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Not AvailableFusarium oxysporum formae specialis cubense (Foc) is a soil-borne fungus that causes Fusarium wilt, which is considered to be the most destructive disease of bananas. The fungus is believed to have evolved with its host in the Indo-Malayan region, and from there it was spread to other banana-growing areas with infected planting material. The diversity and distribution of Foc in Asia was investigated. A total of 594 F. oxysporum isolates collected in ten Asian countries were identified by vegetative compatibility groups (VCGs) analysis. To simplify the identification process, the isolates were first divided into DNA lineages using PCR-RFLP analysis. Six lineages and 14 VCGs, representing three Foc races, were identified in this study. The VCG complex 0124/5 was most common in the Indian subcontinent, Vietnam and Cambodia; whereas the VCG complex 01213/16 dominated in the rest of Asia. Sixty-nine F. oxysporum isolates in this study did not match any of the known VCG tester strains. In this study, Foc VCG diversity in Bangladesh, Cambodia and Sri Lanka was determined for the first time and VCGs 01221 and 01222 were first reported from Cambodia and Vietnam. New associations of Foc VCGs and banana cultivars were recorded in all the countries where the fungus was collected. Information obtained in this study could help Asian countries to develop and implement regulatory measures to prevent the incursion of Foc into areas where it does not yet occur. It could also facilitate the deployment of disease resistant banana varieties in infested areas

A Framework for Prognostics and Health Management Applications toward Smart Manufacturing Systems

Prognostics and health management (PHM) has emerged as an intelligent solution to improve the availability of manufacturing systems. PHM consists of system health monitoring, feature extraction, fault diagnosis, and fault prognosis through remaining useful life estimation. However, the application of PHM to manufacturing systems is challenging because systems have become more complex and uncertain. In particular, small and medium-sized enterprises have difficulty in applying PHM due to the lack of internal expertise, time and resources for research and development. The objective of this paper is to develop a framework to provide a readily usable and accessible guideline for PHM application to manufacturing systems. A survey was performed to gather the current practices in dealing with system failures and maintenance strategies in the field. A framework was developed for giving a guideline for PHM application based on common core modules across manufacturing systems and their kinds with respect to the amount of available data and domain knowledge. A reference table was developed to track the PHM techniques for feature extraction, fault diagnosis, and fault prognosis. Finally, fault prognosis of a system was conducted as a case study, following the framework and the reference table to verify its practical use