Three-dimensional geometric morphometrics of Arvicanthis: implications for systematics and taxonomy

Arvicanthis is an African murid, found throughout sub-Saharan Africa, Sudan and Egypt. Although in the past 10 years several studies have been carried out to assess its systematics, there is still a need for a general revision of the genus. In this study the morphometric relationships between 71 populations throughout the range were investigated. A three-dimensional geometric morphometric approach was used to assess differences in the size and shape of the skull. These were related to the different biogeographical domains characterizing the range of the genus and to molecular and karyotypic phylogenies. Results agree only in part with phylogeny, and show a close relationship with the environmental backgrounds of each species. It is therefore suggested that the adaptation of Arvicanthis to local environment has played an important role in the phenotypic evolution of the skull. This leads to problems in taxonomic definitions based on morphometrics, which should not be used without comparison with other independently derived characters such as the DNA and the karyotype

Matching Seeds to Needs - female farmers adapt to a changing climate in Ethiopia

Between 2010 and 2012 Bioversity International worked with partners and stakeholders in Ethiopia to develop an innovative low-cost strategy for managing risks to agricultural systems posed by the adverse effects of climate change. The objective, which the project indeed achieved, was to decrease vulnerability and enhance adaptive capacity in smallholder farming communities by increasing the intraspecific diversity of important food security crops using barley and durum wheat

Resilient seed systems for climate change adaptation and sustainable livelihoods in the East Africa sub-region: Report of training workshop, Addis Ababa Ethiopia, 17-21 September 2019

Bioversity International is implementing a Dutch-supported project entitled: Resilient seed systems for climate change adaptation and sustainable livelihoods in the East Africa sub-region. This work aims to boost timely and affordable access to good-quality seed for a portfolio of crops / varieties for millions of women and men farmers’ and their communities across east Africa. A first project training: i) contextualized farmer varietal selection, ii) provided practical demonstrations of tools for climate-change analysis, iii) introduced policy issues associated with managing crop diversity, iv) outlined characterization and evaluation of genetic resources, and v) articulated associated gender issues, and issues related to disseminating elite materials. The training concluded with a contextualizing field trip. In the workshop evaluation, 98% participants declared their overall satisfaction level to be high (74%) or medium (24%), indicating the training furnished them with good ideas for networking and using the tools and methods they learned about

Participatory Multi-Environmental Trials (MET) identified promising durum wheat landraces in Northern Ethiopia

Participation of farmers in research process from early stage has been gaining ground in breeding research. Participant farmers can provide very valuable scientific evaluation of genotypes that can be used for effective discrimination of useful varieties easily adopted by similar farmers. Participatory varietal selection (PVS) is a powerful tool in identifying crops varieties with high acceptance probability in marginal environments because participant farmers evaluate the genotypes not only from yield perspective but also from stress tolerance perspective. Here we present a participatory MET conducted in four locations to select durum wheat landraces for larger scale production in the areas. In all four locations, 36 genotypes (31 landraces plus 5 improved varieties) were tested for two cropping seasons and evaluated by both researchers and farmers groups. In each location, a total of 30 farmers (15 female and 15 male) and five breeders critically evaluated the each variety for earliness, spike quality, drought tolerance and overall performance on scale of 1 to 5, traits defined by the farmers themselves. 1 stands for bad and 5 for excellent performance. Researchers have collected data for three phenological traits and seven agronomic traits and analysis was conducted to see preference matching between researcher data and farmers score data. The results show clearly that farmers are capable to discriminate genotypes reasonably though their discrimination power varies from location to location. The discrimination by breeders was consistent across locations. Very high significant (p<0.01) association was established between farmers visual score and researchers collected grain yield data and days to maturity in all locations with some exceptions for maturity date. Genotypes ranking for grain yield based on researchers collected data and farmer scoring matched about 80% in the 10 top performing genotypes. In conclusion: · Participatory varietal selection could bridge the problem of variety adoption by complementing farmers and breeders preferences . · Farmers are keen in evaluating genotypes and have reasons for rejecting or accepting varieties . · There was good agreement between farmers score and objectively collected data in identifying the 10 top performing genotypes. Participatory MET could be a reliable approach for fast technology development and dissemination as it considers the involvement of end users from the very beginning

Genetic diversity in Ethiopian Durum wheat ( Triticum turgidum var durum ) inferred from phenotypic variations

The valorization of genetic diversities of major crops like wheat may help substantially to feed the world Population. Durum heat genotypes consisting of 265 farmers’ varieties (FVs), which have been cultivated for many centuries in Ethiopia, as well as 24 improved varieties (IMVs) have been recently evaluated in northern Ethiopia. The evaluation has been carried out at two different locations for 2 consecutive years to verify the inherited diversity in FVs for important phenological and agronomic traits; with the intention to provide refined information to breeders and genebank managers. As a result of a careful evaluation, a very significant variation was observed between the FVs and IMVs. A large number of the former have demonstrated superior performance to the latter in terms of mean values of the major traits within the stipulated years and locations. The best perform- ing FV has shown a gain of 20% grain yield over the best IMV. Multivariate analyses revealed that FVs displayed larger genetic diversity than in those IMVs. FVs could therefore be used as donor of useful alleles in durum wheat breeding for improvement of yield per se and other traits of agronomic and phenological importance. The identified stable superior FVs include: 8208, 226834A, 238567, 222426, 226282 could be best candidates for farmers in marginal environments. Genotypes that have shown stable performance for spatial variation such as 204493A, 214357 and 238567; and temporal variation such as 8208, 208479, 214357 and 226834A could be the best candidates for exploitation in future breeding programs

cost effectiveness evaluation of oncological drugs newly marketed in italy

In a previous publication, the incremental overall survival (OS gain vs current therapy) was estimated for the 32 new cancer therapies authorized in Italy between 2010 and 2013.The objective of this article was to quantify the respective incremental costs (including possible regulatory agreements) in order to build incremental cost-effectiveness ratios (ICERs) to be used for economic evaluation.In a first group of 12 therapies, where OS gains were statistically significant (p < 0.05), the ICERs' median value was €53,273 per year gained (range: 3,945 - 179,098) and the mean value was €64,181 (95% CI: 29,302 - 99,060). In the other group, excluding four therapies with negative OS gains, ICERs were calculated for the remaining 16 drugs. The median ICER resulted in €69,568 (range: 3,406 - 308,928) and the mean value was €87,330 (95% CI: 37,024 - 137,636).Assuming a threshold of €5,000 per life-month gained, a total of 14 new cancer therapies met this criterion of economic acceptability (eight out of 12 in the..

Working with farmers in Ethiopia to tap the potential of Durum wheat genetic diversity to adapt to climate change

Poster summarizing some of the activities and achievements of the Seeds for Needs Initiative in Ethiopia in honour of community seed bank openin