Search results for "EED"
showing 10 items of 5952 documents
Why no tetraploid cultivar of foxtail millet?
2004
Autotetraploid material was induced by colchicine treatment of a pure line of foxtail millet and an interspecific hybrid between foxtail millet and giant green foxtail. Compared with diploid material, tetraploids were smaller, flowered later, and had a two-fold reduced fertility (number of grain per cm of spike). Grain weight increased by 20% with polyploidy, but total grain yield decreased by 46%. This work illustrates the difficulty of breeding polyploid lines of foxtail millet that are of agronomic use.
Forage silica and water content control dental surface texture in guinea pigs and provide implications for dietary reconstruction.
2019
Significance Ingesta leave characteristic wear features on the tooth surface, which enable us to reconstruct the diet of extant and fossil vertebrates. However, whether dental wear is caused by internal (phytoliths) or external (mineral dust) silicate abrasives is controversially debated in paleoanthropology and biology. To assess this, we fed guinea pigs plant forages of increasing silica content (lucerne < grass < bamboo) without any external abrasives, both in fresh and dried state. Abrasiveness and enamel surface wear increased with higher forage phytolith content. Additionally, water loss altered plant material properties. Dental wear of fresh grass feeding was similar to lucerne brows…
Shape, size, and quantity of ingested external abrasives influence dental microwear texture formation in guinea pigs
2020
Food processing wears down teeth, thus affecting tooth functionality and evolutionary success. Other than intrinsic silica phytoliths, extrinsic mineral dust/grit adhering to plants causes tooth wear in mammalian herbivores. Dental microwear texture analysis (DMTA) is widely applied to infer diet from microscopic dental wear traces. The relationship between external abrasives and dental microwear texture (DMT) formation remains elusive. Feeding experiments with sheep have shown negligible effects of dust-laden grass and browse, suggesting that intrinsic properties of plants are more important. Here, we explore the effect of clay- to sand-sized mineral abrasives (quartz, volcanic ash, loess,…
Effects of species and soil-nitrogen availability on root system architecture traits - study on a set of weed and crop species
2017
Better managing crop : weed competition in cropping systems while reducing both nitrogen and herbicide inputs is a real challenge that requires a better understanding of crop and weed root architecture in relation to soil-nitrogen availability. An original approach was used which considered the parameters of a simulation model of root architecture as traits to analyse (a) the interspecific diversity of root system architecture, and (b) its response to soil-nitrogen availability. Two greenhouse experiments were conducted using three crop and nine weed species grown at two contrasted concentrations of soil-nitrogen availability. Plant traits were measured to characterise both overall plant gr…
Blackgrass (Alopecurus myosuroides Huds.) seed dispersal from a single plant and its consequences on weed infestation
2001
Blackgrass (Alopecurus myosuroides Huds.) seed dispersal from single mother-plants was studied in two experiments. For the first experiment, eight blackgrass plants of different heights and number of ears were produced in a greenhouse with the help of different in sowing densities and nitrogen nutrition levels. At the beginning of seed shedding, the plants were placed outside, and seeds were gathered daily. Daily seed dispersal was analysed by fitting a Weibull equation to the number of seeds as a function of distance to the mother-plant. The second experiment was carried out in a field comprising winter barley and spring barley plots as well as bare soil. In each of these three parts, two …
Variable impacts of enchytraeid worms and ectomycorrhizal fungi on plant growth in raw humus soil treated with wood ash
2007
Abstract An increasing amount of evidence shows the context dependent nature of various biotic interactions across terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. We established a laboratory experiment to study whether the effects of Cognettia sphagnetorum (Enchytraeidae) and ectomycorrhizal fungi on Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris) seedling growth are influenced by wood ash application. Acidic coniferous forest soil was treated with wood ash at 5000 kg ha−1 or left as ash-free control and inoculated with soil saprotrophic microbes and nematodes. The microcosms were destructively sampled 26 and 51 weeks after initiation of the experiment. We measured enchytraeid and pine seedling biomass, abundance of nem…
Microencapsulation of healthier oils to enhance the physicochemical and nutritional properties of deer pâté
2020
The influence of pork backfat substitution by microencapsulated healthier oils on physicochemical and nutritional properties of deer pate was assessed. Four different treatments were elaborated: control with 100% of pork backfat and the other ones with 50% of pork backfat was replaced by microencapsulated oils (tigernut, chia and linseed oils). These fat replacements were accompanied by a significant (P lt 0.001) decrease in fat and cholesterol contents. The inclusion of vegetable oils resulted in a significant (P lt 0.001) modification of colour parameters, being tigernut batches which presented the highest redness and yellowness values. Moreover, softer textures were observed in reformula…
The Bonobo-DialiumPositive Interactions: Seed Dispersal Mutualism
2013
A positive interaction is any interaction between individuals of the same or different species (mutualism) that provides a benefit to both partners such as increased fitness. Here we focus on seed dispersal mutualism between an animal (bonobo, Pan paniscus) and a plant (velvet tamarind trees, Dialium spp.). In the LuiKotale rainforest southwest of Salonga National Park, Democratic Republic of Congo, seven species of the genus Dialium account for 29.3% of all trees. Dialium is thus the dominant genus in this forest. Dialium fruits make up a large proportion of the diet of a habituated bonobo community in this forest. During the 6 months of the fruiting season, more than half of the bonobos' …
Hydroperiod length as key parameter controlling seed strategies in Mediterranean salt marshes: The case of Halopeplis amplexicaulis
2018
Abstract The comprehension of plant biology and the response to the environment is fundamental to achieve the optimal skills to manage and conserve the fine equilibrium between biotic and abiotic parameters regulating natural biodiversity in salt marshes. The behaviour of annuals living in these stressful conditions is poorly understood and constitutes a good model for a better understanding of this relationship. We thus identified the determinant environmental factors involved in population survival of Halopeplis amplexicaulis, a threatened annual species inhabiting salt marshes. To achieve this objective, maternal climatic parameters were analyzed in seeds collected in different years, an…
Dental microwear texture gradients in guinea pigs reveal that material properties of the diet affect chewing behaviour
2021
ABSTRACT Dental microwear texture analysis (DMTA) is widely used for diet inferences in extant and extinct vertebrates. Often, a reference tooth position is analysed in extant specimens, while isolated teeth are lumped together in fossil datasets. It is therefore important to test whether dental microwear texture (DMT) is tooth position specific and, if so, what causes the differences in wear. Here, we present results from controlled feeding experiments with 72 guinea pigs, which received either fresh or dried natural plant diets of different phytolith content (lucerne, grass, bamboo) or pelleted diets with and without mineral abrasives (frequently encountered by herbivorous mammals in natu…