Search

Graphical Abstract:

Genus Alisphaera including 9 species and was not often reported in different waters. During our investigation of coccolithophorid assemblages in the South China Sea, two species of this genus were found, Alisphaera gaudii and A. memoria sp. nov. The new species is morphologically related to the type species, A. ordinata and to A. capulata because the two parts of the distal flange overlap. A. memoria is primarily characterised by a large and very well developed vertical part of the distal flange, which is about 3 times wider than the horizontal part, and one of the elements of the vertical part of the distal flange usually has a spine.

Background: Effective management strategies are crucial in minimizing the adverse consequences associated with the leafhopper, Amrasca devastans(Dist.) (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae). Economic limitations to entomopathogenic fungi production present a substantial challenge, particularly in developing countries. This study aimed to investigate a cost-effective solid-state fermentation (SSF) for large-scale production of Purpureocillium lilacinumPL1 conidia to manage A. devastansinfestations in okra cultivation. Results: Rice and maize were demonstrated as highly suitable substrates for producing conidia densities of over 2 × 1010conidia g−1. Furthermore, the influence of agricultural phytosanitary agents on the growth rates of P. lilacinumPL1 was evaluated. Certain pesticides were ineffective on the expansion of P. lilacinumPL1 colonies, while fungicides exhibited complete inhibition. The laboratory investigation revealed that 1 × 107conidia ml−1of P. lilacinumPL1 exhibited a success rate of 88.66% in decreasing the population of A. devastansnymphs in vitro. Furthermore, field investigations carried out in okra plantations demonstrated that the utilization of P. lilacinumPL1 at the concentration of 1 × 107conidia ml−1of resulted in a significant reduction of the pest nymph population by 72.87% subsequent to the 2 applications. Conclusion: In conclusion, the cost-effective mass production of P. lilacinumPL1 conidia through SSF presents a promising solution for managing A. devastansinfestations in okra farming, particularly in economically challenged regions.

•Reliable coffee authenticity using UV–VIS spectra and machine learning (PLS–DA).•PLS–DA model predicting green coffee species with accuracy at 100%.•PLS–DA model predicting green coffee origins with accuracy greater than 88%.

The present paper focuses on flora of silica-scaled chrysophytes from Cat Tien National Park (Vietnam). The use of electron microscopy technique allowed for the discovery of 42 taxa found in reservoirs, lakes, bogs and temporary ponds in the forest. Thirty-six taxa belong to the genusMallomonas, among them 29 species and seven infraspecific taxa. The others are species of generaSynura(4),Spiniferomonas(1) andChrysosphaerella(1). Nineteen taxa are reported for the first time in Vietnam.

About 600 phytoplankton samples were collected from Vietnamese coastal waters including around the Spratly Islands. Cell morphology and shapes of apical plates (1'), intercalary plates (2a), and other plate patterns were squashed and photographed to support species identification. Fourteen species of the sectionsconicaandtabulatain the genusProtoperidiniumwere described, among them 8 species includingP. decollatum, P. laciniosum, P. rhombiforme, P. symmetricum and P. tohrui(conicasection); these are the first reports ofP. balechii, P. nudum, P. punctulatum(tabulatasection) among the tropical phytoplankton flora of the South China Sea.

Objective There are no reports on the burden of suicidal ideation and suicide attempts in the general population of French Polynesia (FP). We aimed to improve suicide prevention and mental health care by assessing the prevalence of suicide risk and major mental health disorders and care among adults in FP.Methods We conducted the Mental Health in General Population Survey in FP during 2015 to 2017. Participants were selected using the quota method to obtain a representative sample of the general population. Suicide risk and psychiatric diagnoses were assessed using the Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview.Results We included 968 people aged 18 years or older. The prevalence of current suicidal ideation (13.1%) and current (2.6%) and lifetime suicide attempts (18.6%), as well as mental health disorders (42.8%), was high in FP. A notable proportion of participants with these conditions did not seek medical assistance.Conclusion A high prevalence of suicide risk and mental health disorders was found in the general population of FP. Suicide prevention and mental health plans are needed in FP that include better access to primary care for the diagnosis and treatment of mental health disorders. Further research is needed to clarify cultural risk and protective factors.

This paper aims at a deeper understanding of microplastic mechanisms leading to crack initiation in ductile metals in Very High Cycle Fatigue (VHCF). Fatigue tests were conducted using an ultrasonic technique at loading frequency of 20 kHz. The microplastic mechanisms are revealed via observations of slip markings at the specimen surface and self-heating measurements due to intrinsic dissipation. Pure copper and Armco iron (which contains a very low amount of carbon) were investigated. Both are single-phase ductile materials but the crystallographic structure of copper is face-centered cubic while it is body centered cubic for Armco iron. A good correlation was found between slip markings initiation and dissipation for both materials. The dissipation for both materials is of the same order of magnitude but the location, the morphology and the evolution over cycles of slip markings were found different.

The mean trophic position (TP) of mesozooplankton largely determines how much mass and energy is available for higher trophic levels like fish. Unfortunately, the ratio of herbivores to carnivores in mesozooplankton is difficult to identify in field samples. Here, we investigated changes in the mean TP of mesozooplankton in a highly dynamic environment encompassing four distinct habitats in the southern South China Sea: the Mekong River plume, coastal upwelling region, shelf waters, and offshore oceanic waters. We used a set of variables derived from bulk and amino acid nitrogen stable isotopes from particulate organic matter and four mesozooplankton size fractions to identify changes in the nitrogen source and TP of mesozooplankton across these habitats. We found clear indications of a shift in N sources for biological production from nitrate in near‐coastal waters with shallow mixed layer depths toward an increase in diazotroph‐N inputs in oceanic waters with deep mixed layer depths where diazotrophs shaped the phytoplankton community. The N source shift was accompanied by a lengthening of the food chain (increase in the TP). This may provide further support for the connection between diazotrophy and the indirect routing of N through the marine food web. Our combined bulk and amino acid δ15N approach also allowed us to estimate the trophic enrichment (TE) of mesozooplankton across the entire regional ecosystem. When put in the context of literature values, a high TE of 5.1‰ suggested a link between ecosystem heterogeneity and the less efficient transfer of mass and energy across trophic levels. Zooplankton are one of the central pillars of the marine food web and form an important link between the production of organic matter by phytoplankton and biomass at higher trophic levels (e.g., fish). Of particular interest are mesozooplankton (0.2–20 mm in size), which encompass a diverse assemblage of animals utilizing a range of feeding strategies, including herbivory, omnivory, and carnivory. Since mass and energy are lost with each trophic step, their prevailing feeding strategy determines the availability of mass and energy to the upper food web. The exact relationship between carnivores and herbivores in mesozooplankton has so far only been studied with complex experiments or in homogenous environments. We have now resolved zooplankton feeding relationships in a highly dynamic marine environment. Specifically, we used stable nitrogen isotopes in amino acids and bulk organic matter in combination with a habitat‐delineating method for phytoplankton to directly determine the ratio of carnivores to herbivores in zooplankton from dynamic habitats in the South China Sea. The mass and energy transfer across trophic levels is less efficient in such variable marine environments compared to stable open ocean systems. These findings represent a big step toward understanding the dynamics of planktonic food webs in general. Trophic structure of mesozooplankton is regulated by similar environmental factors such as phytoplankton assemblagesDiazotrophy and nutrient availability correlated with enhanced mesozooplankton carnivory in a complex tropical marine ecosystemMass and energy transfer across trophic levels of planktonic food webs are less efficient in spatially and temporally variable ecosystems Trophic structure of mesozooplankton is regulated by similar environmental factors such as phytoplankton assemblages Diazotrophy and nutrient availability correlated with enhanced mesozooplankton carnivory in a complex tropical marine ecosystem Mass and energy transfer across trophic levels of planktonic food webs are less efficient in spatially and temporally variable ecosystems

Objectives To assess understudied, alternative suicide prevention modalities in a mental health care setting.Methods This was a prospective study of patients (n = 140, 68 cases and 72 controls) who were admitted to hospital or who contacted an SOS suicide crisis line for suicidal ideation or attempts. Psychiatric diagnoses (Mini-International Neuropsychiatric Interview) and intensity of anxiety/depression/suicidality (Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale, Montgomery–Åsberg Depression Rating Scale, and Beck Scale for Suicidal Ideation) were assessed. All intervention group subjects received a crisis card with a crisis line number, interviews with psychologists or volunteers and a telephone call on days 10 to 21, then 6 months later. These subjects also had a choice between two further 4-month interventions: body contact care or mobile intervention team visits.Results The interventions significantly reduced the number of suicide attempts and suicide (3%) at 6 months compared with the control condition (12%). There were fewer losses to follow-up in the intervention group (7.35%) than in the control group (9.72%).Conclusions The results favour the implementation of integrated care and maintaining contact in suicide prevention.

In this study a novel magnetic composite used as a photocatalyst with combination of zinc oxide nanoparticles and chitosan (ZnO/Fe3O4/CS) was synthesized by a simple co-precipitation method. The role of the prepared magnetic nanocomposite is to improve the removal efficiency of textile dye due to the photocatalytic activity of zinc oxide nanoparticles and reusable capacity of Fe3O4magnetic nanoparticles. Constituents and structure properties of ZnO/Fe3O4/CS were investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), x-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). Magnetic property of the prepared composite was determined by vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM). The results demonstrated that ZnO/Fe3O4/CS nanocomposite dramatically improved the removal efficiency of reactive blue 198 dye (RB198) with high photocatalytic activity and easy separation by a permanent magnet. In addition, the photocatalytic activity of the prepared composite was also performed under different parameters such as contact time, initial pH, the amount of composite and initial concentration of RB198. Interestingly, ZnO/Fe3O4/CS nanocomposite still showed high removal efficiency after recycling three times and performed in a real textile dyeing wastewater.

• Use rules of forms A ℸ B ⇒ z o r ℸ z for feature selection and classification. • Algorithm mining the rules is built based on equivalence classes. • It exploits the downward closure property of negative itemsets and is complete. • Classification using the rules outperforms ten popular classification algorithms. • Feature selection using the rules outperforms two popular variable selection methods. Association rules (ARs) have been applied to classification and variable selection. However, currently, only positive ARs are used for variable selection, while only special forms of positive and negative association rules (PNARs) are used for classification. The purpose of this work was to investigate variable selection and classification methods by mining another, more general form of PNARs, one that is more suitable for binary classification and variable selection problems. The algorithm for mining such PNARs exploits the downward closure property of negative itemsets. It is built based solely on items in a transactional database and on equivalence classes under the support–confidence framework. The algorithm combines the process of mining frequent itemsets and rule generation and is both sound and complete. Experimental results on 10 binary datasets of the variable selection and classification methods using the PNARs mined by the proposed algorithm show that these methods are superior to variable selection methods that use the mutual information measure and the chi-squared test and 10 popular classification algorithms, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The crystallization kinetics of amorphous sputtered Nb-doped TiO2(TNO) thin films during isothermal annealing was examined using in situX-ray diffraction (XRD) measurements. A Johnson-Mehl-Avrami analysis yielded Avrami exponents in the range of 2.0 to 2.7 for TNO films with various oxygen contents, indicating that the crystallization of amorphous TNO films is essentially two-dimensional. The two-dimensional crystal growth is also confirmed by ex situpolarized-light optical microscopic observations of grains, which have much larger lateral sizes than the film thickness.

Uniaxially (001)-oriented anatase Ti0.94Nb0.06O2films were sputtered on a seed layer of glass covered with Ca2Nb3O10nanosheets (CNO-NS). The films had an effective electron mass of 0.7m0(m0denotes the free electron mass), which was smaller than that of randomly oriented films, i.e., 0.9m0. The as-grown films exhibited a low resistivity of 7.6×10-4? cm. Postdeposition annealing under H2atmosphere further reduced the resistivity to 4.0×10-4? cm. This value is comparable with that of conventional transparent conducting oxides. Results indicate that sputtering using CNO-NS is promising for the fabrication of highly conductive Ti1-xNbxO2electrodes on glass.

We present a low-temperature (?300 °C) process for preparing transparent conducting anatase Nb-doped TiO2(TNO) polycrystalline films by sputtering. We first deposited amorphous films composed of an oxygen-rich bottom layer and oxygen-deficient top layer at room temperature. These films were then crystallized in a reducing atmosphere. The oxygen-rich bottom layer behaved as a seed layer during crystallization of the top layer, resulting in significant improvement of crystallinity and reduction of crystallization temperature. We obtained TNO polycrystalline films showing a resistivity of 6.4×10-4? cm and absorption below 10% in the visible region by post-deposition annealing at 400 °C. The developed low-temperature process was applied to fabricating TNO films on plastics and glass with low glass-transition temperature.