Effect of pre-germination treatments on the dormancy breaking and early growth performance of bitter kola (Garcinia kola- (heckel) in south southern Nigeria

The demand for bitter kola (Garcinia kola) is high in Nigeria market but the population of the species is low both in the wild and home gardens. Rapid deforestation, heavy exploitation in the natural forest and difficulties associated with its germination occasioned by seed dormancy have been blamed. The study on enhancing germination and early growth of Garcinia kola was conducted using Complete Randomized Design (CRD) with three treatments and a control. The control was made of untreated seeds (T1) while the treatments included nicked seeds soaked in water for 24 hours (T2), seeds from fermented pods (T3), and seeds from fresh pods (T4). Seed germination tests were carried out after pre treatment using 16 seeds for each treatment anf the control in the nursery site of the Cross River University of Technology (CRUTECH, Obubra campus) in South southern Nigeria.. The result showed that cutting seeds at the opposite end to the radicle (nicking) was the most suitable pre-sowing treatment to increase seed germination and early growth performance of Garcinia kola. Treating the seeds with mechanical scarification (nicking) significantly enhanced germination (P<0.001) and significantly influenced seedlings growth (P<0.05). The highest mean values of 8, 14.65 cm and 5 were obtained for germination count, plant height and leaf number respectively from nicked seeds soaked in water for 24 hours. Dormancy in Garcinia kola seeds can be removed by nicking the seeds and soaking in cold water for a day.Keywords: Germination, growth, seed nicking, pre-treatment, dormanc

Contribution towards the development of a DNA barcode reference library for West African mammals

DNA barcoding is a widely used molecular approach for species cataloging for unambiguous identification and conservation. In the present study, DNA barcoding of some West African mammals were performed with six new mitochondrial CO1 sequences for Civettictis civetta, Tadarida nigeriae, Orycteropus afer, Heliosciurus gambianus, Equus africanus asinus and Funisciurus anerythrus which are absent in public databases such as BLAST/NCBI and BOLD. Sequence identifications were made by comparing unknown sequences against the DNA barcodes of known species through distance-based tree construction and alignment probing. The sequences have been deposited to GenBank/NCBI.Keywords: mtDNA, West African mammals, conservation, biodiversity

Ivermectin treatment of Loa loa hyper-microfilaraemic baboons (Papio anubis): Assessment of microfilarial loads, haematological and biochemical parameters and histopathological changes following treatment.

Individuals with high intensity of Loa loa are at risk of developing serious adverse events (SAEs) post treatment with ivermectin. These SAEs have remained unclear and a programmatic impediment to the advancement of community directed treatment with ivermectin. The pathogenesis of these SAEs following ivermectin has never been investigated experimentally. The Loa/baboon (Papio anubis) model can be used to investigate the pathogenesis of Loa-associated encephalopathy following ivermectin treatment in humans. 12 baboons with microfilarial loads > 8,000mf/mL of blood were randomised into four groups: Group 1 (control group receiving no drug), Group 2 receiving ivermectin (IVM) alone, Group 3 receiving ivermectin plus aspirin (IVM + ASA), and Group 4 receiving ivermectin plus prednisone (IVM + PSE). Blood samples collected before treatment and at Day 5, 7 or 10 post treatment, were analysed for parasitological, hematological and biochemical parameters using standard techniques. Clinical monitoring of animals for side effects took place every 6 hours post treatment until autopsy. At autopsy free fluids and a large number of standard organs were collected, examined and tissues fixed in 10% buffered formalin and processed for standard haematoxylin-eosin staining and specific immunocytochemical staining. Mf counts dropped significantly (p0.05). All animals became withdrawn 48 hours after IVM administration. All treated animals recorded clinical manifestations including rashes, itching, diarrhoea, conjunctival haemorrhages, lymph node enlargement, pinkish ears, swollen face and restlessness; one animal died 5 hours after IVM administration. Macroscopic changes in post-mortem tissues observed comprised haemorrhages in the brain, lungs, heart, which seen in all groups given ivermectin but not in the untreated animals. Microscopically, the major cellular changes seen, which were present in all the ivermectin treated animals included microfilariae in varying degrees of degeneration in small vessels. These were frequently associated with fibrin deposition, endothelial changes including damage to the integrity of the blood vessel and the presence of extravascular erythrocytes (haemorrhages). There was an increased presence of eosinophils and other chronic inflammatory types in certain tissues and organs, often in large numbers and associated with microfilarial destruction. Highly vascularized organs like the brain, heart, lungs and kidneys were observed to have more microfilariae in tissue sections. The number of mf seen in the brain and kidneys of animals administered IVM alone tripled that of control animals. Co-administration of IVM + PSE caused a greater increase in mf in the brain and kidneys while the reverse was noticed with the co-administration of IVM + ASA. The treatment of Loa hyper-microfilaraemic individuals with ivermectin produces a clinical spectrum that parallels that seen in Loa hyper-microfilaraemic humans treated with ivermectin. The utilization of this experimental model can contribute to the improved management of the adverse responses in humans