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Weed control is crucial for optimizing corn yield. In recent years, advances in computer vision and deep learning have created new opportunities for precision agriculture. However, annotating weed datasets is typically time-consuming, labor-intensive, and costly. To address this challenge, this study proposes an indirect weed detection strategy that reduces reliance on explicit weed annotations by focusing on accurate crop segmentation. Specifically, we develop YOLO-CornSeg, a lightweight segmentation model based on an improved YOLOv8n architecture, designed for precise corn seedling segmentation. The model incorporates a C2f_(D)WR module to enhance multi-scale feature extraction and a Segment_(E)fficient head to improve segmentation performance while maintaining computational efficiency. Based on the resulting segmentation masks, an indirect weed detection strategy is applied, in which non-crop green regions are identified as weeds using HSV-based image processing. Experimental results show that YOLO-CornSeg achieves a mean Intersection over Union (mIoU) of 91.1% with a model size of 8.3 MB, outperforming several state-of-the-art two-stage semantic segmentation models while maintaining low computational complexity and a compact model size. The improved segmentation accuracy further enhances the reliability of downstream weed inference. Overall, this study highlights the potential of combining lightweight crop segmentation with indirect weed detection strategies to support precision herbicide application.

With the rapid development of agricultural intelligence, nondestructive testing (NDT) has shown considerable promise for agricultural product inspection. Compared with traditional methods—which often suffer from subjectivity, low efficiency, and sample damage—NDT offers rapid, accurate, and non-invasive solutions that enable precise inspection without harming the products. These inherent advantages have promoted the increasing adoption of NDT technologies in agriculture. Meanwhile, rising quality standards for agricultural products have intensified the demand for more efficient and reliable detection methods, accelerating the replacement of conventional techniques by advanced NDT approaches. Nevertheless, selecting the most appropriate NDT method for a given agricultural inspection task remains challenging, due to the wide diversity in product structures, compositions, and inspection requirements. To address this challenge, this paper presents a review of recent advancements and applications of several widely adopted NDT techniques, including computer vision, near-infrared spectroscopy, hyperspectral imaging, computed tomography, and electronic noses, focusing specifically on their application in agricultural product evaluation. Furthermore, the strengths and limitations of each technology are discussed comprehensively, quantitative performance indicators and adoption trends are summarized, and practical recommendations are provided for selecting suitable NDT techniques according to various agricultural inspection tasks. By highlighting both technical progress and persisting challenges, this review provides actionable theoretical and technical guidance, aiming to support researchers and practitioners in advancing the effective and sustainable application of cutting-edge NDT methods in agriculture.

With the rapid development of agricultural intelligence, nondestructive testing (NDT) has shown considerable promise for agricultural product inspection. Compared with traditional methods—which often suffer from subjectivity, low efficiency, and sample damage—NDT offers rapid, accurate, and non-invasive solutions that enable precise inspection without harming the products. These inherent advantages have promoted the increasing adoption of NDT technologies in agriculture. Meanwhile, rising quality standards for agricultural products have intensified the demand for more efficient and reliable detection methods, accelerating the replacement of conventional techniques by advanced NDT approaches. Nevertheless, selecting the most appropriate NDT method for a given agricultural inspection task remains challenging, due to the wide diversity in product structures, compositions, and inspection requirements. To address this challenge, this paper presents a review of recent advancements and applications of several widely adopted NDT techniques, including computer vision, near-infrared spectroscopy, hyperspectral imaging, computed tomography, and electronic noses, focusing specifically on their application in agricultural product evaluation. Furthermore, the strengths and limitations of each technology are discussed comprehensively, quantitative performance indicators and adoption trends are summarized, and practical recommendations are provided for selecting suitable NDT techniques according to various agricultural inspection tasks. By highlighting both technical progress and persisting challenges, this review provides actionable theoretical and technical guidance, aiming to support researchers and practitioners in advancing the effective and sustainable application of cutting-edge NDT methods in agriculture.

To explore the relationship between water and carbon utilization and key factors to keep high water use efficiency (WUE), a 2-yr experiment was conduct by covering 0 and 0.6 kg m-2 straw to the surface of soil with plant densities of 1.0 × 105, 7.5 × 104, and 5.5 × 104 plants ha-1 in North China Plain during summer maize growing seasons of the 2012 and 2013. Results showed that straw mulching not only increased grain yield (GY), WUE, and carbon efficient ratio (CER) but also inhibited CO2 emission significantly. WUE positively correlated with CER, GY and negative correlated with evapotranspiration (ET) and CO2 emission. CER had the larger direct effect on WUE compared with ET and CO2 emission. The results indicate that straw mulching management in summer maize growing seasons could make sense for inhibiting CO2 emission.

It is the key of motivating sub-contractors working hard and mutual cooperation, ensuring implementation overall goal of the project that to design rational incentive mechanism for general contractor. Based on the principal-agency theory, the subcontractor efforts is divided into two parts, one for individual efforts, another helping other subcontractors, team Cooperation incentive models of multiple subcontractors are set up, incentive schemes and intensities are also given. The results show that the general contractor may provide individual and team motivation incentives when subcontractors working independently, not affecting each other in time and space; otherwise, the general contractor may only provide individual incentive to entice teams collaboration between subcontractors and helping each other. The conclusions can provide a reference for the subcontract design of general and sub-contractor dynamic alliances.

To gain a better understanding of the anticancer effects of hydroxyapatite （HAP） nanoparticles in vivo and in vitro, the effects of the interaction of HAP nanoparticles with hepatoma cells were explored. HAP nanoparticles were prepared by homogeneous precipitation and characterized by laser particle analysis and transmission electron microscopy （TEM）. HAP nanoparticles were observed to be uniformly distributed, with rod-like shapes and diameters in the range of 42.1-87.1 nm. Overnight attached, suspended, and proliferating Bel-7402 cells were incubated with HAP nanoparticles. Inverted microscopy observation revealed that HAP nanoparticles with a cell membrane showed good adsorption. TEM demonstrated that HAP nanoparticles were present on the surface of cells, continuously taken up by cells through endocytosis, and transported in vesicles close to the nucleus. Fluorescence microscopy showed that the concentrations of intracellular Ca2＋ labeled with Fluo-3 calcium fluorescent probe were significantly enhanced. In addition, inverted microscopy observation revealed that suspended cells treated with HAP nanoparticles did not adhere to the culture bottle, resulting in cell death. After the overnight attached cells were treated with HAP nanoparticles for 96 h with increasing doses of HAP nanoparticles, inverted microscopy observation revealed that cell proliferation was slowed and ceU-ceU adhesion was weakened. Feulgen staining and image analysis indicated that the nuclear DNA content of the cells was markedly reduced, and argyrophilic nucleolar organizer region （AgNOR） staining and image analysis indicated that the number of AgNORs was significantly decreased. Therefore, hepatoma cells brought about the adsorption, uptake, transport and degradation of HAP nanoparticles. In addition, HAP nanoparticles affected hepatoma cells with regard to cell-cell adhesion, cell and extracellular matrix adhesion, and DNA and protein synthesis; thus inhibiting cell proliferation. This understanding of the effects of interaction between HAP nanoparticles and hepatoma cells is useful for further study of the anticancer mechanisms of HAP nanoparticles.

Peripheral nerve regeneration using a novel nerve conduit （PRGD/PDLLA/β TCP/NGF） was evaluated, which was made of RGD peptide modified poly{（lactic acid）-co-[（glycolic acid）-alt-（L-lysine）]} （PRGD）, poly（d,l-lactic acid） （PDLLA） and β-tricalcium phosphate （β-TCP）. And the effectiveness was compared with that of PRGD/PDLLA/β-TCP, PDLLA and autograft in terms of nerve regeneration across a gap. Both of biodegradablity and cell-biocompatibility of the novel nerve conduit were evaluated in vitro. The results show that PRGD/PDLLA/β-TCP/NGF composite ma terials have better biodegradation properties and cell affinity than PDLLA, and could promote the RSC96 Schwann cells adhesion, proliferation and growth on the surface of materials. PRGD/PDLLA/ β-TCP/NGF composite conduit was significantly superior to that of the PDLLA conduit in histological and axon morphologic index. PRGD/PDLLA/β-TCP/NGF conduit is more beneficial to nerve regeneration than PDLLA conduit. The biodegradable PDLLA/PRGD/β-TCP/NGF conduit has a good biocompatibility with rats tissue and it could effectively promote the nerve regeneration after bridging sciatic nerve defect of rats, the effect is as good as that of the autograft nerve, significantly superior to the PRGD/PDLLA/β-TCP conduit and PDLLA conduit. PDLLA/PRGD/β-TCP/NGF composite conduit is a potential ideal conduit.

Stable and single-dispersed hydroxyapatite （HAP） nanoparticles were synthesized with ultrasonic-assisted method. HAP nanoparticles were characterized by dynamic light scattering, XRD （X-ray diffraction） and TEM （Transmission Electron Microscopy）. The effect of HAP nanoparticles on the K562 human myelogenous leukemia cell line was investigated by MTT assay and cell count test, and the mechanism was studied through the changes of cell cycle and ultrastructure. The results showed that HAP nanoparticles inhibited the proliferation of K562 cells dramatically in vitro. HAP nanoparticles entered the cytoplasm of K562 cells and the cells were arrested at G/M phase, thus, the cells died directly.

The inhibition effect of hydroxyapatite （ HAP ） nanoparticles on hepatocarcinoma was investigated in vivo. The human hepatocarcinoma cell line Bel- 7402 was transplanted subcutaneously into nude mice. Hydroxyapatite nanoparticles suspension at a dose of 0. 2 mL was injected into the transplanted tumors every day for 2 weeks, and saline was used us control. The efficacy of hydroxyapatite nanoparticles on this carcinoma was surveyed and morphological changes of tissue and cells were observed by light microscopy and transmission electron microscopy （TEM）. Experimental results show that hydroxyapatite nanoparticles have a visible destructive effect on the structures of hepatocarcinoma cells and tissue. The inhibition rates of tumor growth were 77.21% and 51. 32% after intra-tumor injection of hydroxyapatite nanoparticles for 1 week and 2 weeks, respectively. Compared with the control group, hydroxyapatite nanoparticles can also prolong the survival time of the nude mice bearing this cancer significantly. This indicates that hydroxyapatite nanoparticles have the therapeutic potential on hepatoma in vivo.

Schwann cells play a key role in peripheral nerve growth and regeneration. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of RGD peptides on Schwann cell behavior, and to identify the effects of the modified PDLLA films with RGD in vivo. The results revealed that RGD coating with the concentration of 100-500 ug/mL promoted the cell proliferation and boosted the cell migration. Molecularly, RGD coating also enhanced the expression of the proliferation related genes （c-fos and c-jun） and the cell behavior related genes （actin, tublin, tau and MAP1） at first stages of the seeding, which is similar to the effects from laminin coating. In vivo, RGD addition improved the recovery efficiency of the transected nerve in regard of the more survived Schwann cells in vivo and the formation of more mature myelin sheath. Taken together, RGD peptides are good candidates to enhance the biocompatibility of the biomaterials and facilitate the peripheral nerve regeneration by prompting responses in Schwann ceils.