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Cold stress has an immediate impact on plant structure and function. A large number of free radicals cause oxidative stress in plants. Cold stress causes altered membrane permeability, lipid peroxidation, and DNA damage. It denatures enzymes and disrupts plant metabolism. Different methods are being investigated for acclimatizing plants subjected to cold stress. Nanobiotechnology and bacterial strains are growing agricultural strategies. Nanoparticles’ (NPs) unique qualities (small size, high mobility, biocompatibility, low cost, and increased reactivity) make them ideal candidates in agriculture. NP and bacterial applications maintain plastid structure and function, enhance antioxidant activities, secondary metabolites, and hormone expression, and reduce electrolyte leakage. They increase the number and content of proteins involved in oxidation–reduction reactions, hormone pathways, stress signaling, and reactive oxygen species detoxification under cold stress conditions. Chitosan, zinc oxide, and titanium dioxide NPs can help plants with cold stress. Meanwhile, bacterial strains in the genus Bacillus and Pseudomonas have been tested for cold tolerance. These strategies also upregulate antifreeze proteins, which are essential for the storage of plant products. Nano-bio-fertilizers should be prepared for the sustainable development of plants under low temperatures.

The effect of prior probabilities in the maximum likelihood classification on individual classes receives little attention, and this is addressed in this paper. Prior probabilities are designed only for overlapping spectral signatures. Accordingly, their effect on an individual class is independent of the classes that are spectrally separable from this class. The theoretical reasoning reveals that an increased prior probability, which shifts the decision boundary away from the class mean, will increase the assignment and boost the producer's accuracy as compared to the use of equal priors; though the change of the user's accuracy is not constant, it is expected to decrease in most cases. The tendency is just the opposite when a lower prior probability is used. A case study was conducted using Landsat TM data provided along with ERDAS Imagine® software. Two other pieces of evidence derived from the published literature are also presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate variation and land use changes have been widely recognized as two major factors that impact hydrological processes. However, it is difficult to distinguish their contributions to changes in streamflow. Quantifying their contributions to alteration of streamflow is especially important for the sustainable management of water resources. In this study, the changes in streamflow for the period of 1960–2008 at two stations (Dongwan and Luhun) were analyzed in the Yihe watershed in China based on hydrological data series and climate parameters. Using a non-parametric Mann–Kendall (MK) and Pettitt's test, as well as Budyko analysis, we first examined the trends of hydroclimatic variables and the breakpoint of annual streamflow over the past 50 years. Subsequently, we evaluated the contributions of annual precipitation (P), potential evapotranspiration (PET), and land use condition (represented by w), respectively, to streamflow variation. We observed a decreasing trend for P, as well as increasing trends for PET and w. Annual streamflow showed a significant downward trend with an abrupt change occurring in 1985 during the period of 1960–2008. Accordingly, we divided the studied period into two sub-periods: period I (1960–1985) and period II (1986–2008). The sensitivity of the streamflow to the different environmental factors concerned in this study differed. Streamflow was more sensitive to P than to PET and w. The decrease in P was the greatest contributor to the decline in streamflow, which accounted for 50.01% for Dongwan and 55.36% for Luhun, followed by PET, which accounted for 24.25% for Dongwan and 24.45% for Luhun, and land use change was responsible for 25.25% for Dongwan and 20.19% for Luhun. Although land use change plays a smaller role in streamflow reduction, land use optimization and adjustment still have great significance for future water resource management, since climate variation is difficult to control; however, the pattern optimization of land use can be achieved subjectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to metal toxicity, widespread industrialization has negatively impacted crop yield and soil quality. The current study was aimed to prepare and characterize biochar made from wood shavings of Pinus roxburghii and to determine the plant growth promoting and heavy metal detoxification of cadmium (Cd) and chromium (Cr) contaminated soil. FTIR SEM coupled with EDX characterization of biochar was performed; Cd and Cr were used at a rate of 20 mg/kg. Biochar was used at the rate of 50 mg/kg for various treatments. The completely randomized design (CRD) was used for the experiment and three replicates of each treatment were made. Various agronomic and enzymatic parameters were determined. The results indicated that all growth and enzymatic parameters were enhanced by the prepared biochar treatments. The most prominent results were observed in treatment T5 (in which shoot length, root length, peroxidase dismutase (POD), superoxide dismutase (SOD) catalyzes (CAT), and chlorophyll a and b increased by 28%, 23%, 40%, 41%, 42%, and 27%, respectively, compared to the control). This study demonstrated that biochar is a sustainable and cost-effective approach for the remediation of heavy metals, and plays a role in plant growth promotion. Farmers may benefit from the current findings, as prepared biochar is easier to deliver and more affordable than chemical fertilizers. Future research could clarify how to use biochar optimally, applying the minimum amount necessary while maximizing its benefits and increasing yield., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Objective: A kind of bacteria associated with highly denitrifying capability was isolated, and investigated about its growth and degradation characteristics., Methods: By using an enrichment culture and plate dilution method, one strain of bacteria was isolated from domestic wastewater and their denitrifying capability on the river water received domestic wastewater was determined., Results: The isolated bacteria strain had some nitrogen and phosphorous removal ability, its denitrifying intensity was 63.2%. The efficiencies of removing TN (total nitrogen) and TP (total phosphorus) (76.2% and 93.8%, respectively) were the highest when the consortium was added at the dosing amount of 100 mg/L after treatment for 10 days., Conclusions: One strain of denitrifying bacteria was successfully isolated from sewage sediments; its removal capacity of nitrogen and phosphorus from eutrophic water was good, which provided a basic biological method for nitrogen and phosphorus removal associated with eutrophic sewage treatment.