Biodiversity, Distribution and Host Range of the Genus Ephedrus Haliday (Hymenoptera: Aphidiidae) in Manipur, N.E. India

The aphidiid wasps are small ichneumonoid hymenopterous insects which are strictly specific solitary endophagous parasitoids of the aphids. They are amongst the most important group of parasitic insects that can be utilized as bio-control agent of aphids. So far 60 genera of aphidiid parasitoids have been described from all over the world. Out of these the genus Ephedrus Haliday is a common one. An extensive study of this genus along with their aphid hosts in different localities of Manipur during 2007- 2008 revealed the occurrence of 13 species belonging to the genus viz. Ephedrus brevis, E. cerasicola, E. dioscorae, E. lacertosus, E. minor, E. nacheri, E. niger, E. orientalis, E. persicae, E. plagiator, E. srinagarensis, Ephedrus sp.a and Ephedrus sp.b. The parasitoids revealed variations in terms of their altitudinal distribution (from 785m.to 1920 m. MSL).  Most of the parasitoid species exhibited host specificity however E. plagiator showed extreme polyphagy parasitizing 4 aphid host species infesting different host plants

Scoping biological indicators of soil quality Phase II. Defra Final Contract Report SP0534

This report presents results from a field assessment of a limited suite of potential biological indicators of soil quality to investigate their suitability for national-scale soil monitoring

Encrypted accelerated least squares regression.

Information that is stored in an encrypted format is, by definition, usually not amenable to statistical analysis or machine learning methods. In this paper we present detailed analysis of coordinate and accelerated gradient descent algorithms which are capable of fitting least squares and penalised ridge regression models, using data encrypted under a fully homomorphic encryption scheme. Gradient descent is shown to dominate in terms of encrypted computational speed, and theoretical results are proven to give parameter bounds which ensure correctness of decryption. The characteristics of encrypted computation are empirically shown to favour a non-standard acceleration technique. This demonstrates the possibility of approximating conventional statistical regression methods using encrypted data without compromising privacy

New challenges in breeding chickpea under changing climate

Climate change is a continuous natural process leading to evolution of diverse flora and fauna. The variability thus created during process of evolution followed by selection of most fit by nature itself forms primary base for crop improvement programs. However, the industrialization led climate change in the present era has been witnessed in form of abrupt rise or drop in temperature, erratic or uneven and untimely rainfall resulting in floods and drought situations. This is a cause of concern as such changes have direct impact on food production. Since most of the pulse crops including chickpea is sensitive to such climate changes, there is need to define likely effects of climate change on chickpea crop and strategies to mitigate its impact on chickpea production and productivity. Among various abiotic and biotic stresses likely to emerge are deficient or high soil moisture, frequent and untimely rains leading to unseasonal flood like situations during winter season, extreme temperatures during different crop growth stages such as frost during vegetative stage, low or high temperature at reproductive stage leading to flower/pod drop and abrupt rise in temperature during vegetative stage leading to initiation of early flowering followed by sudden drop in temperature leading to flower or pod drop; excessive crop growth due to frequent untimely winter rains, higher incidence of root diseases (collar rot and wet root rot) due to high temperature and high soil moisture at early stage of crop growth, increased incidence of foliar diseases (botrytis gray mould, Ascochyta blight, Alternaria blight, stem rot etc.) due to excessive vegetative growth, and more aggression of weak pathogens causing dry root rot and collar rot are likely to cause huge damage to chickpea crop. Similarly, rise in atmospheric humidity at the time of flowering and podding stage may lead to higher activities of insect pests like gram pod borer, cut worm etc. Among various strategies to combat these challenges, strategies like screening of germplasm accessions to identify donors possessing traits of economic importance, diseases and insect pest resistance, tolerance to temperature extremities (cold and heat stress), frost, high or low soil moisture stress etc. will be of paramount importance. Careful screening of genetic resources (core or mini-core sets) including wild relatives and primitive landraces will become imperative. The mapping and tagging of gene(s) or quantitative trait loci (QTLs) responsible for imparting resistance/tolerance to abiotic and biotic stresses and yield attributes will be desirable for targeted transfer of the required traits. Further, rapid generation advancement and integration of molecular markers in enhancing efficiency of selection methods will ensure desired improvement in chickpea

Relationship of postpartum interval to estrus, body condition score, milk yield and blood biochemical parameters in Surti buffaloes (Bubalus bubalis)

The aim of the present investigation was to find out the relationship among postpartum interval to estrus, body condition score, milk yield and blood biochemical parameters of Surti buffaloes (Bubalus bubalis). The study was conducted on sixteen clinically healthy Surti buffaloes (parity 1-7) with normal parturition. These animals were divided into two groups on the basis of their postpartum interval to estrus (PPIE). Group 1 animals had PPIE ? 50 days whereas group 2 had PPIE > 50 days. Body condition score (BCS), milk yield and Blood samples were collected by jugular venipuncture on days starting from 6th day after calving thereafter at fortnight interval till 90th day postpartum. Blood serum parameters such as glucose, total protein, blood urea, creatinine, cholesterol, triglyceride, progesterone and estrogen were measured. Perusal of data revealed that animals having higher BCS on the day of estrus had significantly (P?0.05) shorter PPIE. There was non-significant effect of daily and cumulative 100 days milk yield on PPIE. Serum concentration of glucose and creatinine was significantly (P?0.05) higher for group 1 animals at most of the stages. There was non-significant difference between serum concentration of total protein, blood urea nitrogen and cholesterol between both the groups. Progesterone and Estradiol-17 ? concentrations were significantly (P?0.05) higher in group 1 animals than group 2 animals at different stages of this study

On the nature of ferromagnetism in diluted magnetic semiconductors: GaAs:Mn, GaP:Mn

A microscopic Hamiltonian for interacting manganese impurities in diluted magnetic semiconductors (DMS) is derived. It is shown that in p -type III-V DMS the indirect exchange between Mn impurities has similarities with the Zener mechanism in transition metal oxides. Here the mobile holes and localized states near the top of the valence band play the role of unoccupied oxygen orbitals which induce ferromagnetism. The Curie temperature estimated from the proposed kinematic exchange agrees with recent experiments on GaAs:Mn. The model is also applicable to the GaP:Mn system.Comment: 10 pages, 3 figures. Submitted to Europhysics Letters, June 25, 200

Bulk Viscous LRS Biachi-I Universe with variable GG and decaying Λ\Lambda

The present study deals with spatially homogeneous and totally anisotropic locally rotationally symmetric (LRS) Bianchi type I cosmological model with variable $G$ and $\Lambda$ in presence of imperfect fluid. To get the deterministic model of Universe, we assume that the expansion $(\theta)$ in the model is proportional to shear $(\sigma)$. This condition leads to $A=\ell B^{n}$, where $A$,\;$B$ are metric potential. The cosmological constant $\Lambda$ is found to be decreasing function of time and it approaches a small positive value at late time which is supported by recent Supernovae Ia (SN Ia) observations. Also it is evident that the distance modulus curve of derived model matches with observations perfectly.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figures and 1 table, Accepted for publication in Astrophysics and Space Scienc

Identification of a non-redundant set of 202 in silico SSR markers and applicability of a select set in chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.)

The paucity of sequence information flanking the simple sequence repeat (SSR) motifs identified especially in the transcript sequences has been limiting factor in the development of SSR markers for plant genome analysis as well as breeding applications. To overcome this and enhance the genic SSR marker repertoire in chickpea, the draft genome sequence of kabuli chickpea (CDC Frontier) and publicly available transcript sequences consisting of in silico identified SSR motifs were deployed in the present study. In this direction, the 300 bp sequence flanking the SSR motifs were retrieved by aligning 566 SSR containing transcripts of ICCV 2 available in public domain on the reference chickpea genome. A set of 202 novel genic SSRs were developed from a set of 507 primer pairs designed, based on in silico amplification of single locus and having no similarity to the publicly available SSR markers. Further, 40 genic SSRs equally distributed on chickpea genome were validated on a select set of 44 chickpea genotypes (including 41 Cicer arietinum and 3 Cicer reticulatum), out of which 25 were reported to be polymorphic. The polymorphism information content (PIC) value of 25 polymorphic genic SSRs ranged from 0.11 to 0.77 and number of alleles varied from 2 to 9. Clear demarcation among founder lines of multi-parent advanced generation inter-cross (MAGIC) population developed at ICRISAT and near-isogenic nature of JG 11 and JG11 + demonstrates the usefulness of these markers in chickpea diversity analysis and breeding studies. Further, genic polymorphic SSRs reported between parental lines of 16 different mapping populations along with the novel SSRs can be deployed for trait mapping and breeding applications in chickpea

An evaluation of possible mechanisms for anomalous resistivity in the solar corona

A wide variety of transient events in the solar corona seem to require explanations that invoke fast reconnection. Theoretical models explaining fast reconnection often rely on enhanced resistivity. We start with data derived from observed reconnection rates in solar flares and seek to reconcile them with the chaos-induced resistivity model of Numata & Yoshida (2002) and with resistivity arising out of the kinetic Alfv\'en wave (KAW) instability. We find that the resistivities arising from either of these mechanisms, when localized over lengthscales of the order of an ion skin depth, are capable of explaining the observationally mandated Lundquist numbers.Comment: Accepted, Solar Physic

Orbit spaces of free involutions on the product of two projective spaces

Let $X$ be a finitistic space having the mod 2 cohomology algebra of the product of two projective spaces. We study free involutions on $X$ and determine the possible mod 2 cohomology algebra of orbit space of any free involution, using the Leray spectral sequence associated to the Borel fibration $X \hookrightarrow X_{\mathbb{Z}_2} \longrightarrow B_{\mathbb{Z}_2}$. We also give an application of our result to show that if $X$ has the mod 2 cohomology algebra of the product of two real projective spaces (respectively complex projective spaces), then there does not exist any $\mathbb{Z}_2$-equivariant map from $\mathbb{S}^k \to X$ for $k \geq 2$ (respectively $k \geq 3$), where $\mathbb{S}^k$ is equipped with the antipodal involution.Comment: 14 pages, to appear in Results in Mathematic