Participatory cotton breeding for organic and low input farming in Central India

Up to 80% of world’s organic cotton is produced in India. However, involved producers are facing increased difficulties to find suitable cultivars. Few hybrids selected for high input farming and genetically-modified (GM) cotton, which is explicitly excluded in organic farming, are presently dominating the Indian seed market. In addition farmers have lost their traditional knowledge on seed production and hybrid seed needs to be purchased each season

Evolution of the Kondo resonance feature and its relationship to spin-orbit coupling across the quantum critical point in Ce2Rh{1-x}CoxSi3

We investigate the evolution of the electronic structure of Ce2Rh{1-x}CoxSi3 as a function of x employing high resolution photoemission spectroscopy. Co substitution at the Rh sites in antiferromagnetic Ce2RhSi3 leads to a transition from an antiferromagnetic system to a Kondo system, Ce2CoSi3 via the Quantum Critical Point (QCP). High resolution photoemission spectra reveal distinct signature of the Kondo resonance feature (KRF) and its spin orbit split component (SOC) in the whole composition range indicating finite Kondo temperature scale at the quantum critical point. We observe that the intensity ratio of the Kondo resonance feature and its spin orbit split component, KRF/SOC gradually increases with the decrease in temperature in the strong hybridization limit. The scenario gets reversed if the Kondo temperature becomes lower than the magnetic ordering temperature. While finite Kondo temperature within the magnetically ordered phase indicates applicability of the spin density wave picture at the approach to QCP, the dominant temperature dependence of the spin-orbit coupled feature suggests importance of spin-orbit interactions in this regime.Comment: 6 figure

Endophytic Mycoflora of Indian Medicinal Plant, Terminalia arjuna and their Biological Activities

Studies were undertaken to isolate, identify and evaluate the biological activities of endophytic mycoflora of Indian medicinal plant, Terminalia arjuna. A total of 20 isolates of endophytic fungi were obtained from the leaves, twigs and bark tissues of the Terminalia arjuna. Out of 20, six isolates exhibited promising antibacterial, antifungal and anti-inflammatory activities when cultivated at shake flask level. The selected isolates were identified on the basis of morphology and ITS gene sequencing. Three isolates, designated as TA BA 1, TA L1 and TA L2 were identified as Aspergillus flavus whereas; the remaining three endophytic fungi were identified as Diaporthe arengae (TA TW2), Alternaria Sp. (TA TW1) and Lasiodiplodia theobromae (TA BA2). Aspergillus flavus was found as the predominant endophyte in leaves and bark tissues of the plant. The crude extract of the test isolates showed considerable antimicrobial activity against common human bacterial (Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Proteus vulgaris, Salmonella abony and Bacillus subtilis) and fungal (Candida albicans, Aspergillus niger and Penicilium sp.) pathogens. The extract of Diaporthe arengae (TA TW2) significantly reduced the concentration of DPPH free radical as percent DPPH scavenging activity was found to be highest (69.56%) in comparison with other isolates. The % inhibition of hemolysis of RBCs was found to be highest (82.85%) with Diaporthe arengae (TA TW2) in comparison (83.26%) with standard drug (Ibuprofen). Among all, the extract of the Diaporthe arengae (TA TW2) showed excellent biological activities and hence was subjected to further characterization. The phytochemical investigation of the extract revealed the presence of terpenoids as the major phytoconstituents which was supported by TLC and UV spectroscopic studies. The results indicate that the isolated endophytes could be the valuable source of these bioactive molecules with diverse biological activities. The bioactivities may be attributed to the terpenoids present in the endophytic extract

Management of false wire worm, Gonocephalum beetle (Tenebrionidae: coleoptera) in chickpea raised under residual moisture conditions

False wire worm, Gonocephalum indicum, incidence was observed for the first time in severe form in Rabi 2008-09 on chickpea, confined to saline tracts of Vidarbha (MS). Gonocephalum adults inflicts injury near collar region of chickpea resulting in collapsing and drying of plants translating into re-sowing of crop due to poor plantstand. Field study revealed 5.8 – 32.3% damaged plants with lowest damage in Module 9 (Seed treatment with clothianidin 2 gm/kg seed + spaying of chlorpyriphos 2 ml/liter water 20 days after crop emergence), Module 10 (Application of phorate granules 10 kg/ha at sowing + spraying of chlorpyriphos 2 ml/liter water 20 days after crop emergence) and Module 11(Seed treatment with clothianidin 2 gm/kg seed + application of clothianidin granules 200 gm/ha 20 days after crop emergence) with 5.8, 6.2 and 8.7% affected plants. The % drying of plants due to injury was in the range of 4.3 – 21.6 % with lowest in Module 11, Module 10 and Module 9 with 4.3, 6.0 and 6.2 % drying of plants, respectively. Superiority of Module 9 (20.4 q/ha) and Module 11 (19.7 q/ha) was evident in yield, whereas, lowest yield was observed in control plot (13.2 q/ha). Module 9 and Module 11 registered higher net returns of Rs. 13887 and Rs. 9948 per ha, respectively, whereas, Module 9 and Module 10 had highest ICBR of 1: 6.0 indicating the suitability of modules in terms of bioefficacy and cost effectiveness for the management of Gonocephalum in problematic area

INTERNET OF THINGS BASED SMART AGRICULTURE SYSTEM USING PREDICTIVE ANALYTICS

Due to the use of internet of things (IoT) devices, communication between different things is effective. The application of IoT in agriculture industryplays a key role to make functionalities easy. Using the concept of IoT and wireless sensor network (WSN), smart farming system has been developedin many areas of the world. Precision farming is one of the branches comes forward in this aspect. Many researchers have developed monitoring andautomation system for different functionalities of farming. Using WSN, data acquisition and transmission between IoT devices deployed in farms will be easy. In proposed technique, Kalman filter (KF) is used with prediction analysis to acquire quality data without any noise and to transmit this data for cluster-based WSNs. Due to the use of this approach, the quality of data used for analysis is improved as well as data transfer overhead is minimized in WSN application. Decision tree is used for decision making using prediction analytics for crop yield prediction, crop classification, soil classification, weather prediction, and crop disease prediction. IoT components, such as and cube (IOT Gateway) and Mobius (IOT Service platform), are integrated in proposed system to provide smart solution for crop growth monitoring to users.Â

Diaphragmatic hernia following oesophagectomy for oesophageal cancer – Are we too radical?

Background: Diaphragmatic herniation (DH) of abdominal contents into the thorax after oesophageal resection is a recognised and serious complication of surgery. While differences in pressure between the abdominal and thoracic cavities are important, the size of the hiatal defect is something that can be influenced surgically. As with all oncological surgery, safe resection margins are essential without adversely affecting necessary anatomical structure and function. However very little has been published looking at the extent of the hiatal resection. We aim to present a case series of patients who developed DH herniation post operatively in order to raise discussion about the ideal extent of surgical resection required. Methods: We present a series of cases of two male and one female who had oesophagectomies for moderately and poorly differentiated adenocarcinomas of the lower oesophagus who developed post-operative DH. We then conducted a detailed literature review using Medline, Pubmed and Google Scholar to identify existing guidance to avoid this complication with particular emphasis on the extent of hiatal resection. Discussion: Extended incision and partial resection of the diaphragm are associated with an increased risk of postoperative DH formation. However, these more extensive excisions can ensure clear surgical margins. Post-operative herniation can be an early or late complication of surgery and despite the clear importance of hiatal resection only one paper has been published on this subject which recommends a more limited resection than was carried out in our cases. Conclusion: This case series investigated the recommended extent of hiatal dissection in oesophageal surgery. Currently there is no clear guidance available on this subject and further studies are needed to ascertain the optimum resection margin that results in the best balance of oncological parameters vs. post operative morbidity

The Cosmology of Massless String Modes

We consider the spacetime dynamics of a gas of closed strings in the context of General Relativity in a background of arbitrary spatial dimensions. Our motivation is primarily late time String Gas Cosmology, where such a spacetime picture has to emerge after the dilaton has stabilized. We find that after accounting for the thermodynamics of a gas of strings, only string modes which are massless at the self-dual radius are relevant, and that they lead to a dynamics which is qualitatively different from that induced by the modes usually considered in the literature. In the context of an ansatz with three large spatial dimensions and an arbitrary number of small extra dimensions, we obtain isotropic stabilization of these extra dimensions at the self-dual radius. This stabilization occurs for fixed dilaton, and is induced by the special string states we focus on. The three large dimensions undergo a regular Friedmann-Robertson-Walker expansion. We also show that this framework for late-time cosmology is consistent with observational bounds.Comment: 15 pages, no figures, references added (again