The goal of this study was to identify factors determining weed species composition in soyabean crops in Hungary, where its expanding production faces difficult weed problems. The abundance of weed flora was measured in 262 fields across the country, along with 38 background variables. Using a minimal adequate model containing 24 terms with significant net effects, 21.6% of the total variation in weed species data could be explained. Plot location (edge vs core position, the single site variable in our analysis) was found to be the most important explanatory variable that was followed by a set of environmental (temperature, precipitation, altitude, soil texture, pH, Ca, K, Na and humus content), cultural (cultivar maturity, organic manure, fertiliser P and N, row spacing) and weed management (flumioxazin, pendimethalin, dimethenamid, propaquizafop, bentazone, quizalofop-p-ethyl, quizalofop-p-tefuril, linuron, thifensulfuron) factors. Variation partitioning revealed that environmental variables accounted for about four times more variance than cultural and about two and half times more than weed management variables. Chenopodium album, Ambrosia artemisiifolia, Hibiscus trionum, Echinochloa crus-galli and Convolvulus arvensis were the most dominant and frequent weeds, but their abundance was influenced by different factors. The responses of weed species to the studied variables provide new information about their ecological behaviour, and our findings also can be used to develop better weed management strategies.

Backgrounds/Aims: The incidence of obesity is increasing dramatically not only among adults, but also in children. The purpose of the survey was to assess the age- and gender-specific anthropometric data of children between the ages of 7 and 14 years who attended elementary schools in Budapest. Methods: A cross-sectional study was performed in 2005. Altogether 1,928 students (1,002 boys and 926 girls) were recruited from the schools. The representative sampling sites were selected randomly. Height and waist circumference were measured, other data were analyzed by an 8-polar bioelectrical impedance procedure. Statistical analysis was carried out using SPSS 11 for windows. Results: On the basis of body mass index (BMI), prevalence of underweight, overweight and obesity were 5.1, 18.1 and 7.4% for boys and 6.8, 19.6 and 6.3% for girls, respectively. On the basis of body fat percentage (%BF), prevalence of obesity was 17.9% for boys and 12.8% for girls. Forty nine percent of boys and 28% of girls categorized as overweight by BMI were obese according to their %BF. The difference in waist circumference between individuals categorized by BMI as normal and obese was 24.7 cm for boys and 20.5 cm for girls. Between those categorized as non-obese and obese by %BF, the difference was 17.3 cm for boys and 16.4 cm for girls. Normal and overweight boys and girls with high %BF had significantly higher waist circumferences than their counterparts with normal %BF. This means that many obese children may escape detection as obese, if classified as overweight on the basis of BMI alone. Conclusion: Results appear to underline that in addition to BMI, the determination of the %BF and waist circumference is important in epidemiological studies to identify obese subjects.

To better manage invasive populations, it is vital to understand the environmental drivers underlying spatial variation in demographic performance of invasive individuals and populations. The invasive common ragweed, Ambrosia artemisiifolia, has severe adverse effects on agriculture and human health, due to its vast production of seeds and allergenic pollen. Here, we identify the scale and nature of environmental factors driving individual performance of A. artemisiifolia, and assess their relative importance. We studied 39 populations across the European continent, covering different climatic and habitat conditions. We found that plant size is the most important determinant in variation of per-capita seed and pollen production. Using plant volume as a measure of individual performance, we found that the local environment (i.e. the site) is far more influential for plant volume (explaining 25% of all spatial Published in "Biological Invasions doi: 10.1007/s10530-017-1640-9, 2018" which should be cited to refer to this work. variation) than geographic position (regional level; 8%) or the neighbouring vegetation (at the plot level; 4%). An overall model including environmental factors at all scales performed better (27%), including the weather (bigger plants in warm and wet conditions), soil type (smaller plants on soils with more sand), and highlighting the negative effects of altitude, neighbouring vegetation and bare soil. Pollen and seed densities varied more than 200-fold between sites, with highest estimates in Croatia, Romania and Hungary. Pollen densities were highest on arable fields, while highest seed densities were found along infrastructure, both significantly higher than on ruderal sites. We discuss implications of these findings for the spatial scale of management interventions against A. artemisiifolia.

The cannabinoid type-1 receptor (CB1R) is one of the most abundant members of the G protein-coupled receptor family in the central nervous system. Once activated by their cognate ligands, endocannabinoids, CB1Rs generally limit the timing of neurotransmitter release at many cortical synapses. Prior studies have indicated the involvement of CB1R in neurodegeneration and in various neuronal insults, with an emphasis on their neuroprotective role. In the present study we used a novel selective CB1R radioligand to investigate regional variations in CB1R ligand binding as a factor of progressive Braak tau pathology in the frontal cortex of Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients. The frontal cortex was chosen for this study due to the high density of CB1Rs and their well-characterized involvement in the progression of AD. Post-mortem prefrontal cortex samples from AD patients from Braak stages I to VI and controls were subjected to CB1R autoradiography with [125I]SD-7015 as radioligand. Regional concentration of [125I]SD-7015, corresponding to, and thereby representing, regional CB1R densities, were expressed in fM/g_tissue. The results show that CB1R density inversely correlates with Braak tau pathology with the following tendency: controls

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