Meti shell contains calcium carbonate which can be calcined into CaO and used as a heterogeneous catalyst in biodiesel synthesis. This study evaluated the ability of CaO catalyst from Meti shell with ...concentrations of 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5% for the synthesis of biodiesel from Moringa seed oil at various transesterification times (1, 2, 3, and 4 hours). The presence of CaO in the Meti shell was indicated by diffraction at 2θ angles of 32.47o , 37.74o , 54.22o , 64.65o , and 67.67oC. Utilizing CaO 3% and a transesterification reaction time of 3 hours resulted in an Rf value corresponding to the standard biodiesel Rf ranges, i.e. 0.69 and 0.66, respectively. The synthesized biodiesel has the highest methyl oleate content of 59.16% with characteristics that have met Indonesian National Standard (SNI 04-7182-2006), including water content of 0.004%, an acid number of 0.06 mg KOH/g, saponification number 273.6 mgKOH/g, iodine number 78.678 g iodine/100 g, the cloud point is 10oC, the pour point is 21oC, however, the cetane number is still below the minimum number of 51.
The two-spotted spider mite
Tetranychus urticae Koch is one of the economically most important pests in a wide range of outdoor and protected crops worldwide. Its control has been and still is ...largely based on the use of insecticides and acaricides. However, due to its short life cycle, abundant progeny and arrhenotokous reproduction, it is able to develop resistance to these compounds very rapidly. As a consequence, it has the dubious reputation to be the“most resistant species” in terms of the total number of pesticides to which populations have become resistant, and its control has become problematic in many areas worldwide.
Insecticide and acaricide resistance has also been reported in the ectoparasite
Sarcoptes scabiei, the causative organism of scabies, and other economically important Acari, such as the Southern cattle tick
Rhipicephalus microplus, one of the biggest arthropod threats to livestock, and the parasitic mite
Varroa destructor, a major economic burden for beekeepers worldwide.
Although resistance research in Acari has not kept pace with that in insects, a number of studies on the molecular mechanisms responsible for the resistant phenotype has been conducted recently. In this review, state-of-the-art information on
T. urticae resistance, supplemented with data on other important Acari has been brought together. Considerable attention is given to the underlying resistance mechanisms that have been elucidated at the molecular level. The incidence of bifenazate resistance in
T. urticae is expanded as an insecticide resistance evolutionary paradigm in arthropods.
Exploration of outer space is a mesmerizing and thought-provoking endeavor. The fascination about what may be out there is only matched by asking who might be out there. Exopsychology is concerned ...about how humans think about extraterrestrials, but also how extraterrestrials may think, feel, and behave. It strives to find generalizable psychological theories to enrich and extend the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). Producing technosignatures requires that a species skillfully realizes the relevant possibilities for action, which the environment offers in all its socio-material richness. These possibilities are called affordances. They are not fixed but relational to individual and collective available abilities and customs. We apply an affordance perspective to specify the relation between information processing, body, environment, and material engagement in the context of space exploration and SETI. In this way, we can uncover aspects of the psychological configurations that SETI requires from its extraterrestrial targets, but which are also critical to the human practice of space exploration. Moreover, we elaborate on arguments against employing the concept of “intelligence” in SETI. A successful first contact requires a mutual attunement to species-typical diachronic backdrops, which constitute meaning. One possibility for a meaningful message form and content is the reference to the material environment and its respective engagement. Meaningfulness of affordances is conserved in a form of life and transmitted via social interaction. Considering affordances within SETI fosters an understanding of how the thinking, feeling, and behavior of life forms in the Universe emerge in relation to their socio-material environment.
•The psychological concept of affordances is explored in context of space exploration and SETI.•To create technosignatures, extraterrestrials must exploit the opportunities for action provided by their environment.•Communication with extraterrestrials may be possible by commutating with and about material engagement.
The two-spotted spider mite, Tetranychus urticae Koch (Acari: Tetranychidae) is the most economically important mite pest in agricultural areas and chemical acaricides are widely used to control T. ...urticae populations. Cyflumetofen is a recently introduced acaricide that inhibits the mitochondrial electron transport chain at complex II (succinate dehydrogenase, SDH), which represents the most recently developed mode of action for mite control worldwide. In the present study, started upon the launch of cyflumetofen in Turkey, a five-year survey was performed to monitor cyflumetofen susceptibility in 28 T. urticae populations collected from agricultural fields across the country. The first resistance case that might cause control failure in practical field conditions was uncovered in 2019, three years after the registration of cyflumetofen. In addition, an extremely resistant population (1722-fold resistance) was also detected towards the end of 2019. Cyflumetofen resistance did not decrease in the laboratory after relaxation of selection pressure for over one year in field-collected populations, suggesting the absence of a fitness cost associated with resistance in these populations. Next to phenotypic resistance, metabolic and physiological mechanisms underlying the decreased susceptibility were also investigated. Synergism assays showed the involvement of P450 monooxygenases in cyflumetofen resistance. Downregulation of carboxylesterases as resistance mechanism, is underpinned by the fact that pre-treatment with esterase inhibitor DEF decreased cyflumetofen toxicity in field-collected strains. Furthermore, a novel H258L substitution in the subunit B of complex II was uncovered in a field population. In silico modeling of the new mutation suggested that the mutation might indeed influence toxicity to complex II inhibitors cyenopyrafen and pyflubumide, but most likely not cyflumetofen. However, further studies are needed to uncover the exact role of this mutation in resistance to this new class of complex II inhibitors.
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•Cyflumetofen resistance was monitored in Turkish T. urticae populations for five years.•More than 1700-fold resistance was detected only three years after its introduction.•P450 inhibitor PBO significantly synergized the cyflumetofen toxicity.•A H258L mutation in subunit B of SDH was uncovered.•The potential role of new mutation in resistance was studied with molecular modeling.
In this article, we develop a response to Wright, et al.'s article “Geopolitical Implications of a Successful SETI Program,” which is a critique of our own prior article in 2020 that develop a ...realpolitik analysis of risks related to contact with extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI).
Pyridaben is a mitochondrial electron transport complex I inhibitor. The H110R mutation in the PSST subunit has been reported as a major factor in pyridaben resistance in the two-spotted spider mite, ...Tetranychus urticae. However, backcross experiments revealed that the mutant PSST alone conferred only moderate resistance. In contrast, inhibition of cytochrome P450 (CYP) markedly reduces resistance levels in a number of highly resistant strains. It was reported previously that maternal factors contributed to the inheritance of pyridaben resistance in the egg stage, but the underlying mechanisms have yet to be elucidated. Here, we studied the combined effects of the PSST H110R mutation and candidate CYPs, as metabolic resistance factors, on pyridaben resistance in T. urticae. We found that the maternal effects of inheritance of resistance in the egg stage were associated with CYP activity. Analysis of differential gene expression by RNA-seq identified CYP392A3 as a candidate causal factor for the high resistance level. Congenic strains, where the alleles of both PSST and CYP392A3 were derived from a resistant strain (RR_i; i = 1 or 2) and a susceptible strain (SS_i) in a common susceptible genetic background, were constructed by marker-assisted backcrossing. RR_i showed upregulation of CYP392A3 and high resistance levels (LC50 > 10,000 mg L−1), while SS_i had LC50 < 10 mg L−1. To disentangle the individual effects of PSST and CYP392A3 alleles, we also attempted to uncouple these genes in RR_i. We conclude that given the variation in LC50 values and expression levels of CYP392A3 in the congenic and uncoupled strains, it is likely that the high pyridaben resistance levels are due to a synergistic or cumulative effect of the combination of mutant PSST and associated CYPs, including CYP392A3, but other yet to be discovered factors cannot be excluded.
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•PSST mutation confers moderate pyridaben resistance in Tetranychus urticae.•We found mutant PSST and associated CYPs conferred the high resistance levels.•CYP392A3 was identified as a candidate, but other factors cannot be excluded.•High resistance is probably due to a synergistic or cumulative effect of factors.
Tetranychus urticae is an extremely generalist herbivore that can cause serious yield losses in various plants, including beans. Although alternative control options are present to control T. urticae ...populations in greenhouses, such as biological control, the control of spider mites in open fields has largely relied on chemical pesticides. Determination of resistance status and resistance mechanisms underlying the decreasing susceptibility is of vital importance to design a robust integrated resistance management program. Up to 9- and 15-fold resistance ratios to abamectin and pyridaben, respectively, were determined based on LC
50
values. Abamectin showed excellent efficacy, whereas pyridaben application would cause control failure in more than half of the tested populations under suitable spraying conditions. Therefore, the use of pyridaben should be in rotation with other acaricides belonging to different mode of action groups. None of the populations harboured the point mutations at the target sites of abamectin and pyridaben. For the first time, resistance monitoring in T. urticae populations against pyridaben was determined in Turkey, despite its long usage history.
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