Near-infrared reflectance spectroscopy (NIRS) of intact seeds allows the non-destructive estimation of seed quality parameters which is highly desirable in plant breeding. Together with yield, oil content and quality, a main aim in safflower (Carthamus tinctorius L.) breeding is the selection of genotypes with a low percentage of empty seeds even under cooler climates. We developed NIRS calibra...

Safflower (Carthamus tinctorius L.) is one of the most extensively used oil crops in the world. However, little is known about how its compounds are synthesized at the genetic level. In this study, Solexa-based deep sequencing on seed, leaf and petal of safflower produced a de novo transcriptome consisting of 153,769 unigenes. We annotated 82,916 of the unigenes with gene annotation and assigne...

In the mycobiont of the liehen Lichina pygmaea mesosome-like structures are described which mainly occur in the fungi cells close to the algal layer. These structures consist of numerous irregularly arranged tubuli which are most distinct after fixation with glutaraldehyde at pH 7.0. Using different fixatives at varying pH they tend to visiculate. In the cytoplasm neighboured to the mesosome-li...

This paper analyses the cut flower market as an example of an invasion pathway along which species of non-indigenous plant pests can travel to reach new areas. The paper examines the probability of pest detection by assessing information on pest detection and detection effort associated with the import of cut flowers. We test the link between the probability of plant pest arrivals, as a precurs...

The aim of the present project is to investigate the effect of salinity on growth, biochemical parameters and fatty acid composition in six varieties of safflower as well as identification of stress tolerant variety under saline (8 d Sm) condition. It was observed that salinity significantly decreased the dry weight and fresh weight of safflower varieties. Nitrate reductase (NRA) and nitrite re...

Leaf spot of safflower caused by Alternaria carthami Chowdhury is common in all the safflower growing regions of the world. The disease was reported from India by Chowdhury (1944) and subsequently from erstwhile USSR (Nelen and Vasileva, 1960), United States (United States Department of Agriculture, 1961), Ethiopia and Kenya (Ellis and Holliday, 1970), Africa (Weiss, 1971), Australia (Irwin, 19...