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Treatments of wheat (Triticum durum L.) seeds with sonication or hydropriming may enhance seed germination and vigour in association with γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA). Therefore, the objective of this study is to examine the effect of sonication and hydropriming treatments on seed germination of wheat through the characterisation of seed germination performance, GABA shunt metabolite level (GABA, glutamate, and alanine), and the level of glutamate decarboxylase (GAD) mRNA transcription. Wheat seeds were exposed to three treatments for 0, 5, 10, 15, and 20 min: (1) sonication with water; (2) sonication without water; and (3) hydropriming without sonication. Treated seeds were evaluated for germination percentage, mean time to germinate, germination rate index in the warm germination test, and seedling emergence and shoot length in the cold test. GABA shunt metabolites level (GABA, glutamate, and alanine), and the level of GAD mRNA transcription were measured for the seeds after treatments and for seedlings during germination and cold tests. Seeds treated with sonication or hydropriming treatments had a higher germination rate index (faster germination) in the standard germination test, and higher seedling emergence and shoot length in the cold test. Seeds treated with sonication or hydropriming treatments showed an enhancement in GABA shunt and their metabolites (alanine and glutamate), and GAD mRNA transcription level compared to untreated-control seeds. In conclusion, the sonication or hydropriming treatments significantly improved the germination performance of wheat and enhanced GABA metabolism to maintain the C:N metabolic balance, especially under cold stress.

Drought is one of the most severe natural disasters. It negatively influences the crop output considerably as water resources are inadequate across large geographic areas. Food insecurity, hunger, and poverty are widespread in three Pakistani provinces: Baluchistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and Sindh. Until March/April 2022, roughly 4.66 million people, or 25% of the population examined, were severely food insecure. Historically, the severity of a drought is evaluated using several different indicators, with the selection of indices depending on the data that is easily accessible. By multiple aspects, including potential evapotranspiration and rainfall data on a standard timescale and computing monthly, seasonal, or annual data, the Reconnaissance Drought Index (RDI) has a significant advantage over the other indices in determining drought severity. When rainfall in a region is significantly lower than the amount of potential evapotranspiration, drought situations can occur on the earth. Rainfall will often occur in locations with an increase in the relative humidity of the air. The reconnaissance drought index (RDI) for Khyber Pakhtaunkhawa province in Pakistan was calculated from 1981 to 2020 for 3-, 6-, and 12-month timeframes. This research employed rainfall, minimum and maximum temperature data from KPK province to describe drought using the DrinC program, the Man Kendall test, and Sen's slope calculator to determine drought patterns and variation. All regions had moderate, severe, and extreme droughts, with RDIs between -1.0 and -3.5. RDI 3-, 6-, and 12-month evaluations highlighted 1991, 1994, 2000, 2010, 2015, and 2017. These results indicate that productivity declines in dry and subsequent years due to seasonal rainfall and soil moisture retention.Wheat production averaged 1.7 tones ha-1 year-1, with significant variations. Between October and December, it is an essential to have favorable growing conditions to increase productivity. If droughts occur in this era, the yield will be substantially more negatively impacted than if they occur later in the growing cycle. The 3-month RDI values offer a more accurate description of this variation than the six-month and twelve-months RDI Values. Geospatial drought analysis indicates a considerable variance in drought patterns across the Kpk province over the last 4 decades. Because long-term droughts sometimes affect water quality, especially groundwater, a rise in the intensity of long-term droughts could pose a risk to the water management in the regions that have been examined. Analysis of the Landsat TM 30 m data took place. At the same time, Landsat imageries were utilized to generate the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI) for drought evaluation. The findings of the NDWI indicate an increase in value from 0.58 to 0.7 for the KPK region.

The assessment of land suitability and capability to reduce the anthropogenic pressure on is significant for the agricultural yield management in rainfed Potwar Region Pakistan. This study examines phases of wheat growth using Landsat-8 thermal bands and temperature based site maps, and demarcates suitable sites in potwar region for sustainable crops through Multi-Criteria Evaluation (MCE), Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP), python and geospatial techniques. The total investigation area was 22168 km2 out of which 12256 km2 (55%) declared highly suitable, 2998 km2 (13%) was moderately suitable, 4843 km2 (22%) was less suitable and 2069 km2 (10%) was found not suitable for wheat crop cultivation (WCC). The results indicated that the areas having temperature ranging between 10–18 °C, pH between 6.2–6.5 and clay loom soil type with drainage level 0.85–1.1 corresponds to extremely suitable for wheat production. Various land quality factors; that is slope, flooding, soil texture, erosion, depth and coarser bits under different land-units were assessed for the crops. Consequently, all these factors were combined to make an integrated land suitability and capability (LSC) map for each landuse and suitable soils for agricultural productions. It is concluded that better landuse practices can be implemented to enhance the suitable agricultural sites.

Cloud computing has grown into a critical technology by enabling ground-breaking capabilities for Internet-dependent computer platforms and software applications. As cloud computing systems continue to expand and develop, the need for a more guaranteed, reliant service, and an early task execution status from Cloud Service Providers (CSP) is vital. Additionally, efficient prediction of task failure significantly improves the running time as well as resource utilization in cloud computing. Task failure forecasting in the cloud is regarded as a challenging task based on the literature review conducted in this study. To address these issues, the goal of this study aimed to create fast machine learning approaches for reliably predicting task failure in cloud computing and analyzing their performance using multiple assessment criteria. The Google cluster dataset was used in this study, coupled with Artificial Neural Network (ANN), Support Vector Machine (SVM), and a stacking ensemble method, to forecast job failure in a cloud computing context. The results show that the proposed models can predict the failed tasks both effectively and efficiently. The stacking ensemble outperformed the experimented models, reaching a 99.8%. The suggested paradigm could greatly benefit cloud service providers by decreasing wasted resources and costs associated with task failures.

Aim This study is a longitudinal multicenter study which aims to find the prevalence, the demographic data, survival and mortality rates of patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) in Oman. Method All Omani patients, pediatrics and adults diagnosed with SLE, who fulfill either the 1997 American College of Rheumatology or Systemic Lupus International Collaborating Clinics classifications criteria for SLE were included from January 2006 till February 2020. Results In total 1160 patients were included in this cohort. Data analysis showed that patient's ages ranged from 2-82 years with female predominance and female-to-male ratio of 7:1 (87.7% female,12.3% male). The mean prevalence of SLE among different age groups was 38.8 (range 5-63 per 100 000 inhabitants). The mortality rate was found to be 5%. Male patients had significantly higher mortality rate than females (7.6% vs 5.4%, P value = .04). Sepsis was the commonest cause of mortality (34%). The coexistence of systemic sclerosis correlates significantly with death (P = .002). Survival analysis in our data showed 5, 10, 20, 40-year survival rates of 100%, 100%, 99% and 90% respectively for antinuclear antibody (ANA) positive patients and lower survival rate for ANA negative patients with 5,10, 20, 40-year survival rates of 100, 99%, 99% and 75%, respectively. Conclusion This study showed that the mean prevalence of SLE in Oman to be 38.8 (range 5-63) per 100 000 inhabitants. The 40-year survival rate among patients with positive ANA was found to be 90%, while patients with negative ANA had worse survival outcomes.