Scientific Research Publishing

Worldwide indiscriminate use of agro-chemicals boosts agricultural productivity since the green revolution of 1960s, with the cost of the environment and society. It kills the valuable soil microorganisms and destroys their natural fertility, and reduces the power of biological resistance in crops to make them more susceptible to pests and diseases. To solve the problem, sustainable agriculture is encouraged and some promising agricultural approaches are reported. In this study, the authors aimed to present new perspectives and strategies for efficient and effective use of natural resources (wood and bamboo wastes, weeds, and fungi) to enhance sustainable systems of agriculture. A next generation agriculture by using wood and bamboo wastes with the application of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) and gliocladium fungi (GF) was investigated to establish high productivity of small green pepper (SGP,  Capsicum annuum ). Wood and bamboo wastes as carbon sources, cut weeds as orga...

A pacemaker (or artificial pacemaker) is a medical device which uses electrical impulses, delivered by electrodes contracting the heart muscles, to regulate the beating of the heart. The permanent leadless cardiac pacemaker (LCP) has been shown to be safe and effective in human clinical trials. However, there is little information on the effect of implant location on LCP performance; the aim of this study was to determine whether anatomic position affected the long-term pacing performance of the LCP.  In the study, patients who enrolled in the Leadless II IDE Clinical Trial and had finished 6 months follow-up (n = 479, mean age: 75.7 ± 11 years old) were selected for the study. The LCP that was implanted (Nanostim TM , St. Jude Medical) is an entirely self-contained, active-fixation, rate-adaptive pacemaker that is 42-mm long with a maximum diameter of 6.00 mm. The LCP was delivered to the right ventricle through the use of a specially designed delivery system and was anchore...

Hemorrhagic disease (HD) is a fatal vector-borne disease that affects white-tailed deer and many other ruminants. They often suffer from one of two hemorrhagic diseases (HD): epizootic hemorrhagic disease (EHD) or bluetongue virus (BTV). The symptoms include hemorrhaging, swelling due to fluid accumulation, sores, ulcers, sloughing of hooves, high fever, and loss of fear of humans. And the vector that spreads HD is small biting midge ( Culicoides Ceratopogondiae ). These midges are tiny, blood-sucking flies that are merely pests to humans, but they are the vectors in the spread of the disease in deer and livestock. In recent years, more realistic models have been constructed which take into account dispersion time and host movements of HD. However, few models have been constructed to analyze the dynamics of HD in white-tailed deer populations and dairy farms. In the present work, a vector-borne disease model was proposed in the present work, which took into account migrating effec...

Agility is associated with infants’ developing the ability to efficiently shift their center of gravity. Therefore, it is essential to formulate tests that can reliably evaluate young children’s agility development. And continuous jump over tests, simple reaction-time tests and side-step tests are typically used to evaluate children’s agility during early childhood. They can examine agility through the number of movements completed or through simple movement speed. However, during early childhood, daily living involves recognizing danger, moving quickly to avoid it, and repeatedly and accurately altering one’s direction of movement during play. Hence, consecutive and selective reaction-time observations, and not only speed assessments, are essential to evaluate young children’s agility. In this research, the authors considered the effect of differences between instruction patterns in consecutive, selective reaction-time tests administered to early childhood participants. Participa...

Laterality refers to the preference most humans show for one side of their body over the other. It is particularly noticeable in functions of fingers, such as in using a spoon or writing letters, and is considered to occur from more preferential and frequent use of one hand in daily activities. Some studies have shown that laterality in accuracy of force exertion differs even in the same upper limbs. This is why agonist muscles contributing to the achievement of each movement seem to differ. Agonist muscle is a muscle group in the fingers and antebrachium for handgrip and in biceps brachii for elbow flexion. Hence, laterality in accuracy of force exertion may differ between handgrip and elbow flexion in spite of movement in the same upper limb. So this study aimed to examine the accuracy of grip and elbow flexion force exertions for each demand value and the difference between movements. Participants were 22 right-armed healthy young males (mean age 22.5 ± 5.6 years old, mean ...

In rain-fed ecosystems, drought is the major obstacle to rice production. Developing varieties resistant to drought is considered a promising approach to increase rice yields in drought-prone environments. However, this approach requires an understanding of rice plant responses to drought and the mechanisms of drought tolerance in rice. In this study, the authors conducted a pot experiment to explore growth characteristics, root plasticity, and stomatal conductance in six rice varieties (DA8, Malagkit Pirurutong, Thierno Bande, Pate Blanc MN1, Kinandang Patong, and Moroberekan) in response to different drought stress and re-watering conditions. The experiment was performed in a greenhouse at the Faculty of Agriculture, Kyushu University, Japan (33˚37'N, 130˚25'E; 3 m above sea level) in summer 2015. And the experiment was conducted in a randomized complete block design with three replicates. The results indicated that drought stress significantly depressed plant ...

Soil compaction is a major limiting factor in restoring native vegetation on reclaimed surface mined land in the Appalachian coal mining region of the eastern USA. It limits available water and nutrients, reduces pore volume, restricts root elongation and development, reduces plant growth, and leads to anaerobic conditions that many plants are unable to tolerate. Previously, non-native forage species such as tall fescue ( Schedonorus arundinaceus (Schreb.) Dumort., nom. cons.) have been planted because they easily established on reclaimed mine soil. And some studies have shown that establishing large-statured, robust prairie species as an alternative to low-diversity forage complexes might improve soil conditions on reclaimed mine land over time. In this study, the authors conducted a 10-week glasshouse study comparing growth of “Pete” eastern gamagrass ( Tripsacum dactyloides L.), “Bison” big bluestem ( Andropogon gerardii Vitman), and “Jesup MaxQ” tall fescue at soil bulk...

Relative flexibility between the hamstring and lumbar extensor muscles, which can be evaluated using lumbopelvic curvature during active knee extension in sitting, can sometimes be assessed in physical therapy. However, a quantitative measure of lumbopelvic curvature during active knee extension in sitting has not been established yet, nor has reliability for this test been reported. Therefore, it is necessary to establish reliability of quantitative measures for physical assessments that are used to identify specific subgroups and thus the reliability of the test to assess lumbopelvic curvature during active knee extension in sitting. In this study, the authors aimed to establish reliability for measurement of lumbopelvic curvature during active knee extension in sitting by considering the minimum number of repetitions, inter-session reliability and inter-examiner reliability. And twenty-seven individuals with clinically tight hamstring muscles were recruited. On two separate ses...

Plant senescence is deemed as a complex, highly regulated, developmental phase in the life of a plant with a consequence of a coordinated degradation of macromolecules and a subsequent benefit of component mobilization from other parts of the plant. In some cases, under one or many environmental stresses, senescence is triggered in plants. Despite many studies in the area, less consideration has been given to plant secondary metabolites, especially the role of volatile terpene compounds (VTCs) on plant senescence. Actually, Not only does VTCs serve as a feeding deterrent to insects and some herbivores, it is now well accepted that VTCs play a major role in plant senescence by keeping the plant healthy and also protecting it against environmental stresses that are known to cause plant death. This review sought to capture the biosynthesis and signal transduction of VTCs, the physiology of VTCs in plant development and how that was linked to some phytohormones to i...

Trees planted in urban landscapes often require irrigation during all stages of life. Landscape tree water management requires reasonable estimates of water demand in order to schedule irrigation amounts and timing to conserve water while maintaining tree health. Estimating tree water demand is not straightforward for water demand of isolated trees as typically found in urban landscapes is affected by numerous factors. To meet minimum spring flows, water management districts in Florida sought to make both agriculture and urban landscapes water efficient, which includes tree farms.  Quercus virginiana , commonly known as live oak trees, is endemic to Central Florida and among the most popular landscape trees for their gracefulness and spreading shade. In this study, to provide a basis for irrigation allocations both during production and in landscapes, daily actual evapotranspiration (ET A ) in liters for three live oak trees was measured with weighing lysimeters over five ...

During childhood, externalizing behaviors (EB) are displayed as agitation, hyperactivity, impulsivity, opposition, emotional instability, provocation, resistance, aggressiveness, or irritability. And EB usually result from neurological, developmental, environmental and parenting factors. Some researchers have highlighted that individual and environmental risk factors could be responsible of the likelihood of EB at preschool age. And the individual risk factors included notably social cognition (SC) and executive functions (EF). Besides, externalizing behavior problems are a primary cause of consultation in preschoolers. The aim of the present experimental study was to compare the impact of two very targeted child-oriented trainings in the increasing of social competence and decreasing of EB in preschoolers. One training targeted SC abilities while the second one targeted EF capacities. These two trainings were compared on 48 preschoolers presenting clinically relevant levels of EB...

Dementia is a broad category of brain diseases that cause a long-term and often gradual decrease in the ability to think and remember that is great enough to affect a person’s daily functioning. Memory loss is one typical example. In fact, many dementias are progressive, meaning symptoms start out slowly and gradually get worse. Various factors can cause behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD). And stress is one of the most potent of many factors that can cause expression of behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD). If a patient with dementia is coping with stress, the autonomic nervous system becomes dominated by sympathetic nervous-adrenal medullary (SAM) activity. This study aimed to clarify the causal relationship between BPSD and autonomic nervous system activity by making a theoretical model in which BPSD influencing autonomic nervous system activity, analyzing the model using SEM, and examining the standardization coefficient. In this s...

There is a developmental sensitivity to pH for most aquatic organisms. Ocean acidification due to increasing amounts of carbon dioxide is a current and future problem for organisms with the gradual lowering of the ocean pH. Carbon dioxide increases also can affect freshwater systems, but episodic acidity causes more problems with organisms in poorly buffered streams, ponds and lakes. In this paper, the effects of transient acid spikes on development of  Lepomis  sunfish were studied by combining field work with laboratory studies.  Lepomis  sunfish eggs were collected from rocks on nests in two freshwater ponds and tested for their resistance to laboratory induced transient acid spikes. Fertilized eggs on rocks within the same nest were used for each pH transient experiment. Egg masses on one rock from the nest were used as a control while egg masses on another rock were exposed to transient acid spikes. Overall, 3163 early-life-stage Lepomis individuals (2459 ...

Evidence suggests that childhood physical activity may play a role in the etiology and prevention of adult chronic diseases. Because researchers must often depend on self-recalled physical activity data many years after the exposure, it is important to understand factors which may influence adult recall of childhood physical activity. This study evaluated the influence of adult characteristics on reported childhood physical activity and the association between adult physical activity and self-recalled childhood physical activity.  48,066 post-menopausal women from the Women’s Health Initiative Observational Study reported their physical activity level during ages 5-9, 10-14, and 15-19. And childhood physical activity recalled at ages 5 - 9, 10 - 14, and 15 - 19 was categorized into three levels: physically inactive (0 - 1 days/week), low physical activity (2 - 3 days/week), and high physical activity (≥ 4 days/ week). In this cohort, over 65% of the po...

In several fields of psychology, it has been shown that a participant’s background emotional state influences how information is processed. Emotional state, also referred to as mood, refers to a long-term psychological state. And some studies event-related potential (ERP) studies have demonstrated that emotional state immediately affects the processing of different linguistic mismatches (e.g., semantic and syntactic mismatches) in sentences. Furthermore, mood has been shown to impact discourse processing. In these studies, a strong expectancy was evoked by a linguistic context. In the present study, a strong expectancy was induced by a visual (non-linguistic) context paired with a sentence. A spatial array was followed by a sentence that matched (□○— The square stands in front of the circle ) or mismatched the picture (intra-dimensional mismatch: □○— The square stands behind the circle ; extra-dimensional mismatch: □○— The square stands above the circle ). The main question was wh...

Traditionally, a self-reported questionnaire has been a cost-effective method of gathering information about physical activity (PA). Recently, however, the use of an objective measure, such as a pedometer, has been the focus of PA studies because it permits more accurate quantification. And it can be used to validate the findings of a PA questionnaire in a large population. The objective of this study was to determine the convergent validity of a PA questionnaire against objectively measured PA in adults obtained with the use of a pedometer.  In the study, data from the Cardiovascular Risk in Young Finns Study (YFS) were collected from 1853 participants aged 30 - 45 years old. The participants completed a self-reported questionnaire that included items on leisure time, commuting and habitual PA. PA was expressed as leisure-time physical activity index (PAI) and metabolic equivalent hours/week (METh/wk). The participants wore a pedometer for seven...

Cryopreservation is a process where organelles, cells, tissues, extracellular matrix, organs or any other biological constructs susceptible to damage caused by unregulated chemical kinetics are preserved by cooling to very low temperatures (liquid nitrogen, −196˚C). It is a safe and cost-effective option for long-term conservation of vegetatively propagated plants such as yam. 24-epibrassinolide (EBR) belongs to brassinosteroids (BRs), a class of plant steroid hormones which possess significant growth controlling activity and are involved in the promotion of cell elongation, cell division, differentiation, disease resistance, stress tolerance, and senescence throughout the plant life cycle. In this work, the authors compared the effect of the growth regulator content of the culture medium on the growth of  in vitro  shoot tips of five yam accessions belonging to four yam species (one  Dioscorea alata , one  D. rotundata , one  D. cayenensis  and two...