM03 (.01, .G1, .S1), LAQGSM03 (.01, .G1, >.S1), CASCADE-2004, LAHETO, and BRIEFF. Most of our data are in a good agreement with the inverse kinematics results and disprove the results of some earlier activation measurements that were quite different from the inverse kinematics measurements. The most significant calculation-to-experiment differences are observed in the yields of the A<30 light nuclei, indicating that further improvements in nuclear reaction models are needed, and pointing out as well to a necessity of more complete measurements of such reactions.Comment: 53 pages, 9 figures, 6 tables, only pdf file, submitted to Phys. Rev.

Determination of lethal dose (LD50) and sensitivity of fenugreek (Trigonella foenum-graecum) to sodium azide for induction of mutation

The present experiment was conducted in the year 2021 at Sri Karan Narendra Agriculture University, Jobner, Rajasthan, to determine the optimum dose (LD50) and duration of the chemical mutagen treatment for the induction of desirable mutation. A set of 100 pre-soaked fenugreek seeds were treated with 12 different concentrations of sodium azide, viz. 0.3 mM, 0.6 mM, 1 mM, 2 mM, 3 mM, 4 mM, 5 mM, 6 mM, 7 mM, 8 mM, 9 mM and 10 mM for three different durations, viz. 3 h, 6 h and 9 h. Results showed that a dose-dependent decreasing tendency was observed in germination percentage, survival percentage, root length and shoot length with increasing concentration and duration of sodium azide treatment. Almost all the mutagenic treatments resulted in decrease in germination percentage, survival percentage and seedling height (root and shoot length) with increasing concentrations and duration of mutagen in laboratory conditions. Also, the LD50 value was observed as an 8 mM sodium azide concentration for 6 h in fenugreek. The mutagen treatments given at 9 h duration were detrimental for fenugreek. They cannot be used for mutation induction as they are utterly lethal after a 3 mM sodium azide concentration. So, lower treatments of mutagens have influenced less biological damage and would be suitable for inducing desirable mutations

Feasibility studies of time-like proton electromagnetic form factors at PANDA at FAIR

Simulation results for future measurements of electromagnetic proton form factors at \PANDA (FAIR) within the PandaRoot software framework are reported. The statistical precision with which the proton form factors can be determined is estimated. The signal channel $\bar p p \to e^+ e^-$ is studied on the basis of two different but consistent procedures. The suppression of the main background channel, $\textit{i.e.}$ $\bar p p \to \pi^+ \pi^-$, is studied. Furthermore, the background versus signal efficiency, statistical and systematical uncertainties on the extracted proton form factors are evaluated using two different procedures. The results are consistent with those of a previous simulation study using an older, simplified framework. However, a slightly better precision is achieved in the PandaRoot study in a large range of momentum transfer, assuming the nominal beam conditions and detector performance