Evaluation of chicken blood and maize stover compost as a nitrogen source for maize

Organic materials are an important source of nutrients for many smallholder farmers. The use of composted organic amendments is constrained by their variability and maturity. The aim of this study was to evaluate the potential of aerobically composted chicken blood and maize stover mixtures on maize N uptake and to determine the effect on seed emergence in a greenhouse pot experiment. Four composts with proportions of 10%, 30%, 70% and 100% maize stover were used as soil amendments and compared against an unamended soil (control). The greenhouse pot experiment involved planting 10 maize seeds in each pot. Seed emergence percent was determined a week after sowing to ascertain whether the composts had phytotoxic effects. Percent emergence did not differ significantly among treatments (p =0.26). Two plants were allowed to grow in the pots for five weeks after which maize dry matter yield and foliar analysis followed. The foliar samples were analysed for total nitrogen, dry matter yield and cations (Mg, Ca, K and Na). Nitrogen uptake differed significantly among treatments and ranged from 0.27% to 0.75%. Nitrogen uptake was higher in soils amended with 10% and 30% maize stover compost treatments. Dry matter yield also differed significantly ranging from 1.09g to 2.2g per pot). Uptake of all cations did not differ (p>0.05) significantly among treatments. The 10% and 30% maize stover composts had greater potential to support maize growth as shown by the dry matter yield and total N concentrations in the plant samples

Cardiovascular disease and nutrition: The use of food-based dietary guidelines for prevention in Africa

There is no doubt that morbidity and mortality from cardiovascular disease (CVD) are increasing in many African countries. Research and implementation of public health nutrition programmes in the developed world have shown that CVD can be prevented by dietary interventions. The objectives of this paper are to (i) review the relationships between diet and CVD; (ii) review the possible contribution of the nutrition transition, which is associated with economic development and “modernisation” to CVD in Africa; (iii) identify barriers and challenges plus assessing the opportunities available to steer the nutrition transition into a more positive direction; and (iv) show how ideal nutrient intakes can be translated into appropriate food based dietary guidelines (FBDGs) and how to apply these for prevention and management of CVDs. This should result in appropriate recommendations for diets that will be country-specific, affordable, culturally acceptable and based on available, traditional and indigenous foods. It is concluded that all health professionals should be sensitised, informed, trained and/or educated to apply FBDGs in a way that will motivate the public or patients to follow healthier diets for primary, secondary and tertiary prevention and treatment of CVD

Measurement of the Charge Collection Efficiency after Heavy Non-Uniform Irradiation in BaBar Silicon Detectors

We have investigated the depletion voltage changes, the leakage current increase and the charge collection efficiency of a silicon microstrip detector identical to those used in the inner layers of the BaBar Silicon Vertex Tracker (SVT) after heavy non-uniform irradiation. A full SVT module with the front-end electronics connected has been irradiated with a 0.9 GeV electron beam up to a peak fluence of 3.5 x 10^14 e^-/cm^2, well beyond the level causing substrate type inversion. We irradiated one of the two sensors composing the module with a non-uniform profile with sigma=1.4 mm that simulates the conditions encountered in the BaBar experiment by the modules intersecting the horizontal machine plane. The position dependence of the charge collection properties and the depletion voltage have been investigated in detail using a 1060 nm LED and an innovative measuring technique based only on the digital output of the chip.Comment: 7 pages, 13 figures. Presented at the 2004 IEEE Nuclear Science Symposium, October 18-21, Rome, Italy. Accepted for publication by IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Scienc