Publications
NIBIOs employees contribute to several hundred scientific articles and research reports every year. You can browse or search in our collection which contains references and links to these publications as well as other research and dissemination activities. The collection is continously updated with new and historical material.
2018
Authors
Anne Linn Hykkerud Inger Martinussen Ivan Paponov Mette Thomsen Eivind Uleberg Laura JaakolaAbstract
Rhodiola rosea is a perennial flowering plant with a long history as a medicine plant. The plant contain a range of bioactive compounds including salidroside, rosavin, rosarian and rosin. Some of the compounds are characterized as adaptogens, meaning they can increase the body’s resistance to various stressors. An increased demand for better pharmaceuticals has stimulated the development of new methods for agricultural as well as in vitro cultivation of medicinal plants. A new technology, called rhizosecretion of biologically active chemicals, can provide a continuous supply of biologically active compounds over the lifetime of plants. The plants will then be grown under controlled conditions. In order to increase the production of bioactive compounds in Rhodiola rosea under these conditions it is therefore hypothesized that the biosynthesis can be upregulated by growing it under specific temperature and light quality treatments. An experiment with different light and temperature regimes was established for optimal accumulation of biologically active compounds. Four different clones of Rhodiola rosea were grown under three different light conditions (red, blue and white) combined with two different temperatures (9 and 18 °C) for three weeks. The gene expression of Tyrosine decarboxylase (TyrDC), found to have a key role in the biosynthesis of salidroside, were investigated. In addition, the content of various bioactive compounds were quantified before and after treatment. The results indicate that use if high producing clones is most important for high production and that there is a short-term upregulation during blue light treatment. During the three-week treatment, there was no significant effect of the temperature treatments.
Authors
Caroline Brophy John A. Finn Andreas Lüscher M. Suter Laura Kirwan Maria-Teresa Sebastià Aslaug Helgadottir Ole Hans Baadshaug G. Bélanger Alistair Black Rosemary P. Collins Jure Čop Sigridur Dalmannsdottir Ignacio Delgado Anjo Elgersma Mick Fothergill Bodil E. Frankow-Lindberg An Ghesquiere Barbara Golinska Piotr Golinski Philippe Grieu Anne-Maj Gustavsson Mats Höglind Olivier Huguenin-Elie Marit Jørgensen Zydre Kadziuliene Päivi Kurki Rosa Llurba Tor Lunnan Claudio Porqueddu Ulrich Thumm John ConnollyAbstract
Increasing species diversity often promotes ecosystem functions in grasslands, but sward diversity may be reduced over time through competitive interactions among species. We investigated the development of species’ relative abundances in intensively managed agricultural grassland mixtures over three years to identify the drivers of diversity change. A continental-scale field experiment was conducted at 31 sites using 11 different four-species mixtures each sown at two seed abundances. The four species consisted of two grasses and two legumes, of which one was fast establishing and the other temporally persistent. We modelled the dynamics of the four-species mixtures over the three-year period. The relative abundances shifted substantially over time; in particular, the relative abundance of legumes declined over time but stayed above 15% in year three at many sites. We found that species’ dynamics were primarily driven by differences in the relative growth rates of competing species and secondarily by density dependence and climate. Alongside this, positive diversity effects in yield were found in all years at many sites.
Authors
John Connolly Maria-Teresa Sebastià Laura Kirwan John A. Finn Rosa Llurba M. Suter Rosemary P. Collins Claudio Porqueddu Aslaug Helgadottir Ole Hans Baadshaug Gilles Bélanger Alistair Black Caroline Brophy Jure Čop Sigridur Dalmannsdottir Ignacio Delgado Anjo Elgersma Mick Fothergill Bodil E. Frankow-Lindberg An Ghesquiere Piotr Golinski Philippe Grieu Anne-Maj Gustavsson Mats Höglind Olivier Huguenin-Elie Marit Jørgensen Zydre Kadziuliene Tor Lunnan Päivi Nykanen-Kurki Angela Ribas Friedhelm Taube Ulrich Thumm A. De Vliegher Andreas LüscherAbstract
Weed suppression was investigated in a field experiment across 31 international sites. The study included 15 plant communities at each site, based on two grasses and two legumes, each sown in monoculture and 11 four-species mixtures varying in the relative proportions of the four species. At each site, one grass and one legume species was selected as fast establishing and the other two species were selected for persistence. Average weed biomass in mixtures over the whole experiment was 52% less (95% confidence interval, 30 to 75%) than in the most suppressive monoculture (transgressive suppression). Transgressive suppression of weed biomass persisted over each year for each mixture. Weed biomass was consistently low and relatively similar across all mixtures and years. Average sown species biomass was greater in all mixtures than in any monoculture. The suppressive effect of sown forage species on weeds in mixtures was achieved without any herbicide use. At each site, weed biomass for almost every mixture was lower than the average across the four monocultures. The average proportion of weed biomass in mixtures was less than in the most suppressive monoculture in two thirds of sites. Mixtures outyielded monocultures, and mixture yield comprised far lower weed biomass.
Abstract
Carbonic anhydrase (CA) plays an important physiological role in all biological systems by accelerating the interconversion of CO2 and HCO3 −. In algae, CA is essential for photosynthesis: external CA (CAext) dehydrates HCO3 −, enhancing the supply of CO2 to the cell surface, and internal CA (CAint) interconverts HCO3 − and CO2 to maintain the inorganic carbon (Ci) pool and supply CO2 to RuBisCO. We frst conducted a literature review comparing the conditions in which CA extraction and measurement have been carried out, using the commonly used Wilbur–Anderson method. We found that the assay has been widely modifed since its introduction in 1948, mostly without being optimized for the species tested. Based on the review, an optimized protocol for measuring CA in Macrocystis pyrifera was developed, which showed that the assay conditions can strongly afect CA activity. Tris–HCl bufer gave the highest levels of CA activity, but phosphate bufer reduced activity signifcantly. Bufers containing polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) and dithiothreitol (DTT) stabilized CA. Using the optimized assay, CAext and CAint activities were readily measured in Macrocystis with higher precision compared to the non-optimized method. The CAint activity was 2×higher than CAext, which is attributed to the Ci uptake mechanisms of Macrocystis. This study suggests that the CA assay needs to be optimized for each species prior to experimental work to obtain both accurate and precise results.
Abstract
Although pasture is low-cost feed, many farmers find it difficult to maintain high milk yield when using pasturefor high-yielding dairy cows in automatically milked herds. Therefore, a seven-week experiment with 40 cows inearly to mid-lactation was performed to evaluate a management model for including pasture in the diet withoutjeopardizing milk production. Within a part-time grazing system with morning and evening outdoor access, wecompared a group with ad libitum grass silage indoors combined with access to a small grass-covered permanentpaddock for exercise and recreation (group EX) with a group offered production pasture at a high allowance percow and day combined with restricted grass silage allowance at night (group PROD). Both groups had the sameoutdoor access times and the same concentrate allowance based on pre-experimental milk yield. Milk yield andmilking frequency were recorded daily in the automatic milking unit. Milk recordings and samplings for de-termination of milk composition took place weekly and outdoor behaviour of cows was recorded during pastureaccess hours on six observation days, evenly distributed over the experimental period. During the experiment,average metabolisable energy concentration was higher in the grass silage offered both groups than in pastureherbage. However, our results showed no significant difference in daily milk yield between treatments.Furthermore, no signifi cant differences between treatments were found in energy-corrected milk, milk fatproduction, or body weight change. Milk protein production was, however, significantly higher in group PROD.In early lactation, no difference in milking frequency was observed between treatments while for cows in mid- tolate lactation, milking frequency was significantly higher in group EX than group PROD. Over the entire ex-periment, group EX cows spent significantly less time outdoors than group PROD. In conclusion, offering highyielding dairy cows in automatic milking systems high-quality pasture at a high allowance for a few hours inmorning and afternoon appears to be an interesting alternative to exercise paddock with full indoor feeding, as itcan reduce costs for supplementary silage, facilitate natural behaviour, and encourage cows to spend more timeoutdoors, while maintaining milk production at a level comparable to that of full indoor feeding.
Authors
Silje Elde Ingrid Kvalvik Bjørg Helen Nøstvold Rune Rødbotten Sigridur Dalmannsdottir Hilde Halland Eivind Uleberg Ólafur Reykdal Jón Árnason Páll Gunnar Pálsson Rakel Halldórsdóttir Óli Þór Hilmarsson Gunnar Þórðarson Þóra Valsdóttir Rebekka Knudsen David Natcher Daria SidorovaAbstract
The aim of the "Arctic as a food producing region" - project is to assess the potential for increased production and added value of food from the Arctic region, with the overarching aim of improving economic and social conditions of Arctic communities. This report is the output from the first phase of the project, providing a description of the main food production and examples of conditions for food production in the Arctic areas of the countries involved. This will form the basis for further analysis of opportunities, driving forces and barriers for further development of arctic food production, in the next phase of the project. The project has participation from Canada, Denmark, Greenland, Iceland, Norway and Russia, and is endorsed by the Arctic Council Sustainable Development Working Group (SDWG).
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This research note offers a critical-constructive discussion of the article ‘Class, Culture and Culinary Tastes: Cultural Distinctions and Social Class Divisions in Contemporary Norway’, written by Flemmen, Hjellbrekke and Jarness (FHJ) (Sociology, 2018(1)). Concerns are raised about the methods and the use of the data. A robustness analysis with alternative data and/or alternative methods is suggested. Conceptually, the analysis of FHJ is considered not to engage adequately with a more qualitative body of historical and ethnological literature, as well as the impact of Norwegian agricultural policy. To describe and understand the evolution of social meaning and social patterns of the consumption of ‘traditional’ Norwegian foodstuffs, a qualitative approach could have contributed constructively. Overall, wider implications for Bourdieu-inspired analyses of cultural consumption are addressed.