In oilseed rape (Brassica napus L.) like in most oleaginous crops, seed oil content is the main qualitative determinant that confers its economic value to the harvest. Increasing seed oil content is then still an important objective in oilseed rape breeding. In the objective to get better knowledge on the genetic determinism of seed oil content, a genetic study was undertaken in two genetic backgrounds. Two populations of 445 and a 242 doubled haploids (DH) derived from the crosses "Darmor-bzh" x "Yudal" (DY) and "Rapid" x "NSL96/25" (RNSL), respectively, were genotyped and evaluated for oil content in different trials. QTL mapping in the two populations indicate that additive effects are the main factors contributing to variation in oil content. A total of 14 and 10 genomic regions were involved in seed oil content in DY and RNSL populations, respectively, of which five and two were consistently revealed across the three trials performed for each population. Most of the QTL detected were not colocalised to QTL involved in flowering time. Few epistatic QTL involved regions that carry additive QTL in one or the other population. Only one QTL located on linkage group N3 was potentially common to the two populations. The comparisons of the QTL location in this study and in the literature showed that: (i) some of the QTL were more consistently revealed across different genetic backgrounds. The QTL on N3 was revealed in all the studies and the QTL on N1, N8 and N13 were revealed in three studies out of five, (ii) some of the QTL were specific to one genetic background with potentially some original alleles, (iii) some QTL were located in homeologous regions, and (iv) some of the regions carrying QTL for oil content in oilseed rape and in Arabidopsis could be collinear. These results show the possibility to combine favourable alleles at different QTL to increase seed oil content and to use Arabidopsis genomic data to derive markers for oilseed rape QTL and identify candidate genes, as well as the interest to combine information from different segregating populations in order to build a consolidated map of QTL involved in a specific trait.

This paper presents a study of the velocity of the propagation of energy in guided waves in plates. The motivation of the work comes from the practical observation that the conventional approach to predicting the velocities of pulses or wave packets, that is, the simple group velocity calculation, breaks down when the guided waves are attenuative. The conventional approach is therefore not valid for guided waves in absorbing materials or for leaky waves. The paper presents a theoretical derivation of an expression to predict the energy velocity of guided waves in an isotropic plate, based on the integration of the Poynting energy vectors. When applied to modes with no attenuation, it is shown analytically from this expression that the energy velocity is always identical to the group velocity. On the other hand, when applied to attenuative modes, numerical integration of the expression to yield the true energy velocity shows that this can differ quite significantly from the group velocity. Experimental validation of the expression is achieved by measuring the velocity of wave packets in an absorbing plate, under such conditions when the energy velocity differs substantially from the group velocity. Excellent agreement is found between the predictions and the measurements. The paper also shows the Poynting vectors in the various model studies, and some interesting phenomena relating to their directions.

This article develops a method for investigating some anisotropic media, such as composites, by the use of ultrasonic waves transmitted through a plate-shaped sample immersed in water. The discussion begins with Christoffel's equations for plane linear anelastic waves under the assumptions that for small angles of incidence the wave modes are plane and inhomogeneous and that the anisotropy is representable by hexagonal symmetry. The water-sample interface is treated using the law of Snell-Descartes for nonabsorbing media and takes into account mode conversion and the generation of acoustic surface waves. The method produces viscoelastic constants and relative attenuation coefficients as a function of the angle of refraction. The experimental measurement apparatus is described and data are given for the 25-layer unidirectional Gr/epoxy composite. Results are presented in terms of slowness, damping vector, and attenuation curves. The results are significant in that they demonstrate the anisotropy both for the elastic stiffness and the attenuation. The method appears to hold promise for characterizing some classes of anisotropic media, including 2-D composites, in terms of their anelastic behavior.

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