Livestock waste composts with minimum inorganic fertilizer as a soil amendment in low-input intensive farming are a feasible agricultural practice to improve soil fertility and productivity and to mitigate soil degradation. The key benefits of the practice rely on the activities of soil microorganisms. However, the role of different livestock composts [composted cattle manure (CCM) vs. composte...

Silicon (Si) amendment to plants can confer enhanced resistance to herbivores. In the present study, the physiological and cytological mechanisms underlying the enhanced resistance of plants with Si addition were investigated for one of the most destructive rice pests in Asian countries, the rice leaf folder, Cnaphalocrocis medinalis (Guenée). Activities of defense-related enzymes, superoxide d...

Chitin was used as soil amendment in fiberglass field microplots, alone or with one or a combination of two to three species of Hirsutella rhossiliensis, Paecilomyces marquandii, Verticillium chlamydosporium, Bacillus thuringiensis, and Streptomyces costaricanus. Sudangrass and rapeseed were planted as cover crops and incorporated into soil as green manure amendments. Chitin amendment alone inc...

A mesocosm experiment was conducted to investigate the effect of the addition of Aspergillus niger-treated sugar beet waste, in the presence of rock phosphate, and inoculation with a native, metal-tolerant bacterium, Bacillus thuringiensis, on the stabilisation of soil aggregates of two mine tailings, with differing pH values, from a semiarid Mediterranean area and on the stimulation of growth ...

The American feminist movement has twice mobilized for constitutional change. The constitutional amendment secured by the firstwave feminist movement is no longer of consequence, while the constitutional amendment sought by the second-wave feminist movement was never ratified. Yet today, courts and commentators agree that the Constitution guarantees women equality, even if that guarantee was ne...

Silicon soil amendment has been shown to enhance plant defenses against insect pests. Rice is a silicon-accumulating graminaceous plant. In the southern United States, the rice water weevil and stem borers are important pests of rice. Current management tactics for these pests rely heavily on the use of insecticides. This study evaluated the effects of silicon amendment when combined with curre...

Scholars have shown that written constitutions may be informally amended in various ways, for instance by judicial interpretation, statute, or executive action. But scholars have yet to fully appreciate that written constitutions may also be informally amended by desuetude. Informal amendment by constitutional desue-tude occurs when a constitutional provision loses its binding force upon politi...

The effect of nitrate, acetate, and hydrogen on native perchlorate-reducing bacteria (PRB) was examined by conducting microcosm tests using vadose soil collected from a perchlorate-contaminated site. The rate of perchlorate reduction was enhanced by hydrogen amendment and inhibited by acetate amendment, compared with unamendment. Nitrate was reduced before perchlorate in all amendments. In hydr...

In response to challenges that the disparate impact doctrine violates the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, the Thirteenth Amendment provides a constitutional foundation that deflects the equal protection argument. Early interpreters of the Thirteenth Amendment envisioned the provision as a means to abolish chattel as well as civil slavery, which was the condition of subordinate s...

n The Hyde Amendment bans the use of federal Medicaid funds for abortions except in cases of life endangerment, rape or incest. In addition, as of 2008, 32 states and the District of Columbia had prohibited the use of their state Medicaid funds for abortions except in the limited cases allowed under the Amendment.