The root-knot nematodes (RKN) (Meloidogyne graminicola) are a devastating threat to rice worldwide. The cultivated germplasm is either susceptible or moderately resistant to rice RKN. Therefore, there is a need to identify resistance sources against M. graminicola as an eco-friendly management strategy. The present study evaluated the host response of Oryza sativa genotypes comprising basmati, non-basmati improved varieties, their advanced breeding lines (83) and Oryza glaberrima accessions (42) against M. graminicola in the nematode-infested plot for two consecutive years. All O. sativa genotypes exhibited susceptible responses, while O. glaberrima accessions showed variable levels of resistance. Three of the O. glaberrima accessions (IRGC102196, IRGC102538 and IRGC102557) were highly resistant. M. graminicola significantly affected plant growth parameters in susceptible genotypes compared to resistant O. glaberrima accessions. The results were supported by histopathological studies that showed apparent giant cell formation in PR121 while penetration and development of M. graminicola juveniles were low in the O. glaberrima acc. IRGC102196. In silico analysis indicated that none of the reported nematode resistance genes from different crops had homology with the rice genome. The two anti-nematode genes (Oryzacystatin-I and Oryzacystatin-II) from O. sativa japonica revealed homology with O. sativa cv. PR121 and O. glaberrima acc. IRGC102206. Comparative analysis of these genes between PR121 and O. glaberrima acc. IRGC102206 resulted in the identification of SNPs/InDels that could be associated with nematode resistance. The identified SNPs/InDels could be validated, and further molecular studies are needed to provide insights into the resistance mechanism against rice RKN.

The use of repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) options for the analysis of in vitro ruminal fermentation gas production profiles is illustrated. Because of the different variances and covariance structures among profile observations, ordinary ANOVA for more than two-time points is not recommended. To mitigate this problem, the Greenhouse–Geisser epsilon correction can be applied to reduce the degrees of freedom, inflated by violation of the sphericity assumption, for F ratio probability calculations. After this correction, the Box–Greenhouse–Geisser ANOVA (modified ANOVA) layout appears similar to the layout of a split-plot design ANOVA with whole plots divided into subplots (incubation time). Any F tests in the main plot part are valid but F tests involving the time factor from the subplot part need modification because time factor, by its very nature, cannot be allocated at random. Application of multivariate ANOVA, distance multivariate ANOVA, ante-dependence and mixed model analysis are also considered. All these options lend themselves to wide application in the applied biological sciences.

In this paper, we consider four scenarios for economic optimal management of a fisheries resource by a high sea and coastal fleet segment. These scenarios differ with respect to whether a common or two separate fish stocks are considered and whether the profit from land-based processing is included. The model is parametrized using the Greenland halibut fishery on the west coast of Greenland as an empirical case. For this fishery, we show that the relative ranking of the optimal high sea industry harvest and profit compared to the coastal industry harvest and profit depends on the chosen scenario. When comparing the scenarios for optimal management and the actual situation, we find that the fish stock tends to be overexploited.

The problem of classifying elliptic curves over $\mathbb Q$ with a given discriminant has received much attention. The analogous problem for genus $2$ curves has only been tackled when the absolute discriminant is a power of $2$. In this article, we classify genus $2$ curves C defined over ${\mathbb Q}$ with at least two rational Weierstrass points and whose absolute discriminant is an odd prime. In fact, we show that such a curve C must be isomorphic to a specialization of one of finitely many $1$-parameter families of genus $2$ curves. In particular, we provide genus $2$ analogues to Neumann–Setzer families of elliptic curves over the rationals.

Childhood infections have been shown to stunt growth, contribute to malnutrition and reduce cognition in early adulthood. This study aimed to assess relationships between early life infections and childhood cognition at age 11 years in the Newcastle Thousand Families Study (NTFS). The analysis included 741 members from the NTFS who had complete data for infections between birth and 5 years, and the 11-plus examinations. School records from the 11-plus examinations showed cognitive (IQ), English (EQ) and arithmetic (AQ) abilities. Housing conditions, overcrowding, birth order and social class were recorded at birth. Helicobacter pylori seropositivity was measured at age 49–51 years. Multivariable linear regression was used to examine relationships between infections and cognition. The total number of infections in the first 5 years of life was not significantly associated with IQ, EQ or AQ, nor were there significant relationships between cognitive outcomes and most infections. Tonsillitis did display a positive, significant association with IQ after adjustment for confounders (b = 6.43, 95% CI 0.92, 11.94, p = 0.022). Lower respiratory tract infections (LRTIs) showed significant negative relationships with all cognitive outcomes. H. pylori seropositivity at age 50 exhibited negative, significant relationships with EQ (p = 0.014) and AQ (p = 0.024) after adjustment for confounders. Although no significant relationship between overall infections and cognition were found, there were indications that LRTIs and gastrointestinal system infections may limit cognitive development. Given these infections remain prevalent, further research regarding severity and recurrence of infections and how they affect childhood cognition is needed.

The objective was to evaluate steer performance, meat nutritional value, land-use, food–feed competition and both economic and environmental sustainability within temperate pasture-based suckler weanling-to-beef systems with or without (forage-only) concentrates. Post-weaning, 8-month-old, late-maturing breed steers (333 kg) were assigned to one of three systems: (1) grass silage + 1.2 kg concentrate DM (148 days), followed by pasture (123 days) and finished on ad libitum concentrates (120 days) – slaughter age, 21 months (GRAIN); (2) as per (1) but pasture (196 days) and finished on grass silage ad libitum + 3.5 kg concentrate DM (124 days) – slaughter age, 24 months (SIL + GRAIN); and (3) grass silage-only (148 days), pasture (196 days), silage-only (140 days) and finished on pasture (97 days) – slaughter age, 28 months (FORAGE). The mean target carcass weight was 390 kg for each system. Data generated were used to parameterize a farm-level beef systems model. Concentrate DM intake was 1187, 606 and 0 kg/head for GRAIN, SIL + GRAIN and FORAGE, respectively. The forage-only (FORAGE) system offers several advantages, including improved farm profitability, enhanced meat fatty acid profile and only utilized inedible human feed. Consequently, associated greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions per net human edible food produced were more favourable for FORAGE. However, compared to GRAIN, the FORAGE system had an older age at slaughter and associated increased pasture land-use and GHG emissions per animal, meat weight gain and essential amino acids gain. There are therefore inevitable trade-offs, as one beef system does not improve all sustainability and GHG emission metrics.

We prove that every topologically stable homeomorphism with global attractor of $\mathbb {R}^n$ is topologically stable on its global attractor. The converse is not true. On the other hand, if a homeomorphism with global attractor of a locally compact metric space is expansive and has the shadowing property, then it is topologically stable. This extends the Walters stability theorem (Walters, On the pseudo-orbit tracing property and its relationship to stability. The structure of attractors in dynamical systems, 1978, pp. 231–244).

Most studies on path planning of robotic arm focus on obstacle avoidance at the end position of robotic arm, while ignoring the obstacle avoidance of robotic arm joint linkage, and the obstacle avoidance method has low flexibility and adaptability. This paper proposes a path obstacle avoidance algorithm for the overall 6-DOF robotic arm that is based on the improved A* algorithm and the artificial potential field method. In the first place, an improved A* algorithm is proposed to address the deficiencies of the conventional A* algorithm, such as a large number of search nodes and low computational efficiency, in robotic arm end path planning. The enhanced A* algorithm proposes a new node search strategy and local path optimization method, which significantly reduces the number of search nodes and enhances search efficiency. To achieve the manipulator joint rod avoiding obstacles, a method of robotic arm posture adjustment based on the artificial potential field method is proposed. The efficiency and environmental adaptability of the robotic arm path planning algorithm proposed in this paper are validated through three types of simulation analysis conducted in different environments. Finally, the AUBO-i10 robotic arm is used to conduct path avoidance tests. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method can make the manipulator move smoothly and effectively plan an obstacle-free path, proving the method’s viability.

The paper presents a detailed corpus-based analysis of the German prospective stehen vor NP light verb construction. The starting point of the analysis is the claim that the construction is restricted to change-of-state nouns in the NP-internal position (Fleischhauer & Gamerschlag 2019, Fleischhauer et al. 2019). Based on corpus data, I demonstrate that although the construction shows a strong preference for such nouns, other semantic types of nouns (such as state nouns or process nouns) occur in the construction as well. I argue that process nouns in particular require contextual support to be licensed within the construction. In the paper, I present an analysis of the prospective light verb construction in terms of current relevance. This analysis accounts for the observed preference for change-of-state NP-internal nouns as well as for the need to provide contextual support for process nouns. The notion current relevance is frequently employed in the analysis of the perfect aspect; the current paper represents the first attempt to extend this notion to the prospective aspect.*

Low birthweight rats due to fetal undernutrition sustain higher corticosterone levels when exposed to stress. This is due to the upregulated expression of the pituitary-specific Gas5, a long noncoding RNA (lncRNA) that acts as a glucocorticoid receptor decoy and then competitively inhibiting the binding of glucocorticoids to DNA. However, the mechanism of Gas5 lncRNA upregulation remains unclear. Therefore, using the fetal undernourished model, we identified the factors that regulated Gas5 lncRNA expression and examined their effect on subsequent generations. We found that the expression levels of miR-23 was significantly lower in low birth-weight rats compared with controls. The expression of miR-23 was significantly lower and the expression levels of Gas5 lncRNA were significantly higher in the pituitary gland of low birth-weight offspring of the F2 and F3 generations compared with controls. The methyl modulator intervention in lactating F0 maternal rats restored miR-23 and Gas5 lncRNA expressions not only in F1, F2 and F3 offspring. Moreover, the intervention reduced circulating corticosterone levels and gene expressions in the pituitary gland after restraint stress exposure. In conclusion, miR-23-mediated alterations of the stress response are inherited and restored by methyl modulator intervention during lactation.