Moisture Stress Assessment through NDVI and Climate Tools for Crop Management at Anantpur District, AP

Anantapur is the driest district of Andhra Pradesh and hence, agriculture conditions are very often precarious. Groundnut grows where other crops fail and thus it is the predominant crop of Anantapur district. Groundnut is grown in about 7.5 lakh ha in Anantapur district; however the average yields are low af 500 kg ha-1. Among various available vegetation indices, normalised difference vegetation index (ND VI) is widely used for all reasons, which is a single numerical indicator of presence and condition of green vegetation. ND VI mapping at a regional scale helps to assess the spatial changes in the vigour of green vegetation and thus occurrence of any moisture stress. Climate tOQls have a great role in understanding the crop performance and estimating the yields. This study was taken up by using freely available MODIS data to understand ND VI in terms of abiotic stresses over Anantapur district and linking with the actual rainfall conditions, groundnut crop acreage and production. Results indicate that low groundnut yields in general,could be related to ND VI-based stress measurements and rainfall quantum and distribution in the area however, with a few exceptions. It is hoped that by combining improved practices through IWM with climate-adapted crop varieties, rainfed farmers of Anantapur district can sustain their crop production under present climate variability and become resilient to future climate chang

Identification of several small main-effect QTLs and a large number of epistatic QTLs for drought tolerance related traits in groundnut (Arachishypogaea L.)

Cultivated groundnut or peanut (Arachis hypogaea L.), an allotetraploid (2n = 4x = 40), is a self pollinated and widely grown crop in the semi-arid regions of the world. Improvement of drought tolerance is an important area of research for groundnut breeding programmes. Therefore, for the identification of candidate QTLs for drought tolerance, a comprehensive and refined genetic map containing 191 SSR loci based on a single mapping population (TAG 24 × ICGV 86031), segregating for drought and surrogate traits was developed. Genotyping data and phenotyping data collected for more than ten drought related traits in 2–3 seasons were analyzed in detail for identification of main effect QTLs (M-QTLs) and epistatic QTLs (E-QTLs) using QTL Cartographer, QTLNetwork and Genotype Matrix Mapping (GMM) programmes. A total of 105 M-QTLs with 3.48–33.36% phenotypic variation explained (PVE) were identified using QTL Cartographer, while only 65 M-QTLs with 1.3–15.01% PVE were identified using QTLNetwork. A total of 53 M-QTLs were such which were identified using both programmes. On the other hand, GMM identified 186 (8.54–44.72% PVE) and 63 (7.11–21.13% PVE), three and two loci interactions, whereas only 8 E-QTL interactions with 1.7–8.34% PVE were identified through QTLNetwork. Interestingly a number of co-localized QTLs controlling 2–9 traits were also identified. The identification of few major, many minor M-QTLs and QTL × QTL interactions during the present study confirmed the complex and quantitative nature of drought tolerance in groundnut. This study suggests deployment of modern approaches like marker-assisted recurrent selection or genomic selection instead of marker-assisted backcrossing approach for breeding for drought tolerance in groundnut

Sensor Placement Revisited in a Realistic Environment

Ad-hoc networks of devices and sensors with (limited) sensing and wireless communication capabilities are becoming increasingly available for commercial and military applications. Under a national SensorNet initiative, we have built prototype deployment of a detection, identification, and tracking sensor-cyber network in a variety of locations including Washington D.C. and Port of Memphis. One of the most important and up-front issues is where to place sensors in order to fulfill certain performance criteria, subject to the number of sensors to be deployed, the distribution of threats, the terrain and meteorological conditions, and the population distribution. In this paper, we revisit the sensor placement problem in a more realistic setting. Specifically, we consider three sensor placement problems and prove their equivalence. Then we focus on formulating/solving the third problem as an optimization problem: given the maximum detection time T and the coverage utility requirement C, how to place sensors so as to minimize the number of sensors. In particular, we allow the sensing area of a sensor to be anisotropic and of arbitrary shape, depending on the material released, its dosage fields and release patterns, the wind speed and direction, and the dispersion model. We define the utility function to quantify the utility of sensor coverage by considering its ability to manage potential threats. The coverage model can thus quantify the expected risks of insufficient coverage (or utilities of coverage) in different parts of the monitoring area, considering relevant environment and population data. We propose theoretically grounded solution algorithms for both the 1-coverage and k-coverage cases. The empirical study indicates that our proposed algorithms significantly outperform random and grid placement in terms of the detection time

Distribution of chlorophyll a, organic carbon, nitrogen and carbohydrate of particulate matter of Visakhapatnam harbour waters, east coast of India

24-29Highest values of chl a (315 µg l-1), organic carbon (3.98 mg l-1), total particulate nitrogen (2 mg l-1) and carbohydrate (3.8 mg l-1) were obtained in surface waters in August and lowest values respectively of 1.38 µg l-1 and 1.19, 0.12 and 0.2 mg l-1 in bottom waters in March/July. Below a chl a value of 45 µg l-1 at the surface and 16 µg l-1 at the bottom, a progressively smaller fraction of it seemed to be associated with particulate organic carbon, while beyond this value, a uniform fraction of chl a may be associated with particulate organic carbon. At the maxima (in August), most part of all the organic constituents appeared to be associated with living phytoplankton while at other times, a sizable quantity of each constituent appeared to be associated with detritus, originating predominantly from run-off

<smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="country-region"><smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="City"><smarttagtype namespaceuri="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" name="place"> Biochemical composition of zooplankton from Visakhapatnam harbour waters, east coast of India </smarttagtype></smarttagtype></smarttagtype>

125-129 Proximate composition, zooplankton biomass, protein, lipid, carbohydrate, organic carbon and calorific content of mixed zooplankton in the Visakhapatnam harbour waters were estimated. Biomass varied from 15.2 to 74.0 ml.100 m-3 (=31.05 ±17.7) in the outer harbour and 10 to 64.0 ml.100 m–3 (=26.30±14.8) in the inner harbour. Copepods, tintinnids, decapods and chaetognaths formed dominant groups of total zooplankton ( > 90%) in the harbour waters throughout the year. Of the biochemical fractions of zooplankton, protein formed the major component, varied from 233.6 to 563 mg.g-1 (=379.62±107), lipid varied from 61.2 to 181 mg.g-1 (=103±32.7). Carbohydrate ranged from 65.5 to 127.4 mg.g-1 (=85.78±16.92), organic carbon varied from 334.9 to 461.2 mg.g-1 (=380.44±33.6) and calorific values varied from 2.2 to 5.4 (=3.5±.94) k.cal.g-1. Higher values of these constituents were observed during high saline premonsoon and postmonsoon periods when the population densities of copepods, tintinnids, decapods, chaetognaths were high. Significant positive correlations (P </smarttagtype

Biochemical composition of suspended particulate matter in the shelf waters between Visakhapatnam and Bhimavaram coast, central east coast of India

123-126Suspended particulate matter (SPM), particulate organic carbon (POC), particulate carbohydrate (PCHO) and chlorophyll a (chl a) were measured from 46 water samples collected at 18 stations during September 1988. In the stations off the river Godavary, particulate matter contained more of POC with increasing depth up to 100 m. POC of the surface was dominated by PCHO containing phytoplantonic matter, while at depths, it was dominated by detrital matter

Synthesis of small cyclic peptides via reverse tTurn induced ring closing metathesis of tripeptides

A reverse turn induced (&#947;/&#946;-turn) cyclization of tripeptides 1 can be performed in a ring closing metathesis reaction with Grubbs' catalyst to the corresponding cyclic peptides 2. These cyclic peptides may be useful probes as a conformationally constrained mimic of the bioactive conformation of structurally related HIV protease inhibitors