Diversity and abundance of some insect fauna in Bhawal and Madhupur Sal forests of Bangladesh

The abundance and diversity of insect fauna were studied from two deciduous sal forests of Bhawal and Madhupur located at central part of Bangladesh. A total of 544 individuals of insects of 61 species belonging to 54 genera, 33 families and 11 orders have been identified with Hymenoptera (31%) as the dominant order in species richness followed by Coleoptera (13%), Orthoptera (11%), Diptera (10%), Hemiptera (8%), Lepidoptera (8%), Odonata (8%), Homoptera (3%), Isoptera (3%), Neuroptera (3%) and Dictyoptera (2%). Bhawal scores higher Shannon-Weaver diversity index (Hʹ=3.725) compared to Madhupur (Hʹ=3.340). The Bhawal Sal Forest with the collected 341 (63%) insects and identified 53 (59%) species belonging to 10 orders was found more diverse in species richness than the Madhupur Sal Forest with 37(41%) species belonging to 11 orders identified from the collected 203 (37%) insect samples. Insects of the order Neuroptera were not recorded from Bhawal. Off the 61 species, 29(48%) species were common in both the forests, 24(39%) species were exclusive to Bhawal and eight (13%) species were exclusive to the Madhupur Sal Forest. Apis cerana of Hymenoptera was identified as the dominant species having 9% of the identified samples followed by dipteran species Musca domestica with 6% of the samples. Among the insect species 30 (49%) species were found playing beneficial role as biological control agents, predators, pollinators, honey producers and also organic debris recycler. On the other hand, 31(51%) species were found to be harmful causing damage to forest vegetation as well as human and wildlife at variable degrees. J. Biodivers. Conserv. Bioresour. Manag. 2021, 7(1): 11-24

Plant Growth-Promoting Bacteria Associated with the Nests of the Seed-Harvester Ant, Trichomyrmex Scabriceps

Colonies of seed harvester ants are commonly found in semiarid and arid areas of the world and have been studied for their seed dispersal behaviour. The present study focused on the bacteria associated with the nests of the harvester ant, Trichomyrmex scabriceps, and reveals that ant colonies link the aboveground resources with the belowground microbial communities as they accumulate organic debris in the close vicinity of their nests via their ecosystem engineering activities. Soil samples were collected from the nest chambers and the external debris piles of T. scabriceps colonies, located in managed ecosystems. The nest soil-associated bacteria were examined for their plant growth-promoting abilities via biochemical assays including phosphate solubilization, Indole acetic acid production, siderophore production and physiological assays including biocontrol potential against the soil pathogen, Sclerotium rolfsii. More than 60% of bacteria isolated from the ant nest-associated soil displayed plant-growth promoting ability. Bacillus sp., Azotobacter sp., Klebsiella sp., Comamonas sp., Tsukamurella sp., and Pseudoxanthomonax sp., demonstrated significantly high levels of gnotobiotic growth of the treated chickpea plants. The activities of phenylalanine ammonia-lyase and peroxidase enzymes were higher in plant growth-promoting bacteria treated and pathogen inoculated plants as compared to the control plants lacking the bacteria. Since T. scabriceps colonies often make their nests in the compact soil of unpaved paths of agroecosystems and gardens, these bacteria can act as highly effective biofertilizers and promote growth of the cultivated plants by increasing soil fertility and disease resistance attributes of the plant.

A Short Communication on Wastewater Treatment Techniques Used in Pharmaceutical Plant

Toxic and difficult to biodegrade pharmaceutical wastewater is complex in composition with high concentrations of organic debris and microorganisms. There may still exit quantities of suspended particles and dissolved organic materials even after further treatment. Advanced treatment is required to improve the quality of pharmaceutical wastewater discharge. In this study, the pharmaceutical technology categorization has been established, and the features of pharmaceutical wastewater effluent quality have been summarized. On the other hand, The methods of advanced treatment of pharmaceutical wastewater have been incorporate, including coagulation and sedimentation, flotation, activated carbon adsorption, membrane separation, advanced oxidation processes, membrane separation, and biological treatment. In the meanwhile, each process's features were specified.

Does Mixing Tree Species Affect Water Storage Capacity of the Forest Floor? Laboratory Test of Pine-Oak and Fir-Beech Litter Layers

During the last decade, tree species mixing has been widely supported as a silvicultural approach to reduce drought stress. However, little is known on the influence of tree species mixing on physical properties and the water storage capacity of forest soils (including the forest floor). Thus, the study aimed to analyze the effect of mixing pine needles and oak leaves and mixing fir needles and beech leaves on hydro-physical properties of the litter layer during laboratory tests. We used fir-beech and pine-oak litter containing various shares of conifer needles (i.e., 0, 5, 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90 and 100%) to determine the influence of the needle admixture on bulk density, total porosity, macroporosity, water storage capacity, the amount of water stored in pores between organic debris and the degree of saturation of mixed litter compared to broadleaf litter (oak or beech). We found that the admixture of fir needles increased the bulk density of litter from 7.9% with a 5% share of needles to 55.5% with a 50% share (compared to pure beech litter), while the share of pine needles < 40% caused a decrease in bulk density by an average of 3.0–11.0% (compared to pure oak litter). Pine needles decreased the water storage capacity of litter by about 13–14% with the share of needles up to 10% and on average by 28% with the 40 and 50% shares of pine needles in the litter layer. Both conifer admixtures reduced the amount of water stored in the pores between organic debris (pine needles more than fir needles).

A Messinian Gypsum Deposit in the Ionian Forearc Basin (Benestare, Calabria, Southern Italy): Origin and Paleoenvironmental Indications

This study reports the first accurate record of the Messinian Resedimented Gypsum in the forearc and back-arc basins connected to the Calabrian-Peloritan orogen. A multidisciplinary approach has been used to investigate a gypsum deposit located in the Benestare’s area (Calabria, Southern Italy). Such deposit is made of bedded gypsrudites displaying clastic selenite with chaotical textures. On the top, the gypsrudites are interspersed with gypsum lenses belonging to the branching-like facies. Despite these two facies seem different macroscopically, they show petrographic features, fluid inclusions, organic matter and Strontium isotopic values very similar to each other. On the other hand, both facies show fractured and folded crystals. Crystals are only locally corroded and preserve primary structure relict as well as allochthonous (organic debris) and autochthonous putative microbial remains. All crystals are rich in fluid inclusions but these are visibly affected by stretching and leaking (re-equilibration processes) suggesting a moderate plastic deformation during re-sedimentation and subsequent burial. Minimal transport of the deposit is testified by subangular shapes of the gypsum crystals. The gypsrudite and branching-like facies reveal an 87Sr/86Sr average value of 0.709045 and 0.709082, respectively. These values suggest a strong connection with the global Ocean and reduced freshwater input. The Benestare’s deposit originated from the partial to complete dismantling of selenite crystals related to the first stage (5.97–5.60 Ma) of the Messinian Salinity Crisis through gravitational collapse due to local controlling factors.

Disinfection of the root canal system: what should the protocol be?

The presence of micro-organisms within the root canal system is the critical aetiological factor in peri-radicular periodontitis. During root canal treatment (RCT) it is imperative that this infection and other organic debris are removed from the root canal system. This is challenging because complex tooth anatomy, the presence of a biofilm and the smear layer complicate the process. There are a number of irrigant chemicals and adjunctive systems available in contemporary endodontic practice that are used to disinfect the root canal system during root canal preparation. This article reviews the available evidence concerning these disinfection methods and concludes by presenting a clinical protocol supported by the literature. CPD/Clinical Relevance: A clinical protocol, supported by the literature, is presented for effective decontamination of the root canal system during root canal therapy.

CNN for image-based sediment detection applied to a large terrestrial and airborne dataset

Image-based grain sizing has been used to measure grain size more efficiently compared to traditional methods (e.g. sieving and Wolman pebble count). However, current methods (e.g. BASEGRAIN) are largely based on detecting grain interstices from image intensity which not only require a significant level of expertise for parameter tuning but also underperform when they are applied to sub-optimal environments (e.g. dense organic debris, various sediment lithology). We proposed a model (GrainID) based on convolutional neural networks to measure grain size in a diverse range of fluvial environments. A data set of more than 125,000 grains from flume and field measurements were compiled to develop GrainID. Tests were performed to compare the predictive ability of GrainID with sieving, manual labeling, Wolman pebble counts and BASEGRAIN. When compared with the sieving results for a sandy-gravel bed, GrainID yielded high predictive accuracy (comparable to the performance of manual labeling) and outperformed BASEGRAIN and Wolman Pebble counts (especially for small grains). For the entire evaluation dataset, GrainID once again showed fewer predictive errors and significantly lower variation in results in comparison to BASEGRAIN and Wolman pebble counts and maintained this advantage even in uncalibrated rivers with drone images. Moreover, the existence of vegetation and noise have little influence on the performance of GrainID. Analysis indicated that GrainID performed optimally when the image resolution is higher than 1.8 mm/pixel, the image tile size is 512*512 pixel*pixel and the grain area truncation values (the area of smallest detectable grains) were equal to 18–25 pixels.

Biostratigraphy, Age, and Paleoenvironment of the Pliocene Beaufort Formation on Meighen Island, Canadian Arctic Archipelago

ABSTRACT Meighen Island, in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, is one of the most important localities for study of the late Neogene Beaufort Formation because of the presence of marine sediments interbedded with terrestrial fossiliferous sands. The stratigraphic succession, fossils from the marine beds, correlation with reconstructions of sea level, and paleomagnetic data from the Bjaere Bay region of the island suggest that the Beaufort Formation on Meighen Island was likely deposited either at 3.2–2.9 Ma or during two intervals at ca. 4.5 Ma and 3.4 Ma. The exposed Beaufort Formation on Meighen Island probably encompasses at least one warm interval and eustatic sea-level highstand of the Pliocene. Fossils of plants and arthropods are abundant in the alluvial sands exposed in the Bjaere Bay region. The lower part of the sequence (Unit A), beneath the muddy marine sequence (Unit B), contains plant taxa that have not been seen above the marine beds. Sediments below the marine beds are dominated more by fossils of trees, whereas the organic debris from above marine beds contains many fossils of plants, insects, and mites characteristic of open treeless sites. Regional tree line probably occurred on Meighen Island during deposition of the upper sediments, which implies a mean July climate at least 9 °C warmer than at present. When the marine sediments were deposited, nearshore water temperatures probably did not fall below 0 °C; hence, the Arctic Ocean probably lacked perennial ice cover. This confirms recent modeling experiments exploring the causes of Arctic amplification of temperature that have found the removal of sea ice to be a key factor in resolving previous proxy-model mismatches.

The Importance of Artificial Rearing of Chironomidae Insect (Blood Worm) as Fish and Shrimp Food

The chironomidae family is related to Order of Diptera. They are called non biting midges. Females will lay egg masses in water. The larva feed on organic material such as organic debris and algae. Due to having hemoglobin in their larval blood, they are called bloodworm. They are able to live in a complete absence of oxygen for several hours. Hemoglobin molecules in the blood bind and hold a reserve supply of oxygen. Chironomus as indicators of organic pollution in aquatic environment. Chironomids were important in the diets of all fish species as well as shrimps. Bloodworms are harvested from mud flats and sold to fisherman or as a food source for domestic pets. In the world there are several centers for artificial rearing of this insect. There are different formulations of blood form which is prepared by different companies in the world. Rearing and artificial culturing this insect is important resource for fishes and shrimps which are the mina important food of human being.

The trophic transfer of Cd and Pb from navicula pelliculosa (Bacillariophyta) to Hyalella azteca (Amphipoda)

Currently, information identifying the importance of food and water in the trophic transfer of metals for most aquatic organisms is limited, yet such information is essential for modeling metal movement within food webs. Hyalella azteca is a suitable organism to study the trophic transfer of metals since they represent a major, but potentially vulnerable component of the food web of many lakes. Since studies involving the trophic transfer are limited, the objective of this research was to determine the relative importance of food and water sources of Pb and Cd to these animals. Hyalella azteca browses on the film of microscopic plants, animals and organic debris covering leaves, stems and other substrates. Hyalella azteca are epibenthic freshwater organisms that prefer foods high in protein. A major challenge of this study involved determining a substrate in which algae would grow and stay attached so Hyalella azteca could graze. Preliminary studies found that the diatom species, Navicula pelliculosa grew and adhered well to Teflon ® surfaces and that Hyalella azteca grazed the diatoms from the surface of Teflon ® . Thus, Navicula pelliculosa was grown in the presence of Pb and Cd concentrations and then fed to the organisms. No significant difference was found between organisms exposed to Pb and Cd from water and from water and food, indicating that Pb and Cd bioaccumulation from food is negligible when the dissolved inorganic fractions are buffered with ethylenediamine tetra-acetic acid (EDTA). The average log 10 bioconcentration factor (BCF) for Cd was calculated to be 5.25 from water exposure and 5.49 from water and food exposure. The log 10 Hyalella BCF for Pb was calculated as 4.62 from water exposure and 4.59 from water and food exposure. From these results, it can be concluded that a food source containing Pb and Cd concentrations of 15 nM Pb and 0.37 nM Cd, had no noticeable effect on metal burdens to Hyalella azteca. Metal uptake by Hyalella azteca at the levels studied was found to be primarily from the dissolved phase.