Assessment of the food security level in the regions of the European North of Russia based on benchmarking methodology

This paper justifies the need to use benchmarking tools when assessing food security in the regions of the European North of Russia. The authors reveal the essence and advantages of this approach, define the criteria that characterize the agrarian potential of the regions. On the basis of the author’s methodology, the study develops an algorithm for the benchmarking procedure and tests it on the subjects of the North-West Federal District. Based on the indicators of the formation and use of the agrarian potential and the applied ranking methodology, the paper reveals the similarity of five regions of the European North of Russia, substantiates the leading position of the agricultural sector of the Vologda region. As a result of the study, the authors make a conclusion that the level of food security in the region depends on the starting conditions of the region, relies on state and regional needs, takes into account the regulatory framework. This circumstance makes it necessary to constantly assess the level of food security in order to make appropriate decisions about the necessary management impacts

Improving the level of food security of the region: cluster approach

Scientific approaches to the study of food security at the regional level of the Russian Federation are considered. The main indicators characterizing the level of food security of the Vologda region have been analysed. The main problems in providing the population of the region with food products of their own production have been identified. The problem of the low level of production of meat and meat products in the region has been identified as a problem that requires the most careful attention of regional government bodies. It has been concluded that the strengthen state support for meat livestock enterprises of the region is necessary. The analysis of the opinions of domestic scientists on the application of the cluster approach to the development of the agro-industrial complex has been carried out. The expediency of creating a meat cluster of the Vologda region as a promising tool for solving the problem of the low level of provision of the population of the region with meat is justified. The results of the SWOT analysis of the meat cluster of the Vologda region have been presented. The general concept of the meat cluster of the region is proposed

Transgenerational Stress Memory Is Not a General Response in Arabidopsis

Adverse conditions can trigger DNA damage as well as DNA repair responses in plants. A variety of stress factors are known to stimulate homologous recombination, the most accurate repair pathway, by increasing the concentration of necessary enzymatic components and the frequency of events. This effect has been reported to last into subsequent generations not exposed to the stress. To establish a basis for a genetic analysis of this transgenerational stress memory, a broad range of treatments was tested for quantitative effects on homologous recombination in the progeny. Several Arabidopsis lines, transgenic for well-established recombination traps, were exposed to 10 different physical and chemical stress treatments, and scored for the number of somatic homologous recombination (SHR) events in the treated generation as well as in the two subsequent generations that were not treated. These numbers were related to the expression level of genes involved in homologous recombination and repair. SHR was enhanced after the majority of treatments, confirming previous data and adding new effective stress types, especially interference with chromatin. Compounds that directly modify DNA stimulated SHR to values exceeding previously described induction rates, concomitant with an induction of genes involved in SHR. In spite of the significant stimulation in the stressed generations, the two subsequent non-treated generations only showed a low and stochastic increase in SHR that did not correlate with the degree of stimulation in the parental plants. Transcripts coding for SHR enzymes generally returned to pre-treatment levels in the progeny. Thus, transgenerational effects on SHR frequency are not a general response to abiotic stress in Arabidopsis and may require special conditions

Evidence for neurogenesis in the adult mammalian substantia nigra

New neurons are generated from stem cells in a few regions of the adult mammalian brain. Here we provide evidence for the generation of dopaminergic projection neurons of the type that are lost in Parkinson's disease from stem cells in the adult rodent brain and show that the rate of neurogenesis is increased after a lesion. The number of new neurons generated under physiological conditions in substantia nigra pars compacta was found to be several orders of magnitude smaller than in the granular cell layer of the dentate gyrus of the hippocampus. However, if the rate of neuronal turnover is constant, the entire population of dopaminergic neurons in substantia nigra could be replaced during the lifespan of a mouse. These data indicate that neurogenesis in the adult brain is more widespread than previously thought and may have implications for our understanding of the pathogenesis and treatment of neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson's disease