Crop rotation and fertilization effects on weeds in rice based cropping systems in Madagascar

In the Mid-West region of Madagascar, yields in upland rice remain low due to both low soil fertility and high weed pressure in fields. Increasing managed biodiversity inside crop rotation may be an option to reduce weed pressure in cropping systems. The effect of managed biodiversity was studied in a field experiment carried out in Ivory (19°33'18.90"S, 46°24'53.08"E), with a randomized block design with four replications during two years. Three rainfed rice based rotations (Rice // Groundnut = RA, Rice // Sorghum + Vigna unguiculata =RSV, Rice//Mucuna cochinchinensis + Crotalaria spectabilis = RMC) combined with two levels of fertilization (Low Fertilization = manure vs. High Fertilization = manure + fertilizer) were compared to a rainfed rice monoculture. Each crop or crop mixture in the rotation was grown every year on plots measuring 45.9 m². Each year, weed and rice biomass were measured at each weeding date. Rice biomass was also measured at flowering and harvest. Rice yield and its components were measured at harvest. Weed flora was observed the second year to analyse potential change in weed communities according to fertilization and/or crop rotation. The first year, weed biomass and rice yield were higher in highly fertilized treatments than in lowly ones. In highly fertilized treatments, weeds did not affect yield and weed biomass was positively correlated to rice yield. On contrary, fertilization had no effect on weed biomass the second year. The highest and lowest weed biomass were observed on RA and RMC treatments respectively. Lowest rice yields were observed in RSV and RA treatments, in highly and lowly fertilized treatments respectively. In lowly fertilized treatments, weed biomass reduces significantly rice yield. Finally, rotation had more impact than fertilization on weed flora. Biodiversity may have positive effect on cropping systems performances but it depends largely on the introduced species

WIKWIO Portal: An online resource on weeds for sugarcane growers

Efficient control of weeds is only achievable through a clear and sound knowledge of their biology and ecology. The Weed Identification and Knowledge in the Western Indian Ocean (WIKWIO) portal (http://portal.wikwio.org/) has been developed to meet this objective. It aims at building and leveraging a science and technology network to consolidate existing scientific and technical knowledge, and facilitating the sharing of new information. Although the portal currently covers the Indian Ocean region, most of the tropical weeds that are documented are also present in many other sugarcane-producing countries. This paper highlights the benefits that this resource can have to growers for managing weeds in their fields. The WIKWIO portal is the outcome of a three-year collaboration among weed scientists of CIRAD (France), CNDRS (Comoros), FOFIFA (Madagascar), IFP (India) and MSIRI (Mauritius). A community of stakeholders involved in weed knowledge and management, also collaborated in the action. Experts from the six research institutions worked on a list of nearly 470 species of tropical weeds. They compiled and validated information on the biology, ecology, distribution, agronomic importance and management of each weed species in datasheets in both English and French. Each weed has been fully illustrated with high- resolution pictures and scanned herbarium sheets to provide additional details. Botanists and computer engineers set up an information system to host these data, in addition to other tools that facilitate rapid weed recognition and documentation. The portal became operational in early 2014 and was improved with various options at the completion of the project in February 2017. More than 750 users have registered on the WIKWIO network, contributing over 10,000 observations of weeds, many of them encountered in sugarcane fields in various parts of the world. All the observations posted on the website are geo-referenced, thus providing useful data on their ecological distribution. Identified species are linked to the appropriate datasheets, giving insights into their management and control. Weed identification is possible via a computer-aided tool (IDAO) available on the portal. This resource and the possibility of uploading observations onto the network are accessible through applications (apps) on mobile devices enabling easy use in the field for rapid weed control decision and intervention. The WIKWIO portal enhances a collaborative and participative approach by sharing knowledge and providing practical information. It can serve as a platform for establishing and reinforcing a community of sugarcane growers seeking help or exchanging experience on weed management issues. Nowadays, with the easy and rapid access to internet connectivity, timely assistance may be obtained through the portal. The latter takes place in a 'numerical agriculture' approach that is expected to evolve into a website for tropical weeds

Enjeux et contraintes du partage et de la diffusion des connaissances en malherbologie tropicale pour une meilleure gestion des enherbements, exemple du portail collaboratif Wiktrop

La production agricole tropicale est en pleine mutation et la gestion des enherbements est un élément majeur de la stratégie de l'agriculteur. L'élaboration d'itinéraires de gestion des adventices requiert de plus en plus de connaissances, sur la biologie des espèces, leur comportement dans les milieux cultivés et l'efficacité des pratiques de désherbage. L'accès à l'information est maintenant facilité par les infrastructures numériques en constante évolution, mais nécessite que la connaissance soit partagée, mise à jour et diffusée de façon continue. Une part de connaissance est présente chez chacun des acteurs (producteurs, vulgarisateurs, chercheurs, enseignants), mais sa compilation et sa diffusion présentent différentes contraintes d'ordre réglementaire, humain et technologique. Le portail collaboratif WIKTROP permet à tous les acteurs du monde agricole tropical de partager et diffuser leurs connaissances et leurs questionnements sur les adventices tropicales et leur gestion. Il est associé à des applications mobiles facilitant son utilisation au bureau, sur le terrain ou pour des formations

FIREBall-2: advancing TRL while doing proof-of-concept astrophysics on a suborbital platform

Here we discuss advances in UV technology over the last decade, with an emphasis on photon counting, low noise, high efficiency detectors in sub-orbital programs. We focus on the use of innovative UV detectors in a NASA astrophysics balloon telescope, FIREBall-2, which successfully flew in the Fall of 2018. The FIREBall-2 telescope is designed to make observations of distant galaxies to understand more about how they evolve by looking for diffuse hydrogen in the galactic halo. The payload utilizes a 1.0-meter class telescope with an ultraviolet multi-object spectrograph and is a joint collaboration between Caltech, JPL, LAM, CNES, Columbia, the University of Arizona, and NASA. The improved detector technology that was tested on FIREBall-2 can be applied to any UV mission. We discuss the results of the flight and detector performance. We will also discuss the utility of sub-orbital platforms (both balloon payloads and rockets) for testing new technologies and proof-of-concept scientific ideasComment: Submitted to the Proceedings of SPIE, Defense + Commercial Sensing (SI19

Health Promotion Plan for Increasing Health Knowledge in Citizens of Ti Roche, St. Lucia

The purpose of this project is to develope a health promotion plan for the rural community of Ti Roche; a small town on the Caribbean island of St. Lucia. Over the years, Ti Roche has been deprived of adequate health benefits and services due to the community's lack of resources, trained health personnel and the rural setting of the island. Ti Roche is located in the interior part of St. Lucia where little priority has been given to the community and the health of the people. Health promotion is a program designed to provide citizens and communities with information on and about those factors affecting their health. The object of this plan is to inform the citizens of Ti Roche about hygiene sanitation, environmental factors and other issues that contribute to the development of infections, communicable diseases and accidents. The plan is to help every citizen understand the relationship between sanitation, health and disease so that they respond positively to those relationships. The health promotion plan concerns itself primarily on how the citizens, health promotion workers and others involved, can unite their efforts to make the health programs successful. The project will serve two purposes: 1) it will inform and influenc·e the citizens of Ti Roche on how, by their own effort, they can take action to reduce those factors that negatively impact their health and 2) it will help to establish information to assist in future planning and organizing of health promotion programs and future health policies and decisions. This promotion plan consists of three chapters. The first Chapter discusses the profile of the community and other related issues. Chapter Two provides a review of the literature on health promotion and Chapter Three discusses the overall program plan, its objectives and methos [sic]. This health promotion program is essential for improving the overall health of citizens in Ti Roche. A program that is designed with consideration of the community's culture, sensitive to the people's needs and with an awareness of the resources available, as well as other concerns will have a high probability of acceptance by the people and government and consequently be successful

Connections Between Numerical Algorithms for PDEs and Neural Networks

We investigate numerous structural connections between numerical algorithms for partial differential equations (PDEs) and neural architectures. Our goal is to transfer the rich set of mathematical foundations from the world of PDEs to neural networks. Besides structural insights, we provide concrete examples and experimental evaluations of the resulting architectures. Using the example of generalised nonlinear diffusion in 1D, we consider explicit schemes, acceleration strategies thereof, implicit schemes, and multigrid approaches. We connect these concepts to residual networks, recurrent neural networks, and U-net architectures. Our findings inspire a symmetric residual network design with provable stability guarantees and justify the effectiveness of skip connections in neural networks from a numerical perspective. Moreover, we present U-net architectures that implement multigrid techniques for learning efficient solutions of partial differential equation models, and motivate uncommon design choices such as trainable nonmonotone activation functions. Experimental evaluations show that the proposed architectures save half of the trainable parameters and can thus outperform standard ones with the same model complexity. Our considerations serve as a basis for explaining the success of popular neural architectures and provide a blueprint for developing new mathematically well-founded neural building blocks

Clinical review: Intrapericardial fibrinolysis in management of purulent pericarditis

Purulent pericarditis (PP) is a potentially life-threatening disease. Reported mortality rates are between 20 and 30%. Constrictive pericarditis occurs over the course of PP in at least 3.5% of cases. The frequency of persistent PP (chronic or recurrent purulent pericardial effusion occurring despite drainage and adequate antibiotherapy) is unknown because this entity was not previously classified as a complication of PP. No consensus exists on the optimal management of PP. Nevertheless, the cornerstone of PP management is complete eradication of the focus of infection. In retrospective studies, compared to simple drainage, systematic pericardiectomy provided a prevention of constrictive pericarditis with better clinical outcome. Because of potential morbidity associated with pericardiectomy, intrapericardial fibrinolysis has been proposed as a less invasive method for prevention of persistent PP and constrictive pericarditis. Experimental data demonstrate that fibrin formation, which occurs during the first week of the disease, is an essential step in the evolution to constrictive pericarditis and persistent PP. We reviewed the literature using the MEDLINE database. We evaluated the clinical efficacy, outcome, and complications of pericardial fibrinolysis. Seventy-four cases of fibrinolysis in PP were analysed. Pericarditis of tuberculous origin were excluded. Among the 40 included cases, only two treated by late fibrinolysis encountered failure requiring pericardiectomy. No patient encountered clinical or echocardiographic features of constriction during follow-up. Only one serious complication was described. Despite the lack of definitive evidence, potential benefits of fibrinolysis as a less invasive alternative to surgery in the management of PP seem promising. Early consideration should be given to fibrinolysis in order to prevent both constrictive and persistent PP. Nevertheless, in case of failure of fibrinolysis, pericardiectomy remains the primary option for complete eradication of infection