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This growth chamber experiment evaluates how temperature and humidity regimes shape soluble carbohydrate pools and growth rates in lichens with different photobionts. We assessed soluble carbohydrates, relative growth rates (RGRs) and relative thallus area growth rates (RTAGRs) in Parmelia sulcata (chlorolichen), Peltigera canina (cyanolichen) and Peltigera aphthosa (cephalolichen) cultivated for 14 d (150 μmol m−2 s−1; 12-h photoperiod) at four day: night temperatures (28: 23°C, 20: 15°C, 13: 8°C, 6: 1°C) and two hydration regimes (hydration during the day, dry at night; hydration day: night). The major carbohydrates were mannitol (cephalolichen), glucose (cyanolichen) and arabitol (chlorolichen). Mannitol occurred in all species. During cultivation, total carbohydrate pools decreased in cephalo-/cyanolichens, but increased in the chlorolichen. Carbohydrates varied less than growth with temperature and humidity. All lichens grew rapidly, particularly at 13: 8°C. RGRs and RTAGRs were significantly higher in lichens hydrated for 24 h than for 12 h. Strong photoinhibition occurred in cephalo- and cyanolichens kept in cool dry nights, resulting in positive relationships between RGR and dark-adapted photosystem II (PSII) efficiency (F v/F m). RGR increased significantly with the photobiont-specific carbohydrate pools within all species. Average RGR peaked in the chlorolichen lowest in total and photobiont carbohydrates. Nocturnal hydration improved recovery from photoinhibition and/or enhanced conversion rates of photosynthates into growth.

Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are tumor cells released from primary, metastatic, or recurrent tumors into the peripheral blood and responsible for metastasis. They are also useful as a biomarker for cancer, influencing researchers to focus on early detection, enumeration, and isolation of CTCs due to their demonstrated substantial advantages in clinical theragnostic. Detection and isolation of CTCs are particularly challenging because of their extreme rarity and heterogeneity. Although new CTC enrichment and detection techniques have been continuously developed in recent years, enabling deeper analysis of CTC biology and clinical significance, none have yet achieved the “gold” standard. Even the FDA‐approved CellSearch™ suffers from low capture accuracy, high expense, and time consumption. Nowadays, liquid biopsy has become a more convenient and noninvasive method than traditional tissue biopsy in cancer patient management. It is used to develop predictive biomarkers, in addition to prognostication. In a broad spectrum, CTC detection methods can be categorized as label‐dependent (based on positive enrichment using cell surface markers such as epithelial cell adhesion molecule or EpCAM) and label‐independent (based on negative enrichment, considering size or other differential biophysical properties of CTCs). CTCs have provided critical insights into the metastasis process and will continue to do so, potentially leading to the creation of a brand‐new cancer treatment system. In this review article, we provide an overview of the most modern methods for CTC detection and isolation, along with their significance in cancer management. The review also outlines further prospects for advancements in the field. Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT04556916, NCT03511859, NCT02380196, and NCT05127096

Flammability is an important plant trait, relevant to plant function, wildfire behaviour and plant evolution. However, systematic comparison of plant flammability across ecosystems has proved difficult because of varying methodologies and assessment of different fuels comprising different plant parts. We compared the flammability of plant species at the leaf‐level (most commonly used in flammability studies) and shoot‐level (which retains aspects of plant architecture). Furthermore, we examined relationships between leaf functional traits and flammability to identify key leaf traits determining shoot‐level flammability. We collated and analysed existing leaf‐ and shoot‐level flammability data from 43 common indigenous perennial New Zealand plant species, along with existing data on leaf morphological and chemical traits. Shoot‐level flammability was decoupled from leaf‐level flammability. Moreover, leaf‐level rankings of flammability were not correlated with rankings of flammability of plants derived from expert opinion based on field observations, while shoot‐level rankings had a significant positive relationship. Shoot‐level flammability was positively correlated with leaf dry matter content (LDMC), phenolics and lignin, and negatively correlated with leaf thickness. Synthesis. Our study suggests that shoot‐level measurements of flammability are a useful and easily replicable way of characterizing the flammability of plants, particularly canopy flammability. With many parts of the world becoming more fire‐prone, due to anthropogenic activities, such as land‐use change and global warming, this finding will help forest and fire managers to make informed decisions about fuel management, and improve modelling of fire‐vegetation‐climate feedbacks under global climate change. Additionally, we identified some key, widely measured leaf traits, such as leaf dry matter content (LDMC), that may be useful surrogates for plant flammability in global dynamic vegetation models. Shoot‐ and leaf‐level flammability were decoupled, and shoot flammability corresponded to rankings based on expert opinion, suggesting that shoot‐level tests are a useful way to characterize the flammability of canopy fuels. Furthermore, we identified some widely measured leaf traits, such as leaf dry matter content, that were highly correlated to shoot flammability and can be useful surrogates for measuring plant flammability.

Inter-specific competition among species in a mixed species plantation is inevitable, and the degree of competition for available resources determines the success of species co-existence. Different species compete and interact for resources at different physiological and developmental stages. However, most research has investigated inter-specific competition at the mature stage. We examined seed germination and seedling growth of two confamilial species, Albizia saman and Albizia lebbeck, and explored inter-specific competition at their early life stages, grown in a mixture of different proportions of seeds and seedlings through a series of replacement experiment. The experiment included germination and height growth tests for each species on its own, as well as three mixtures of species with ratios of 25:75, 50:50 and 75:25. We found that the germination speed and percentage, the probability of seedling emergence, and the seedling height were significantly higher in A. saman than in A. lebbeck . Moreover, in mixtures, we observed that A. saman exhibits higher germination speed and percentages compared to A. lebbeck . The increase in seedling height did not vary significantly among treatments when the seedlings of the studied species were mixed in different proportions. However, both species showed an apparent benefit when growing together, which was significantly influenced by A. saman in terms of inter-specific competition indexes. The knowledge of the early growth performance of these species and their inter-specific competition presented in this study may influence recruitment success and will be useful in understanding the population dynamics in the case of a mixed species plantation. Furthermore, our study suggests that there could be an impact of species mixture on the regeneration or recruitment process, even when the species are confamilial. Therefore, this information could be useful for selecting suitable species mixtures in any afforestation and reforestation activities.

• Plant flammability varies across species, but the evolutionary basis for this variation is not well understood. Phylogenetic analysis of interspecific variation in flammability can provide insights into the evolution of plant flammability. • We measured four components of flammability (ignitability, sustainability, combustibility and consumability) to assess the shoot-level flammability of 21 species of Dracophyllum (Ericaceae). Using a macroevolutionary approach, we explored phylogenetic patterns of variation in shoot-level flammability. • Shoot-level flammability varied widely in Dracophyllum. Species in the subgenus Oreothamnus had higher flammability and smaller leaves than those in the subgenus Dracophyllum. Shoot flammability (ignitability, combustibility and consumability) and leaf length showed phylogenetic conservatism across genus Dracophyllum, but exhibited lability among some closely related species, such as D. menziesii and D. fiordense. Shoot flammability of Dracophyllum species was negatively correlated with leaf length and shoot moisture content, but had no relationship with the geographic distribution of Dracophyllum species. • Shoot-level flammability varied widely in the genus Dracophyllum, but showed phylogenetic conservatism. The higher flammability of the subgenus Oreothamnus may be an incidental or emergent property as a result of the evolution of flammability-related traits, such as smaller leaves, which were selected for other functions and incidentally changed flammability.

Terrestrial plants and fire have interacted for at least 420 million years. Whether recurrent fire drives plants to evolve higher flammability and what the evolutionary pattern of plant flammability is remain unclear. Here, we show that phylogeny, the susceptibility of a habitat to have recurrent fires (that is, fire-proneness) and growth form are important predictors of the shoot flammability of 194 indigenous and introduced vascular plant species (Tracheophyta) from New Zealand. The phylogenetic signal of the flammability components and the variation in flammability among phylogenetic groups (families and higher taxonomic level clades) demonstrate that shoot flammability is phylogenetically conserved. Some closely related species, such as in Dracophyllum (Ericaceae), vary in flammability, indicating that flammability exhibits evolutionary flexibility. Species in fire-prone ecosystems tend to be more flammable than species from non-fire-prone ecosystems, suggesting that fire may have an important role in the evolution of plant flammability. Growth form also influenced flammability—forbs were less flammable than grasses, trees and shrubs; by contrast, grasses had higher biomass consumption by fire than other groups. The results show that shoot flammability of plants is largely correlated with phylogenetic relatedness, and high flammability may result in parallel evolution driven by environmental factors, such as fire regime.

In order to improve growth chamber protocols for lichens, we tested the effect of 1) wet filter paper versus self-drained nets as a substratum for lichens, and 2) gradual versus abrupt transitions between dark and light periods. For Lobaria pulmonaria (L.) Hoffm. cultivated on nets, RGR increased by 60% compared to those on wet papers, whereas abrupt on/off transitions between day/night gave as high growth rates as gradual transitions mimicking sunrise/sunset. Because thalli on nets had less surface water than those on papers, the higher RGR on nets likely resulted from less suprasaturation depression of photosynthesis. By supporting very high growth and eliminating any visible damage, the revised growth chamber protocols facilitate new functional lichen studies.

An autonomous microgrid is often formed by incorporating distributed generators into the distribution system. However, distributed generators have less inertia compared to traditional synchronous generators, and can cause the system frequency to become unstable. Additionally, as more clusters are integrated into the distribution microgrid, frequency instability increases. To resolve frequency instability in the microgrid cluster, this study proposes a supercapacitor control approach. The microgrid consists of several clusters which integrate wind power generators, solar PV, STP, fuel cells, aqua electrolyzers, and diesel generators. Initially, a small signal model is developed to facilitate the control design. A fractional-order supercapacitor controller is augmented with the developed small-signal model to stabilize the frequency of the microgrid. Furthermore, the controller parameters are optimized to guarantee robust controller performance. The proposed fractional-order supercapacitor controller provides more degrees of freedom compared to the conventional controller. Time-domain simulations were carried out considering several real-time scenarios to test the performance of the proposed controller. We observed that the presented approach is capable of stabilizing the system frequency in all cases. Furthermore, the proposed approach outperforms existing approaches in stabilizing the frequency of the microgrid cluster.

Temperature rise is a concern for future agriculture in different regions of the globe. This study aimed to reveal the future changes and variabilities in minimum temperature (Tmin) and maximum temperature (Tmax) in the monthly, seasonal, and annual scale over Bangladesh using 40 General Circulation Models (GCMs) of Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) for two radiative concentration pathways (RCPs, RCP4.5 and RCP8.5). The statistical downscaling climate model (SimCLIM) was used for downscaling and to ensemble temperature projections (Tmax and Tmin) for the near (2021–2060) and far (2071–2100) periods compared to the base period (1986–2005). Multi-model ensemble (MME) exhibited increasing Tmax and Tmin for all the timescales for all future periods and RCPs. Sen’s slope (SS) analysis showed the highest increase in Tmax and Tmin in February and relatively less increase in July and August. The mean annual Tmax over Bangladesh would increase by 0.61°C and 1.75°C in the near future and 0.91°C and 3.85°C in the far future, while the mean annual Tmin would rise by 0.65°C and 1.85°C in the near future and 0.96°C and 4.07°C in the far future, for RCP4.5 and RCP8.5, respectively. The northern and northwestern parts of the country would experience the highest rise in Tmax and Tmin, which have traditionally been exposed to temperature extremes. In contrast, the southeastern coastal region would experience the least rise in temperature. A higher increase in Tmin than Tmax was detected for all timescales, signifying a future decrease in the diurnal temperature range (DTR). The highest increase in Tmax and Tmin will be in winter compared to other seasons for both the periods and RCPs. The spatial variability of Tmax and Tmin changes can be useful for the long-term planning of the country.

In this research, we studied the performance of different vegetative and fruits electrochemical cells namely PKL, Aloe Vera, Tomato and Lemon juice electrochemical cells with load condition for 2:1 Zn/Cu based electrodes. It was also studied the variation of Load Voltage (V L ), Load Current (I L ), and Load Power (P L ), with the variation of time for PKL, Aloe Vera, Tomato and Lemon juice electrochemical Cells. Among those cells the PKL electrochemical Cell was more efficient than the other three types of Cells regarding the load Current (I L ), Load Voltage (V L ), and Load Power (P L ). However, we investigated the performance of different types of Cells without load condition for 1:1 Zn/Cu based electrodes. Moreover, the variation of open circuit voltage (V oc ), short circuit current (I sc ) and maximum power (P max ) with the variation of time for those cells were explored. The discharge characteristic of the PKL electrochemical cell was more effective than the other three electrochemical Cells as the Open circuit voltage (V oc ), Short circuit current (I sc ) and Maximum Power (P max ) are more stable and steady in comparison with others. Heat treatment temperature was a new approach by which we can enhance the performance of these electrochemical cells. Most of the results have been tabulated and graphically discussed.