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This study discusses relationships between the physical properties of fenugreek ( Trigonella foenum- graecum L.) seeds and the influence of selected cultivation measures (seed inoculation, chemical protection of plants) on the classification of seeds into homogeneous groups. The key variables in the modeling process were the physical properties of fenugreek seeds, including density, porosity and thousand seed weight, followed by the attributes determined by image analysis. A total of over 50 geometric parameters and 190 image texture parameters representing 10 different color channels were described. Color parameters were measured in the Lab* color space. It was found that cultivation measures influenced the analyzed physical properties of fenugreek seeds. A classification model was developed by combining variables describing the physical properties and color parameters of seeds, and spectral values in the range of 620-700 nm. Classification accuracy reached 99-100 % in the control group and 92-93 % in the group of variables describing the physical properties and geometric parameters of seeds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents the results of discrimination of 11 wheat grain varieties. The statistical analysis included reduction of variables to a set of 49 textures with the highest discriminating strength and multidimensional analysis. Reduction of variables was performed by the following methods: genetic algorithms (sequential forward floating search [SFFS] method) as well as theClass RankerandClass RankersSearchmethods. Furthermore, the multidimensional analysis was performed by methods employing the following classifiers:Bayes, Lazy, Meta, Decision trees,andDiscriminatory analyses.The classification of individual varieties, regardless of the year of cultivation, was between 98 and 100%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The microflora of avian gastrointestinal tract has received increased attention as the focus of efforts to improve animal nutrition and to minimize food-borne illness in humans. This microflora is subjected to variations according to diet, environment and treatments. Conventional methods for determining the flora composition rely on the cultivation of bacteria on anaerobic selective media. This approach is time-consuming because many bacteria are difficult to culture or are uncultivable. Molecular tools introduced in microbial ecology have made it possible to study the composition of intestinal flora in a culture-independent way. Our paper describes a methodological aspects and application of FISH method with rRNA-targeted fluorescent probes to identify bacteria from the gastrointestinal tract of turkey. This technique poses advantages compared with traditional culture-based methods as it does not require cultivation of the target organisms. FISH enables to address simultaneously various ecological issues: 1. to by-pass cultivation problems, 2. to identify and to accurately enumerate prokaryote sub-populations in natural systems by using sets of probes 3. to analyze their spatial distributions. Although FISH has been used widely in bacterial ecology, the method requires some adaptation to the type of samples analyzed. Applying the optimized FISH method for the analysis of turkey caecum, we were able to identify Eubacterium rectale, the genera Enterobacteriaceae, Bacteroides, Bifidobacterium, and Lactobacillus-Enterococcus groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]