ABSTRACT
Drought is a predominant factor responsible for yield reduction throughout the world. The current scenario of climate change and global warming are further causing frequent and severe droughts, which emphasizes the need to understand the response of plants to drought stress. Hence, it is imperative to develop a system wherein water utilization is more efficient in agriculture. In this context, the plant root system which is in close association with soil assumes greater importance and they play an important role in plant growth and development by exploiting soil water and nutrients. Root traits such as root diameter, length, specific area, angle, length and density are considered useful traits for improving plant growth under drought conditions. This review on root dynamics under drought stress presented here provides readers with the latest information on root system architecture, genetics, physiology and molecular responses of roots under drought stress.
ABSTRACT
Background: Alcohol use and traumatic brain injury (TBI) are closely linked public health problems. Alcohol intoxication is one of the major risk factor for TBI, and is a main determinant of prognosis in terms of mortality and functional outcome. The aim of the study is to find out the impact of alcoholism in the neurobehavioral outcome following TBI.Methods: A total of 150 head injury patients were divided into two groups: alcoholics and non-alcoholics, and evaluated between six weeks to one year after injury using the revised neurobehavioral rating scale by Levin et al (NRS-R) for the evaluation of neurobehavioral sequelae and the outcome was compared between groups.Results: The study showed significant difference between the groups indicating that the neurobehavioral sequelae were more in the chronic alcoholics group. In the comparison of individual factors, all except factors III (negative symptoms) and IV (mood and affect) were found to be significantly different. The factors I (executive), II (positive symptoms), V (oral and motor), and VI (not loading on any of the factors) were significant at 0.01 level.Conclusions: Chronic alcoholism significantly increases the risk of developing neurobehavioral sequelae after traumatic brain injury.
ABSTRACT
Mung bean [Vigna radiata (L.) Wilczek] is an important grain legume crop. Earlier works on micropropagation protocols for mung bean suffer from genotype dependence, poor reproducibility and insufficient regeneration efficiency. Hence, we made an attempt to develop an efficient protocol for micropropagation of mung bean cv. KM 2 using transverse thin cell layer (tTCL) system. The epicotyl, hypocotyl and nodal tTCL explants were obtained from 5-day-old seedlings and cultured on MS medium with different concentrations of BAP (6-benzylaminopurine), TDZ (Thidiazuron) and kinetin. The maximum frequency (75.25%) of direct shoot initiation and multiplication was achieved from culturing the nodal tTCL explants on MS medium containing 1.0 mg/L BAP. It has been observed that 61.4% of the regenerated shoots successfully elongated and rooted in MS medium containing 1.0 mg/L of IBA (indole-3-butyric acid) after two weeks of culture. The plantlets successfully established under greenhouse conditions with 64 % survival rate. The hardened plants exhibited homogeneity and no morphological variations were detected among the regenerants and the mother plants. The identified regeneration system could be efficiently used in various in vitro manipulation studies in mung bean as well.
ABSTRACT
Sesame (Sesamum indicum L.) is an important crop known for its high-quality edible oil. Molecular markers are useful to explore highly diverse genotypes and relationships among populations for crossbreeding programs. In the present investigation, the genetic fidelity of 9 sesame cultivars of Tamil Nadu was assessed by 10 RAPD (Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA) and SSR (Simple Sequence Repeats) markers. A total of 102 DNA bands were obtained with RAPD primers, of which 46 were polymorphic. SSR primers generated 19 bands, of which 8 were polymorphic. The genetic relationships of nine varieties were inferred using the average linkage method. The cultivars were grouped into 2 clusters from RAPD and 3 clusters from SSR markers. Among the two RAPD clusters, cluster I comprised of TMV 4, TMV 5, TMV 6, TMV 7, SVPR 1, VRI 1, VRI 2, and CO 1 and cluster II comprised of TMV 3 cultivar. In SSR clusters, cluster I consisted of CO 1 and VRI 2, cluster II consisted of TMV 5, TMV 6, TMV 7, VRI 1, and SVPR 1 and cluster III consisted of TMV 3 and TMV 4 cultivars. The experimental results showed that mono-geographical separation of cultivars generally did not result in the greater genetic distance. This study demonstrated that RAPD and SSR markers were appropriate for evaluation of low diversified sesame varieties. Understanding of these characteristics of sesame cultivars in Tamil Nadu will provide a theoretical foundation for further development of variation among the sesame cultivars.