New strategies for estimation of cut and fill areas in road design with different ground cross-section offsets

Earthwork operations accounted for great amount of forest road construction costs. Any Optimization in planning road profile needs a reliable objective function that calculates earthwork volume in an appropriate time and accuracy. This study aimed at incorporating the shape of the ground cross sections in calculating cut/fill areas using three alternative methods including: Multiple Linear Regression (MLR), Artificial Neural Network (ANN) and heuristic programming in MATLAB environment. The accuracy of results was validated via AutoCAD as a manual method for area calculation of road’s cross-section. Trapezoidal method applied to calculate the area of cut/fill in the heuristic method. Paired sample T-Test and statistical analysis (ANOVA) with confidence level of 0.95 indicated that the heuristic method not only reduced computing time but also provided accurate estimations as same as the manual AutoCAD based method. It can be concluded that although MLR and ANN estimations were as well as AutoCAD results within a reasonable time, they need to be retrained by adding, removing or changing entrance parameters.     

Evaluation of common bean lines for their reaction to tomato yellow leaf curl virus-Ir2

Tomato yellow leaf curl virus (TYLCV) can cause an economically relevant disease in the major tomato growing regions, and no resistance has been identified in commercial and wild tomato cultivars in Iran. In the present study, 34 common bean lines were screened for their reaction to TYLCV-Ir2 under greenhouse conditions. The experiment was conducted in a randomized complete block design with three replications. Bean plants were inoculated at the first trifoliate stage with viruliferous whiteflies (Bemisia tabaci biotype B) and were then sprayed with an insecticide and maintained in whitefly-proof greenhouse. The inoculated plants were monitored for the development of symptoms and the presence of viral DNA by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) four weeks after inoculation. Results revealed that out of the 34 lines, five were resistant. These lines exhibited either no symptoms or very mild symptoms and no viral DNA was detected in them by PCR. Two lines, which showed no typical disease symptoms but contained viral DNA, were identified as tolerant to TYLCV-Ir2. The vector feeding preference for common bean lines was assessed. Results indicated a significant difference in adult whitefly numbers among bean lines but there was no relationship between the number of whiteflies and disease symptom severity. The resistance to TYLCY-Ir2 expressed in common bean lines may be useful as source of resistance for the development of resistant commercial common bean cultivars.     

Growth,physiological status,and yield of salt-stressed wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) plants affected by biofertilizer and cycocel applications

This factorial study was conducted based on randomized complete block design with three replications in a greenhouse during spring 2015 to investigate changes in dry matter mobilization, grain filling period, and some physiological characteristics of wheat. Treatments were four salt levels [0 (S₁), 30 (S₂), 60 (S₃), and 90 (S₄) mM sodium chloride (NaCl) equivalent to 2.76, 5.53, and 8.3 dS m^?1, respectively], four biofertilizers levels [(no biofertilizer (F₀), seed inoculation by Azotobacter chroococcum Beijerinck strain 5 (F₁), Pseudomonas putida (Trevisan) Migula strain 186 (F₂), both inoculation Azotobacter?+?Pseudomonas (F₃)], and three cycocel levels [(without cycocel as control (C₀), application of 600 (C₁), and 1000 (C₂)?mg?L^?1)]. Salinity stress increased leaf electrical conductivity and decreased chlorophyll index, quantum yield, relative water content, and stomata conductance. However, the application of cycocel and biofertilizer reduced the negative impacts at each level of salinity tested. When treated with cycocel, salt stressed plants demonstrated a significant decrease in stomata conductance compared to the salt-treated plants with no cycocel. The results revealed that the maximum shoot and stem dry matter mobilization (0.89 and 0.67?g, respectively) and contribution of stem reserves to grain yield (38.01%) were observed in salinity severe stress (90?mM) and no cycocel application. The application of Azotobacter?+?Pseudomonas had the greatest grain filling rate (0.002?g day^?1) without salinity stress. The greatest grain filling period (43.26 days) was achieved by the highest cycocel level without salinity stress. The application of biofertilizer and cycocel as F₃C₂ had 24.7% more grain yield in comparison to the controls.