Saffron (Crocus sativus L.) is an expensive spice crop cultivated successfully in Iran, Afghanistan, India, Greece, Morocco, Spain, and Italy. The present study was conducted during the periods 2018-2019 and 2019-2020 to evaluate the morphological, yield and quality parameters of saffron in six different regions of non-traditional areas of the western Himalayas. The two experimental factors were "year" and "location." The experiment was conducted using a factorial randomized block design with three replications. Yield attributes, viz., number of flowers, fresh flower yield, fresh stigma yield and dry stigma yield were significantly higher in location L3 compared to other geographical locations. Dry stigma yield in location L3 was higher by 50.0, 41.2, 33.3, 14.3, and 9.1% compared to locations L6, L5, L1, L4, and L2, respectively. These were characterized by the appropriate climatic conditions, viz., high altitude, sandy-loam texture of the soil, optimum temperature, lesser relative humidity and total rainfall, demonstrating that it is possible to cultivate this spice even in non-traditional areas of the western Himalaya. Positive correlations were established for stigma yield with increased altitude and lesser rainfall. Secondary metabolites viz., crocin and picrocrocin increased significantly with the increase in altitude; however, a reverse trend was recorded for safranal content. Total phenolics and flavonoids were significantly higher in the geographical location of Kinnaur, H.P. (L1) and Bharmour, H.P. (L4). In conclusion, the assessment of different geographical locations and soil types is particularly necessary to encourage saffron production and its qualitative traits. Based on current findings, saffron can be grown successfully in some non-traditional locations of the western Himalayan regions.Grapevine trunk diseases (GTDs) are a serious and growing threat to vineyards worldwide. The need for innovative control tools persists since pesticides used against some GTDs have been banned and only methods to prevent infections or to reduce foliar symptoms have been developed so far. In this context, the application of imaging methods, already applied to study plant-microbe interactions, represents an interesting approach to understand the effect of experimental treatments applied to reduce fungal colonization, on GTD-related pathogens activity. To this aim, trials were carried out to evaluate the efficacy of copper-based treatments, formulated with hydroxyapatite (HA) as co-adjuvant with innovative delivery properties, loaded with two different copper(II) compounds (tribasic sulfate and sulfate pentahydrate), and applied to grapevine propagation material to inhibit fungal wood colonization. The treated rootstock (Vitis berlandieri × Vitis riparia cv. K5BB) and scion cuttings (Vitis vinifera L., cv. Charde, in vitro assay revealed (i) the fungistatic effect of HA and the reduced effect of Cu fungicide when combined with HA. In planta assays showed (ii) the reduction of Pmi infection in propagation material treated with HA-Cu formulations, (iii) the movement of HA-Cu formulations inside the plant tissues and their persistence over time, and (iv) the plant defense reaction following the treatment with pure HA or Cu, or combined.Limitations for the application of genome editing technologies on elite wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) varieties are mainly due to the dependency on in vitro culture and regeneration capabilities. Recently, we developed an in planta particle bombardment (iPB) method which has increased process efficiency since no culture steps are required to create stably genome-edited wheat plants. Here, we report the application of the iPB method to commercially relevant Japanese elite wheat varieties. The biolistic delivery of gold particles coated with plasmids expressing CRISPR/Cas9 components designed to target TaQsd1 were bombarded into the embryos of imbibed seeds with their shoot apical meristem (SAM) exposed. Mutations in the target gene were subsequently analyzed within flag leaf tissue by using cleaved amplified polymorphic sequence (CAPS) analysis. A total of 9/358 (2.51%) of the bombarded plants (cv. "Haruyokoi," spring type) carried mutant alleles in the tissue. Due to the chimeric nature of the T0 plants, only six of them were inherited to the next (T1) generation. Genotypic analysis of the T2 plants revealed a single triple-recessive homozygous mutant of the TaQsd1 gene. Compared to wild type, the homozygous mutant exhibited a 7 days delay in the time required for 50% seed germination. The iPB method was also applied to two elite winter cultivars, "Yumechikara" and "Kitanokaori," which resulted in successful genome editing at slightly lower efficiencies as compared to "Haruyokoi." Taken together, this report demonstrates that the in planta genome editing method through SAM bombardment can be applicable to elite wheat varieties that are otherwise reluctant to callus culture.Low-temperature tolerance during the bud-bursting stage is an important characteristic of direct-seeded rice. The identification of cold-tolerance quantitative trait loci (QTL) in species that can stably tolerate cold environments is crucial for the molecular breeding of rice with such traits. In our study, high-throughput QTL-sequencing analyses were performed in a 460-individual F2 3 mapping population to identify the major QTL genomic regions governing cold tolerance at the bud-bursting (CTBB) stage in rice. A novel major QTL, qCTBB9, which controls seed survival rate (SR) under low-temperature conditions of 5°C/9 days, was mapped on the 5.40-Mb interval on chromosome 9. Twenty-six non-synonymous single-nucleotide polymorphism (nSNP) markers were designed for the qCTBB9 region based on re-sequencing data and local QTL mapping conducted using traditional linkage analysis. We mapped qCTBB9 to a 483.87-kb region containing 58 annotated genes, among which six predicted genes contained nine nSNP loci. Quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) analysis revealed that only Os09g0444200 was strongly induced by cold stress. Haplotype analysis further confirmed that the SNP 1,654,225 bp in the Os09g0444200 coding region plays a key role in regulating the cold tolerance of rice. These results suggest that Os09g0444200 is a potential candidate for qCTBB9.  https://www.selleckchem.com/products/l-arginine-l-glutamate.html  Our results are of great significance to explore the genetic mechanism of rice CTBB and to improve the cold tolerance of rice varieties by marker-assisted selection.