Effect of chelating agents on phytoextraction of Ni from contaminated Soil by Zea mays

The effects of application of CDTA, (CA), DTPA, NTA and FYM on the growth of Zea mays and its Ni uptake and accumulation were investigated using the pot-culture experiments. Application of chelating agents decreased the dry matter yield of roots of Zea mays while, higher values of dry matter yield (11.35 g pot-1) was observedin case of FYM sewage sludge amended soil at 80 days after sowing. FYM addition was found beneficial as compared to control (Ni90). Dry matter yield of shoots of Zea mays increased over control due to application of CDTA and FYM. The highest value of dry matter yield of shoot (86.05 g pot-1) was observed in case of CDTA withsewage sludge amended soil at 80 days after sowing. Whereas reverse trend was observed in NTA, CA and DTPA treated soils. Chelating agents enhanced the Ni uptake by both roots and shoots, higher values of Ni uptake by roots (3415.44 ?g pot-1 ) and shoots (10104.98 ?g pot-1 ) Was observed in NTA and CDTA treated soil after 80 days of sowing in amended as compared to sewage sludge unamended soil. Application of CDTA followed by NTA was found more effective in enhancing the Ni uptake by Zea mays roots and shoots than any other chelating agents at both the growth stages. The chelating agents are found useful in enhancing phytoextractability of Ni by Zea mays. Hence, marginally Ni contaminated soil may be remediated by adding chelating agents

Clinical, hemodynamic, echocardiographic, angiographic profiles and post-operative outcomes among DCRV patients from a tertiary care referral center in India

Background: This retrospective study of data from 2006 to 2018 at a tertiary care referral center in India aims to document the contemporary clinical and hemodynamic profile of patients who were diagnosed with double chamber right ventricle (DCRV) based on echocardiography and cardiac  catheterization. Patients were followed up and their outcomes were studied to document their short and long term outcomes.Methods: It is a retrospective observational study of patients diagnosed with DCRV in a tertiary care hospital in India. The diagnosis of DCRV was based on the following criteria: an echocardiographic diagnosis of DCRV with doppler evidence of a mid ventricular gradient; cardiac catheterization revealing a systolic pressure gradient between right ventricular inflow and outflow tracts; a right ventricular angiogram demonstrating an anomalous muscle bundle causing obstruction well below the infundibulum. All the patients were followed up for their long term outcomes.Results: All the patients underwent echocardiography and cardiac catheterization for confirmation of the diagnosis. Sixty percent of our patients presented during adulthood, which is very unusual presentation of this disease entity. Median age of our patient cohort was 23.5 years. Patients presenting during adulthood have atypical symptoms. Dyspnea was the most common presenting symptom in this study. Right ventricular hypertrophy (73.3%)and right bundle branch pattern (26.6%) were the common electrocardiographic findings in our patients. DCRV is commonly associated with other anomalies. Ventricular septal defect (VSD) was the commonest associated anomaly, which was seen in 80% of our patients. Mean gradient cross the anomalous muscle bundle was 67.5 mmHg. Three of our patients (20%) had no associated anomaly, which is very rare in DCRV. Eight patients underwent surgical correction with significant reduction in gradients in all and no perioperative mortality. Median follow up of 8 years showed no adverse outcomes and no progression of gradients.Conclusions: This study describes in detail the clinical profile, echocardiographic and angiographic identification of anomalous muscle bundles in DCRV patients, which will help the young readers in identifying this often missed diagnosis. It highlights the unusual presentation during adulthood with atypical symptoms in DCRV patients with excellent long-term outcomes on follow up

CSF Biomarkers for Alzheimer's Disease Diagnosis

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most common form of dementia that affects several million people worldwide. The major neuropathological hallmarks of AD are the presence of extracellular amyloid plaques that are composed of Aβ40 and Aβ42 and intracellular neurofibrillary tangles (NFT), which is composed of hyperphosphorylated protein Tau. While the amyloid plaques and NFT could define the disease progression involving neuronal loss and dysfunction, significant cognitive decline occurs before their appearance. Although significant advances in neuroimaging techniques provide the structure and physiology of brain of AD cases, the biomarker studies based on cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and plasma represent the most direct and convenient means to study the disease progression. Biomarkers are useful in detecting the preclinical as well as symptomatic stages of AD. In this paper, we discuss the recent advancements of various biomarkers with particular emphasis on CSF biomarkers for monitoring the early development of AD before significant cognitive dysfunction

Safety and efficacy of dialyzer reuse by manual reprocessing: an observational study

Background: Haemodialysis is the main form of RRT in the patients of CKD. Haemodialysis is a costly procedure and is not afforded by many. Reuse of components of Haemodialysis circuit helps in reducing cost but may be associated with decreased efficacy and side effects.Methods: Prospective observational study. Manual reprocessing of dialyzer was done with either formaldehyde or peracetic acid. Single brand (Fresenius) dialyzer were used across all patients. Dialysis efficacy was calculated by URR and side effect and toxicity monitored in a predefined proforma.Results: A total 50 patients were studied (39 male and 11 female) with age ranging from 31-60 years. The mean urea reduction ratio after four dialysis session with the same dialyzer was 62.93% which is below KDOQI recommendation. The findings in our study suggest that URR was adequate upto three session of haemodialysis by reprocessed dialyzer but not beyond that. The choice of chemical for reprocessing did not affect the efficacy. As compared to F6 dialyze F8 dialyzer had better initial URR and this was maintained upto fourth reuse. Serum albumin levels correlated with the fall in efficacy of dialyzers. There were no significant complications of reuse of dialyzers across both methods of reprocessing and there was no dialyzer first use syndrome.Conclusions: ESRD affects a younger age group in our country. Use of large membrane area results in better efficacy. Dialyzer reuse with manual reprocessing is safe and also effective upto third and fourth use. Dialyzer reuse is associated with economic benefits

Large-scale IPM validation in whitefly (Bemisia tabaci)-prone cotton (Gossypium spp.) fields adjoining kinnow orchards

Whitefly [Bemisia tabaci (Gen)] is a serious sucking pest of cotton in the north zone of India. Cotton (Gossypium spp.) fields adjoining kinnow orchards used to have a quite higher incidence of whiteflies compared to the fields away from orchards. Therefore, the study was carried out at ICAR-National Centre for Integrated Pest Management, New Delhi during 2017–19 to implement integrated pest management (IPM) validation trial in cotton fields located adjoining the kinnow orchards in the village Nihalkhera of district Fazilka, Punjab in farmers’ participatory (FP). The IPM strategy consists of weed removal from orchards, timely sowing of recommended cotton hybrid, 4 foliar sprays of 2% potassium nitrate, use of azadirachtin 1500 ppm @5 ml/litre, conservation of natural enemies by avoidance of insecticides that are harmful (IOBC Class-4) to natural enemies and judicious use of safer pesticides (IOBC class1 and 2). The IPM adoption resulted in the successful management of whitefly and other sucking pests along with a two to three-fold increase in predator population compared to FP. IPM recorded a substantial reduction in the use of pesticide active ingredients (86%) and the number of sprays (58%) along with high parasitization (35.32–45.98%) of whitefly nymphs by Encarsia sp. IPM provided a significant increase in yield (23%), net return (57.5%) along with a high benefit cost (B:C) ratio of 2.65

Draft genome sequence of Sclerospora graminicola, the pearl millet downy mildew pathogen:Genome sequence of pearl millet downy mildew pathogen

Sclerospora graminicola pathogen is one of the most important biotic production constraints of pearl millet worldwide. We report a de novo whole genome assembly and analysis of pathotype 1. The draft genome assembly contained 299,901,251 bp with 65,404 genes. Pearl millet [Pennisetum glaucum (L.) R. Br.], is an important crop of the semi-arid and arid regions of the world. It is capable of growing in harsh and marginal environments with highest degree of tolerance to drought and heat among cereals (1). Downy mildew is the most devastating disease of pearl millet caused by Sclerospora graminicola (sacc. Schroet), particularly on genetically uniform hybrids. Estimated annual grain yield loss due to downy mildew is approximately 10?80 % (2-7). Pathotype 1 has been reported to be the highly virulent pathotype of Sclerospora graminicola in India (8). We report a de novo whole genome assembly and analysis of Sclerospora graminicola pathotype 1 from India. A susceptible pearl millet genotype Tift 23D2B1P1-P5 was used for obtaining single-zoospore isolates from the original oosporic sample. The library for whole genome sequencing was prepared according to the instructions by NEB ultra DNA library kit for Illumina (New England Biolabs, USA). The libraries were normalised, pooled and sequenced on Illumina HiSeq 2500 (Illumina Inc., San Diego, CA, USA) platform at 2 x100 bp length. Mate pair (MP) libraries were prepared using the Nextera mate pair library preparation kit (Illumina Inc., USA). 1 ?g of Genomic DNA was subject to tagmentation and was followed by strand displacement. Size selection tagmented/strand displaced DNA was carried out using AmpureXP beads. The libraries were validated using an Agilent Bioanalyser using DNA HS chip. The libraries were normalised, pooled and sequenced on Illumina MiSeq (Illumina Inc., USA) platform at 2 x300 bp length. The whole genome sequencing was performed by sequencing of 7.38 Gb with 73,889,924 paired end reads from paired end library, and 1.15 Gb with 3,851,788 reads from mate pair library generated from Illumina HiSeq2500 and Illumina MiSeq, respectively. The sequences were assembled using various assemblers like ABySS, MaSuRCA, Velvet, SOAPdenovo2, and ALLPATHS-LG. The assembly generated by MaSuRCA (9) algorithm was observed superior over other algorithms and hence used for scaffolding using SSPACE. Assembled draft genome sequence of S. graminicola pathotype 1 was 299,901,251 bp long, with a 47.2 % GC content consisting of 26,786 scaffolds with N50 of 17,909 bp with longest scaffold size of 238,843 bp. The overall coverage was 40X. The draft genome sequence was used for gene prediction using AUGUSTUS. The completeness of the assembly was investigated using CEGMA and revealed 92.74% proteins completely present and 95.56% proteins partially present, while BUSCO fungal dataset indicated 64.9% complete, 12.4% fragmented, 22.7% missing out of 290 BUSCO groups. A total of 52,285 predicted genes were annotated using BLASTX and 38,120 genes were observed with significant BLASTX match. Repetitive element analysis in the assembly revealed 8,196 simple repeats, 1,058 low complexity repeats and 5,562 dinucleotide to hexanucleotide microsatellite repeats.publishersversionPeer reviewe

System of crop intensification for more productive, resource-conserving, climate-resilient, and sustainable agriculture: experience with diverse crops in varying agroecologies

With continually increasing demand for food accompanied by the constraints of climate change and the availability and quality of soil and water, the world’s farmers are challenged to produce more food per hectare with less water, and with fewer agrochemical inputs if possible. The ideas and methods of the system of rice intensification which is improving irrigated rice production are now being extended/adapted to many other crops: wheat, maize, finger millet, sugarcane, tef, mustard, legumes, vegetables, and even spices. Promoting better root growth and enhancing the soil’s fertility with organic materials are being found effective means for raising the yields of many crop plants with less water, less fertilizer, reduced seeds, fewer agrochemicals, and greater climate resilience. In this article, we review what is becoming known about various farmer-centred innovations for agroecological crop management that can contribute to agricultural sustainability. These changes represent the emerging system of crop intensification, which is being increasingly applied in Asian, African, and Latin American countries. More research will be needed to verify the efficacy and impact of these innovations and to clarify their conditions and limits. But as no negative effects for human or environmental health have been identified, making these agronomic options more widely known should prompt more investigation and, to the extent justified by results, utilization of these methodologies

D3.8 Final version of the personalization and positioning software tool with documentation. PIPER EU Project

The aim of this report is to provide an overview of the final version of the PIPER framework and application. The software, along with its documentation, and not the report, constitutes the main part of the deliverable. The software and documentation were already distributed at the Final Workshop and online (under the Open Source license GPLv2 or later for the software, and the GNU FDL 1.3 license for the documentation). The documentation includes detailed descriptions of the framework principles, user interface, metadata, along with the modules and their parameters. It also includes application scenarios (called workflows). Information about the use of the modules is complemented by Tutorials that were developed as part of WP1 (online on the wiki) and explanatory videos were developed as part of WP4 (videos of the final workshop, now available on YouTube). The headers in the source code files (also available online) list the main contributors to the software. The report will therefore not provide details about information that is already available elsewhere but will only provide a very brief summary of the functionalities available. Some of the descriptions are excerpts of the manual