Modelling Scenarios of Development of Small Agriculture Businesses

The paper deals with the dynamic simulation of possible development scenarios of small farmers. The model is based on the official data sources but also on the qualitative research of small farmers. The modelling structure reflects the specifics of the examined field and personal and social specifics of small farmers. For the purposes of the analysis, the business model describes the value creation in the small farms, thereafter the model is extended into dynamic simulation model and the selected scenarios of development are simulated. The analysis shows the impact of the current setup in the field. Despite the paper contains the optimistic scenarios, simple change of parameters leads to unsustainable situation. The pessimistic scenarios grow from realistic conditions when parameters reflects the recent period settings. This clearly depicts the influence of weak market position of the farmers and advocates the diversification tendencies

Scavenger Receptor CD163 and Its Biological Functions

CD163 is a member of scavenger receptor super family class B of the first subgroup. It is mapped to the region p13 on chromosome 12. Five different isoforms of CD163 have been described, which differ in the structure of their cytoplasmic domains and putative phosporylation sites. This scavenger receptor is selectively expressed on cells of monocytes and macrophages lineage exclusively. CD163 immunological function is essentially homeostatic. It also has other functions because participates in adhesion to endothelial cells, in tolerance induction and tissues regeneration. Other very important function of CD163 is the clearance of hemoglobin in its cell-free form and participation in anti-inflammation in its soluble form, exhibiting cytokine-like functions. We review the biological functions of CD163 which have been discovered until now. It seems apparent from this review that CD163 scavenger receptor can be used as biomarker in different diseases and as a valuable diagnostic parameter for prognosis of many diseases especially inflammatory disorders and sepsis

Evaluation of the Growth Dynamics and Morphological Characteristics of Genetic Sources of Silybum marianum (L.) Gaertn

The aim of this work was to evaluate the growth dynamics and selected morphological characteristics of genetic sources of milk thistle (Silybum marianum L. Gaertn.) for the further development of the minimal set of descriptors. Milk thistle is grown in the Czech Republic for its achenes; however, the quality of achenes can be reduced by many factors, by the occurrence of fungal pathogens mainly. The growth dynamics and morphological characteristics of milk thistle during the vegetation period in the years 2010–2013 at two localities were evaluated. The cluster analysis of the data showed the similarity for some of the accessions and confirmed the dependence of the data value to the climatic conditions. Source from Serbia, Slovakia, Romanian variety ’De Prahova’, German accessions SIL 2 and SIL 8, Hungarian accesion RCAT 040360 DDR and Czech variety ’Silyb’ seem to be promising genetic sources from the viewpoint of growth and development in the Czech Republic