Effect of foliar application of α-tocopherol and pyridoxine on vegetative growth, flowering, and some biochemical constituents of Calendula officinalis L. plants

A field experiment was conducted during 2010 at the Experimental Farm of Fajr, SB University of Kerman, Iran. The aim was to study the effects of foliar spray of α-tocopherol (0, 50, 100 part per million (ppm)) and pyridoxine (0, 50, 100 ppm) on vegetative growth, flowering parameters, and some chemical constituents of Calendula officinalis L. plants. Most parameters were significantly affected by application of two vitamins which were used in this study. The obtained results could be summarized as follows; pyridoxine at 100 ppm recorded the best value of leaf area, stem height, chlorophyll b, reducing sugars and hyperoside content; no significant difference was found between plants treated with vitamins in terms of chlorophyll a, root length, fresh weight and dry weight of root; the treatment with α-tocopherol at 100 ppm resulted in the highest yield of seed, fresh and dry aerial parts, as compared to control plants; maximum values of carotenoid were obtained by the application of pyridoxine at 50 ppm; and application of both vitamins led to the reduction of flower diameter.Keyswords: Calendula officinalis L., α-tocopherol, pyridoxin

Allelopathic appraisal effects of straw extract wheat varieties on the growth of corn

Allelopathy is a process in which secondary metabolites produced by plants, micro-organisms, viruses and fungi control growth and development of other biological systems. Some plants may beneficially or antagonistically affect other plants through allelochemical compounds which may be released directly or indirectly from live or dead parts and cause allelopathic and phytotoxic effects. In Kerman province of Iran, cultivating corn after winter wheat usually causes less growth and yield, hence, this study was conducted to estimate the effects of different concentrations of two native Iranian wheat (Alvand and Falat) straw extracts on germination, radicle growth, coleoptile length, plant height, leaf area (LA), wet weight (WW) and dry weight (DW) of two hybrid corn varieties (single cross 704 and 647). Results showed that the straw extracts had significant negative allelopathic effects on both corn varieties' growth. Furthermore, based on the study results, we suggest that before corn cultivation, wheat straw and residues should be eliminated from the field by leaving no-till fields fallow to avoid negative allelopathic effects of wheat straw on corn growth.Key words: Allelopathic, corn, wheat straw

Effects of media and indole butyric acid (IBA) concentrations on hopbush (Dodoneae viscosa L.) cuttings in green house

Abstract. Hopbush (Dodoneae viscosa L.) is an evergreen bush type tree; that is used for hedges and green walls in parks, gardens and houses, in South East of Iran. Propagation by stem cuttings is quicker and cheaper than seed, if the cuttings set in convenient media and rooting hormone. In order to investigate the effects of different media and different concentrations of indole 3-butyric acid (IBA) on rooting of hopbush (Dodonea viscosa L.) cuttings, an experiment was conducted using mist system in greenhouse in spring 2010. The treatments were 3 different media: sand, perlite, and sand + perlite, (1+1 by volume), with 4 levels of IBA concentrations (0 ppm, 2000 ppm, 4000 ppm, and 6000 ppm). A randomized complete block with factorial design was used with 5 replications. The average and the means were compared by Duncun's multiple range test (1% and 5%); M STAT-C was used for comparing the interaction effects. The effect of medium on number of roots, percentage survival of stem cutting, root fresh weight and dry weight was significant, but on root length was not significantly affected. The effects of different concentrations of hormone on number of roots, percentage survival of stem cutting, root fresh weight and dry weight was significant. The interaction effect of media and hormone on root length was significant, too. The best result was obtained in perlite, with 4000 ppm IBA. The results showed that perlite medium and 4000 ppm IBA concentration can be suggested for soft wood cutting of hopbush

Assessment of content and chemical forms of arsenic, copper, lead, and chromium in sewage sludge compost as affected by various bulking agents

In current study, the effect of various organic substances as bulking agents (BAs) including wheat straw, pistachio hull wastes, and tree leaves at different levels (10, 25, 45% v/v) were investigated on total concentration and chemical forms of Cu, Pb, Cr, and As in sewage sludge (SS) compost prepared by windrow method. According to the results, the composting process (with/without BAs), due to losses of SS mass and volume, increased the total concentration of heavy metals (HMs) compared to the un-composted SS sample (RSS). Evaluation of HMs chemical forms in prepared compost sample without BAs application (CSS) showed that the composting process reduced the mobility factor of As (from 28% to 20%), Pb (from 11.6% to 9.3%), and Cr (from 14.5% to 9.2%) compared to the RSS. Application of three BAs considerably decreased the mobility factor of As (17.5-18.8%), Pb (4.8-7.9%), and Cr (1.4-6.8%) compared to CSS and RSS. Changes of Cu mobility in prepared compost samples showed an unclear trend, however in some treatments, due to transferred organic fraction into exchangeable and carbonate fractions, increasing of this factor was obvious. Generally, the composting appeared to reduce As, Pb, and Cr availability by stabilizing the three metals and making them more stable and less mobile. In addition, the BAs application effect on HMs behavior of SS compost samples were so different and no specific kind of BAs can be recommended as a superior BAs in SS composting process

Seed Germination Enhancement of Zinnia (Zinnia elegans) Using Electromagnetic Field

The effect of electromagnetic field was examined on Zinnia (Zinnia elegans) seeds to enhance seed germination and early growth. The seeds were exposed to four magnetic strengths of 15, 100, 400 and 800 µT in four durations of 30, 60, 120 and 240 min. The experiments were carried out in two forms of laboratory germination and soil emergence. Results showed that magnetic field application enhanced seed performance in both terms of laboratory germination and soil emergence. The magnetic field significantly (p≤0.05) affected root length, shoot length, fresh and dry root weight, fresh and dry shoot weight, seedling length and weight, germination percentage, speed of germination, vigor index I and II in laboratory germination. Also, the magnetic field exposure significantly affected soil emergence factors of root length, shoot length, dry root weight, dry shoot weight, seedling length, emergence percentage and emergence speed at 0.05 level of probability. The other factors were significantly (p≤0.05) different compared with unexposed control. No significantly differences were found on the interaction of time and exposure field. The best results were found to 400 µT (micro Tesla) on seed germination and seed emergence. The exposure durations of 240 and 30 min showed promising results over all magnetic fields in seed germination and emergence, respectively. However, there was no significant difference among exposure times. Keyword

Performance improvement of the Goertzel algorithm in estimating of protein coding regions using modified anti-notch filter and linear predictive coding model

The aim of this paper is to improve the performance of the conventional Goertzel algorithm in determining the protein coding regions in deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) sequences. First, the symbolic DNA sequences are converted into numerical signals using electron ion interaction potential method. Then by combining the modified anti-notch filter and linear predictive coding model, we proposed an efficient algorithm to achieve the performance improvement in the Goertzel algorithm for estimating genetic regions. Finally, a thresholding method is applied to precisely identify the exon and intron regions. The proposed algorithm is applied to several genes, including genes available in databases BG570 and HMR195 and the results are compared to other methods based on the nucleotide level evaluation criteria. Results demonstrate that our proposed method reduces the number of incorrect nucleotides which are estimated to be in the noncoding region. In addition, the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve has improved by the factor of 1.35 and 1.12 in HMR195 and BG570 datasets respectively, in comparison with the conventional Goertzel algorithm

Determination of Malaria Epidemiological Status in Iran’s Malarious Areas as Baseline Information for Implementation of Malaria Elimination Program in Iran

Background: According to willingness of the Ministry of Health, Iran and presence of appropriate conditions for disease elimination, national malaria control program decided to conduct a research to clarify malaria status in 2007 and to provide required information to perform the elimination program. This review is comprised of the basis of national malaria elimination program in vision of 2025, which was started in 2010.Methods: In this descriptive study, data were analyzed by applications of different variables at district level. All districts in the three south eastern provinces, in which malaria has local transmission, were considered. Malaria cases has been determined and studied based on the national malaria surveillance system.Results: Since vivax malaria is predominant in Sistan & Baluchestan Province, number of vivax cases is equal to malaria positive cases approximately. The important point is that Nikshahr contains the maximum number of local vivax cases in this province and the maximum number of falciparum cases is reported from Sarbaz district. Among all districts of Hormozgan Province, no case of autochthonous falciparum was detected except in Bandar Jask and one case in Minab. There was no case of autochthonous falciparum in Kerman Province, except in Kahnoj and Ghale Ganj that each of them had one case in 2007.Conclusion: It appears that the report of locally transmitted cases in Iran is increasing over the past few years, before starting malaria elimination plan. Since the Afghan refugees started to return to their own country so the main source of reporting of imported malaria cases reduced and local cases would be demonstrated more clearly