A real-time PCR assay conjugated with the fluorescent SYBR Green I dye has been developed for rapid, sensitive and quantitative detection of ‘Candidatus Phytoplasma prunorum’ in its natural hosts, in stone fruits such as apricot plants and in the insect vector Cacopsylla pruni. The selected primers amplified specifically a fragment 153 bp long from the rplV (rpl22) gene of ‘Ca. P. prunorum’ and...

the fruit set rate and yield of pear are commonly low due to insufficient pollination, as the species is unattractive to honeybees. to improve honeybee foraging behavior for the pollination of dangshan pear (pyrus bretschneideri cv. dangshansuli), nine methods were used to attract bees. a control treatment of colonies was fed with normal sugar syrup, while six other treatments were fed using su...

Prickly pear (Opuntia sp.) is both a benefit and hindrance to the livestock industry in the southwestern U.S. It competes with herbaceous forage but is sometimes used as emergency feed during drought. Spineless prickly pear (0. fiscus-indica Engelm. and 0. rufida Engelm.) has been planted in some regions of the southwest but little is known about its nutritional value. Our objectives were to de...

BACKGROUND Quince (Cydonia oblonga Miller) is a deciduous shrub belonging to the Rosaceae family. Quince seed extract has long been used as a cosmetic ingredient for its moisturizing effect. However, little is known about whether quince seed extract has therapeutic effects on keratinocyte-associated skin inflammation. METHODS In the present study, we investigated the effect of the topical app...

today, hormones and nutrients are used in order to improve vegetative and reproductive growth of many agricultural products in the world. the purpose of this study, was to increase fruit set, fruit weight, and finally, increase of yield along with improvement of vegetative growth with putrescine treatments (0, 0.01, 0.001m) and potassium nitrate (0, 2 and 4%) of quince (cydonia oblonga cv. esfa...

We examined the colonization rate and communities of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) in the roots of Pyrus pyrifolia var. culta (Japanese pear) in orchards to investigate the effect of phosphorus (P) fertilization on AMF. Soil cores containing the roots of Japanese pear were collected from 13 orchards in Tottori Prefecture, Japan. Soil-available P in the examined orchards was 75.7 to 1,200 m...

fire blight is one of the most destructive diseases of stone and pome fruits. the causal pathogen is erwiniaamylovora, species in the family enterobacteriaceae. pears are the most susceptible, but apples, quinces and some other rosaceous plants are also vulnerable. in iran, the disease has been reported for the first time in baraghan in alborz province (zakeri & sharifnabi 1991). fire blight pr...