Climate change is one of the most serious problems facing the world today. The recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports confirmed that climate change will have a significant impact on global surface temperature. The projections of IPCC are that the rise of the mean temperature will be as high as 6.4oC by 2100, while the concentration of CO2 will be 1.3 times higher than it was 2...

Waste collectors have a theoretical risk of Hepatitis A virus infection. The aim of the study was to assess the prevalence and risk factors of hepatitis A virus infection (HAV) among municipal solid waste workers (MSWWs) in a municipality of central Greece. A seroprevalence study of HAV was conducted among 208 employees (100 waste collectors and 108 municipal gardeners) of a municipality in ce...

A stepwise approach was developed in 1993 to handle agricultural damage complaints caused by white-tailed deer {Odocoileus virginianus). Results from 2 seasons were evaluated to determine the effectiveness of the procedures implemented. Approximately half of the damage complaints received were handled by prescribing non-lethal techniques such as fencing, harassment, and repellents. The remainde...

This document reviews the safety assessment for Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) delta-endotoxin proteins that have been introduced into agricultural crops to provide protection against insect pests. Information is provided on the scientific basis for U.S. EPA approvals for the introduction of Bt proteins into agricultural crops. Relevant to these approvals is the extensive data base on Bt protein s...

It has been 10 years since the last review on apomixis, or asexual seed formation, in this journal (Koltunow, 1993). In that article, emphasis was given to the commonalties known among apomictic processes relative to the events of sexual reproduction. The inheritance of apomixis had been established in some species, and molecular mapping studies had been initiated. The molecular relationships b...

Phytoplasmas are insect-transmitted bacterial plant pathogens that cause considerable damage to a diverse range of agricultural crops globally. Symptoms induced in infected plants suggest that these phytopathogens may modulate developmental processes within the plant host. We report herein that Aster Yellows phytoplasma strain Witches' Broom (AY-WB) readily infects the model plant Arabidopsis (...

This study measures levels of technical, allocative and economic efficiency in agricultural crop production for Brazil in 1995. A nonparametric frontier model (DEA) under constant returns to scale was used. On average, the results suggest that the sector suffers from moderate technical inefficiency and from strong allocative inefficiency. If full technical efficiency were achieved, the crop pro...

The Worker Role Interview is a semistructured interview designed to be used as the psychosocial-environmental component of the initial rehabilitation assessment for the injured worker. Interrater reliability of the Worker Role Interview was computed for three raters for a sample of 30 adult subjects receiving rehabilitation due to an upper extremity injury. Reliability was assessed with the int...

heat stress is a significant occupational health and safety for workers in petrochemical industries. heat stress is a combination of heat load individual and environmental factors impose on workers’ bodies, which in turn, have impacts on workers’ performance, safety, and health. the present paper is carried out to determine the heat stress levels in workplace and to compare it with allowed wet ...