It is a commonly known fact that agricultural chemicals have made a large contribution to the improvement of productivity in modern agriculture. At the same time, however, the ecological influence of such chemicals has been a matter of much concern. Furthermore, close attention is being paid to the problem of resistance in pathogenic insects, fungi and weeds because of the large amounts of limi...

Growing demographic trends require sustainable technologies to improve quality and yield of future food productions. However, there is uncertainty about plant protection strategies in many agro-ecosystems. Pests, diseases, and weeds are overwhelmingly controlled by chemicals which pose health risks and cause other undesirable effects. Therefore, an increasing concern on control measures emerged...

In 1997, the Ministry of Health Malaysia introduced a surveillance programme for occupational and work-related diseases including poisonings for cases seen in government health facilities. Between June 1997 and November 1998, there were 36 cases of respiratory disease and 95 cases of poisoning by chemicals and pesticides notified while skin diseases were 108 cases. Respiratory diseases reported...

Following the intensification of agriculture and the promotion of agro-chemicals in low and middle income countries, acute pesticide poisoning has become a major public health problem with more than 300,000 deaths each year around the world. The easy availability of highly toxic pesticides in the homes of farming communities has made pesticides a preferred choice for suicide with an extremely h...

The First Green Revolution during 1970 s targeted to the four basic elements of production system viz. semi-dwarf high yielding varieties of rice and wheat, extensive use of irrigation, fertilizers and agro-chemicals and consequently resulted in terrific increase in the agricultural production. However, the agricultural production is experiencing a plateau nowadays, which has adversely affected...

The grave environmental, social, and economic concerns over the unprecedented exploitation of non-renewable energy resources have drawn attention policy makers research organizations towards sustainable use agro-industrial food crop wastes. Enzymes are versatile biocatalysts with immense potential to transform industry lignocellulosic biorefineries. Microbial enzymes offer cleaner greener solut...

AGRO100 (also known as AS1411) is a G-rich oligonucleotide that has long been established as a potent anti-cancer aptamer. However, the structure of AGRO100 remained unresolved, due to the co-existence of multiple different G-quadruplex conformations. We identified a DNA sequence named AT11, derived from AGRO100, which formed a single major G-quadruplex conformation and exhibited a similar anti...