The antioxidant activity and the chemical composition of methanol extracts from peel and pulp belonging to two species of Tunisian prickly pears Opuntia ficus indica (spiny and thornless forms) and Opuntia stricta has been studied. The antioxidant capacity was measured by DPPH radical scavenging activity. The Total Phenolic Compound (TPC) and the total flavonoid content were determined by the F...

Rhazya stricta. an evergreen poisonous shrub is rapidly invading large areas of rangelands in Saudi Arabia. A laboratory study was conducted to investigate the effect of its dry foliage leachate on seedling growth and survival of some range plants including R. stricta its self at different stages of seedling growth. Results indicated that seedlings were more susceptible to allelopathic effects ...

Background: MDM2 (Murine Double Minute2) is an oncoprotein that inhibits the P53 activity. Overexpression of MDM2 gene has been reported in several human tumors. In the present study, we aimed to evaluate the impact of 40-bp insertion/deletion (ins/del) polymorphism on the promoter of MDM2 and susceptibility to breast cancer in a sample of Iranian population. Methods: This case-control study wa...

OBJECTIVES The present study aimed to evaluate the overall quality of case reports concerning acupuncture treatment in Korea. METHODS We selected a representative Korean journal and retrieved eligible case reports on acupuncture treatment published from 2009 to 2015. We assessed the quality of reporting based on CAse REport (CARE) and STandards for Reporting Interventions in Clinical Trials o...

Evidence that plants differ in their ability to take up both organic (ON) and inorganic (IN) forms of nitrogen (N) has increased ecologists' interest on resource-based plant competition. However, whether plant uptake of IN and ON responds to differences in soil microbial community composition and/or functioning has not yet been explored, despite soil microbes playing a key role in N cycling. He...

Associational susceptibility has been predicted to arise when a target plant’s neighbor is more palatable to an herbivore than the target plant itself, resulting in attraction and spillover of the herbivore onto the target plant. This prediction was tested on two hosts of the invasive pyralid moth Cactoblastis cactorum Berg. A combination of observational surveys and experimental plantings were...

We report here on efforts to show that a combination of native wetland plant species might perform better than a monoculture in wetlands designed for arsenic remediation by supplementing weaknesses. Carex stricta and Spartina pectinata were used in hydroponic experiments. (i) Arsenic uptake was first assessed at two ages via exposure to control or arsenic-laden solutions (0 or 1.5 mg As L(-1) a...

Because transplant experiments show that performance usually decreases across species range boundaries, some range limits might develop from factors and processes that prevent adaptation to stressful environments. Here, we determined whether an ecological cost of plant defense involving stress associated with changes in the local plant community may contribute to range limit development in the ...

The essential oil content in the inflorescence of lavender (Lavandula angustifolia Mill.) cultivated in the mid hills of Uttarakhand was found to be 2.8 % based o n the fresh weight. The oil was an alysed by capillary GC and GC– MS. Thirty seven constituents, representing 97.81 % of the o il were identified. The major components of the oil were linalyl acetate (47.56 %), linalool (28.06 %), lav...