Agro-morphological Diversity of High Altitude Bean Landraces in the Kailash Sacred Landscape of Nepal

Many varieties of bean are widely grown across diverse agro-ecological zones in Nepal. And opportunities exist for improving the crops and enhancing their resilience to various biotic and abiotic stressors. In this context, an experiment was conducted from June to October 2016 in Khar VDC of Darchula district to study the phenotypic traits of nine landraces of bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.). The bean landraces were planted using randomized complete block design in three sites (Dhamidera, Dallekh and Sundamunda villages), with three replications in each site for their comparative analysis. The study considered the following phenotypic traits: days to emergence, days to 50% flowering, days to 90% pod maturity, number of nodes, pod length, pod width, number of pods, number of seeds per pod and weight and grain yield for 100 seeds. Kruskal-Wallis test showed significant differences in the landraces both within and among locations. KA-17-08-FB and KA-17-04-FB were late  flowering (63 and 65 days respectively) compared to other landraces whereas KA-17-07-FB flowered earliest (within 42 days). In all three sites, three landraces namely KA-17-07-FB, KA-17-04-FB and KA-17-06-FB were found to be relatively more resistant to pest and diseases than other landraces. Eight out of nine landraces in Dhamidera and Dallekh villages and seven out of nine in Sundamunda village produced seeds greater than 1.0 t/ha. Among the nine varieties KA-17-02-FB was the highest yielding variety, with an average yield of 3.8 t/ha. This study is useful for identifying suitable landraces for future promotion based on their maturity, grain yield, diseases resistance and other qualitative and quantitative characteristics

Agrobiodiversity and Its Conservation in Nepal

Nepal is a part of the world\u27s biodiversity hotspot and ranks the 49th in the world for biodiversity. Agrobiodiversity and its conservation status were studied through literature review, field survey, key informant survey and focus group discussion. Results of field implementation of some good practices and action research were also documented. Among 24,300 total species in the country, 28% are agricultural genetic resources (AGRs), termed as agrobiodiversity. Agrobiodiversity has six components (crops, forages, livestock, aquatic, insects and microorganisms) and four sub-components (domesticated, semi-domesticated, wild relatives and wild edible) in Nepal. Agrobiodiversity on each component exists at agroecosystem, species, variety/breed/biotype/race/strain, genotype and allele levels, within an altitude range from 60 to 5,000 masl. There are 12 agroecosystems supporting 1026 species under crop component, 510 under forage, 35 under livestock, 250 under the aquatic animal, 17 under aquatic plant, 3,500 under insect and 800 under microorganism. An estimated loss of agrobiodiversity is 40%, however, farmers have reported up to 100% loss of AGRs in some areas for a particular species. Conservation of agrobiodiversity has been initiated since 1986. Four strategies namely ex-situ, on-farm, in-situ and breeding have been adopted for conservation and sustainable utilization of AGRs. Eighty good practices including process, methods and actions for managing agrobiodiversity have been in practice and these practices come under five conservation components (sensitization, method and approach, accelerator, value and enabling environment). Within the country, 18,765 accessions of AGRs have been conserved in different kinds of banks. A total of 24,683 accessions of Nepalese crops, forages and microbes have been conserved in different International and foreign genebanks. Some collections are conserved as safety duplication and safety backup in different CGIARs\u27 banks and World Seed Vault, Korea. Two global databases (GENESYS and EURISCO) have maintained 19,200 Nepalese accessions. Geographical Information System, Climate Analog Tool and biotechnological tools have been applied for better managing AGRs. Many stakeholders need to further concentrate on the conservation and utilization of AGRs. Global marketing of some native AGRs is necessary for sustaining agriculture and attracting young generations as well as conserving them through use

Quantum limit transport and destruction of the Weyl nodes in TaAs

Weyl fermions are a new ingredient for correlated states of electronic matter. A key difficulty has been that real materials also contain non-Weyl quasiparticles, and disentangling the experimental signatures has proven challenging. We use magnetic fields up to 95 tesla to drive the Weyl semimetal TaAs far into its quantum limit (QL), where only the purely chiral 0th Landau levels (LLs) of the Weyl fermions are occupied. We find the electrical resistivity to be nearly independent of magnetic field up to 50 tesla: unusual for conventional metals but consistent with the chiral anomaly for Weyl fermions. Above 50 tesla we observe a two-order-of-magnitude increase in resistivity, indicating that a gap opens in the chiral LLs. Above 80 tesla we observe strong ultrasonic attenuation below 2 kelvin, suggesting a mesoscopically-textured state of matter. These results point the way to inducing new correlated states of matter in the QL of Weyl semimetals

Utilisation of sexual health services by female sex workers in Nepal

Background The Nepal Demographic Health Survey (NDHS) in 2006 showed that more than half (56%) of the women with sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including HIV, in Nepal sought sexual health services. There is no such data for female sex workers (FSWs) and the limited studies on this group suggest they do not even use routine health services. This study explores FSWs use of sexual health services and the factors associated with their use and non-use of services. Methods This study aimed to explore the factors associated with utilisation of sexual health services by FSWs in the Kathmandu Valley of Nepal, and it used a mixed-method approach consisting of an interviewer administered questionnaire-based survey and in-depth interviews. Results The questionnaire survey, completed with 425 FSWs, showed that 90% FSWs self-reported sickness, and (30.8%) reported symptoms of STIs. A quarter (25%) of those reporting STIs had never visited any health facilities especially for sexual health services preferring to use non-governmental clinics (72%), private clinics (50%), hospital (27%) and health centres (13%). Multiple regression analysis showed that separated, married and street- based FSWs were more likely to seek health services from the clinics or hospitals. In- depth interviews with 15 FSWs revealed that FSWs perceived that personal, structural and socio-cultural barriers, such as inappropriate clinic opening hours, discrimination, the judgemental attitude of the service providers, lack of confidentiality, fear of public exposure, and higher fees for the services as barriers to their access and utilisation of sexual health services. Conclusion FSWs have limited access to information and to health services, and operate under personal, structural and socio-cultural constraints. The ‘education’ to change individual behaviour, health worker and community perceptions, as well as the training of the health workers, is necessary

Resonant torsion magnetometry in anisotropic quantum materials

Unusual behavior of quantum materials commonly arises from their effective low-dimensional physics, which reflects the underlying anisotropy in the spin and charge degrees of freedom. Torque magnetometry is a highly sensitive technique to directly quantify the anisotropy in quantum materials, such as the layered high-T$_c$ superconductors, anisotropic quantum spin-liquids, and the surface states of topological insulators. Here we introduce the magnetotropic coefficient $k=\partial^2 F/\partial \theta^2$, the second derivative of the free energy F with respect to the angle $\theta$ between the sample and the applied magnetic field, and report a simple and effective method to experimentally detect it. A sub-$\mu$g crystallite is placed at the tip of a commercially available atomic force microscopy cantilever, and we show that $k$ can be quantitatively inferred from a shift in the resonant frequency under magnetic field. While related to the magnetic torque $\tau=\partial F/\partial \theta$, $k$ takes the role of torque susceptibility, and thus provides distinct insights into anisotropic materials akin to the difference between magnetization and magnetic susceptibility. The thermodynamic coefficient $k$ is discontinuous at second-order phase transitions and subject to Ehrenfest relations with the specific heat and magnetic susceptibility. We apply this simple yet quantitative method on the exemplary cases of the Weyl-semimetal NbP and the spin-liquid candidate RuCl$_3$, yet it is broadly applicable in quantum materials research.Comment: 7 pages including 6 figures and methods sectio