Objectives: The aim of this study was to assess the dental caries among primary school children (first grades) in Eastern, Southeast and Vardar Region of the Republic of Macedonia and evaluate if the disease pattern is different between the regions. Materials and Methods:A cross sectional study was conducted in 2013 involving 301 six year old primary school children (born in 2007), who were randomly selected from seven central and 13 regional primary schools. The ethical clearance was taken from institutional ethical committee of the Faculty of Dentistry at the University of St Cyril and St Meth and parental consent was obtained for each child. Participants' dental status was evaluated using the 1997 World Health Organization caries diagnostic criteria for decayed, missing and filled primary teeth (DMFT) and Decayed, Missing or Filled permanent Teeth (DMFT) by two calibrated examiners. Data obtained during the survey were stored in a database (SPSS 13.00 and tested for possible statistically significant differences using the Kruskal-Wallis ANOVA test. A p ≤ 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results:The total number of children in the sample was 301, comprising 152 (50.50%) females and 149 (49.50%) males. The results of this survey showed that the DMFT score of the six year-old children from all three regions was 5.59 ± 3.82, while in the Eastern region was 5.65 ± 3.68 for the primary dentition and 0.04 ± 0.28 for the permanent dentition. Average DMFT score of the six year-old children from the southeast region was 5,29 ± 4.30 for the primary dentition and 0.07 ± 0.3 for the permanent dentition, while for six year-old children group from the Vardar region it was 5.81 ± 3.5 for primary dentition and 0.17 ± 0.5 for the permanent dentition. Kruskal-Wallis ANOVA test by ranks gave a p-value of 0.4 > 0.05, indicating that there was no statistically significant difference between DMFT scores of six year-old children from different regions for primary teeth. Kruskal-Wallis ANOVA test by ranks gave a p-value of 0.03 < 0.05, indicating that there were statistically significant differences between DMFT scores of six year-old children from different regions for permanent teeth. Significant caries (SiC) index was 9.93 ± 2.0. The prevalence of caries-free children was 15.82%. The percentage of untreated caries or the ratio of DMFT/DMFT was 0.8581 (85.81%). Conclusions:Dental caries experience was seen to be high among six year old school children (first grades) in Eastern, Southeast and Vardar Region of the Republic of Macedonia.

The research was conducted in order to determine yield related characters which are more effective as selection criteria than yield itself. Three spring canola (Brassica napus L.) genotypes have been investigated for plant height, number of primary branches (including the main raceme), number of pods per plant, pod length, number of seeds per pod, seed weight per pod and 1000 seed weight and their correlations with seed yield per plant. Seed yield had highest correlation with number of pods per plant (r= 0.935 and r= 0.973 in Skopje and Strumica, respectively), followed by seed weight per pod (r= 0.693 and r= 0.729) and 1000 seed weight (r= 0.627 and r= 0.680). Path coefficient analysis was used to identify the direct and indirect effect of studied characters on seed yield. Number of pods per plant (p=0.759 and p=0.877 for Skopje and Strumica, respectively) and seed weight per pod (p=0.216 and p=0.225) had the highest direct effect on seed yield in both locations followed by 1000 seed weight (p=0.056 and p=0.010). The coefficient of determination (R2) was 0.943

Winter oilseed rape (WOSR) production is dependent on weather conditions, but is also characterized by low nitrogen (N) use efficiency. The objectives of this study were to: (i) evaluate sources of variability for the seed yield and oil content of four rapeseed cultivars under the influence of three sowing dates (SD trial) and five nitrogen dosages (N trial) during four growing seasons; (ii) understand year-related interactions and the effect of climatic variables in different growth stages; and (iii) assess the presence of interactions cultivar by year (C × Y) and treatment by year (T × Y). Six climatic factors were observed, during germination, overwintering, budding, flowering and ripening. The mixed effect split-plot analysis of variance was used, as well as factorial regression models. The C × Y interaction was the most important for the oil content in both trials. The precipitation at budding stage (75.8%), relative air humidity at overwintering (63.3%) and flowering stage (53.0%) accounted for the highest proportion of T × Y interaction for the seed yield, as well as precipitation at flowering (92.0%) and ripening (85.0%) for the oil content. Water availability was the main determinant of the seed yield and/or oil content accompanied with cooler temperatures during the seed development. The study successfully dissected the effect of year-related climatic variables on the agronomical traits in winter rapeseed. Based on this, appropriate agronomic practices can be applied at specific growing stages to ensure a high seed and oil yield.

Background: The common cause of dental infections is necrosis of the pulp of a tooth, which is followed by bacterial invasion through the pulp chamber into the deeper tissues. The bacterial infections are caused by host indigenous bacteria primarily aerobic gram positive cocci, anaerobic gram negative and gram negative rods. The aim of this study is to identify the presence of different cultivating microorganisms which cause dental infections in primary and young permanent teeth manifested by as abscesses and apical parodontitis. Material and Methods: Seventy kids ages 5-15 years (36 females, 34 males) were studied prospectively (I assume this) at the University Dental Clincal Center of Kosovo, Department of Pediatric Dentistry in cooperation with Microbiological Department of Faculty of Medicine. All patients who had clinical, and radiological confirmation of thier dental infections, followed by extraction of their teeth. Once the tooth was extracted blood and pus sample from the empty alveoli were cultured. The analysis of the sample for bacteria identification was done using the automated system VITEK 2 cards (Biomeriux, France). Results: Of 70 children's with deciduous 73.5% of them had acute infection and 26.5% chronic infection. On the other hand 75% of children with permanent dentitions had chronic and 25% acute infection. In acute infections the most common aerobic bacteria was Streptococcus group with 47% (Streptococcus mitis and oralis) followed by the Actonomyces group (Actinomyces mayeri and Actinomyces odontoliticus) and anaerobic bacteria in 34%. In chronic infections streptococcus group was the prevalent aerobic group and in anaerobic infection Actinomyces mayeri and Actinomyces naeslundi was the most representative aerobes in 21% of samples. Conclusion: The dental infections in pediatric population (5-15 years old) are polymicrobial predominantly anaerobic bacte-T. Kutllovci et al. 60 ria over aerobic. This study paves the way for preventives measures that need to me implemented in this group of children.

Designing breeding programs for rapeseed (Brassica napus L.) cultivars with improved seed and oil yields require information about the genetic variability of traits effecting seed and oil production. This investigation was undertaken in order to examine phenotypic and genetic variability, broad-sense heritability, genetic gain under selection and interrelationships of some agronomic and seed quality traits of investigated genotypes. Genotypes, years and their interaction showed significant variation for all studied characters. Phenotypic variability coefficients were higher than genetic ones. Broad-sense heritability estimates ranged from 12.66% (for ripening period) up to 52.12% (for days to first pods filling). Expected genetic gain was lowest for days to maturity (0.45%) and highest for height to the first lateral branch (12.94%). The analysis of genetic correlations revealed that seed yield per plant is highly and positively associated with pods per plant, oil content, plant height and ripening period, although significant negative correlations were found between seed yield per plant and leaves per plant, days to maturity, protein content, days to first pods filling, days to flowering, height of the first lateral branch and 1000 seed weight. Genetic path-coefficient analysis indicated that pods per plant and oil content were the most important components of seed yield per plant. Their direct effects on seed yield per plant were p=0.472 and p=0.082, respectively. Protein content had highly significant negative direct effect on seed yield (p=-0.365), followed by 1000 seed weight (p=-0.017) and height to the first lateral branch (p=-0.081). These observations will support the selection of genotypes with desired traits for further rapeseed seed and oil yield improvement

Trichoderma species have been identified as potential biocontrol agents of many plant pathogenic fungi, including Botrytis cinerea Pers., one of the major pathogens in tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) production in the Republic of Macedonia. The aim of this study was to evaluate the in vitro antagonistic activity of Trichoderma asperellum and T. harzianum against 18 genetically diverse B. cinerea isolates. The results showed considerable antagonistic abilities of both Trichoderma species against all tested B. cinerea isolates. Both antagonists significantly (p < 0.01) inhibited the mycelial growth (T. asperellum from 74.246% to 96.915% and T. harzianum from 71.072% to 95.889%) and conidial germination (T. asperellum from 76.932% to 95.107% and T. harzianum from 76.933% to 93.658%) of B. cinerea isolates. The antagonistic abilities were not related to the genetic group, but apparent association with the region of origin of the pathogen isolates was observed. Trichoderma asperellum and T. harzianum are promising biocontrol agents for control of gray mold disease in tomato.

In the second half of 20 th century the awareness of importance of landraces for the future, led to organized collecting missions for numerous plant species. A total of 2217 maize (Zea mays L.) landraces, collected in the former Yugoslavia, are stored at Maize Research Institute (MRIZP) gene bank. During 2014, new collecting missions were organized in the eastern and western parts of Macedonia. According to collecting site and kernel type, 14 samples from the Faculty of Agricultural Sciences and Food, R. Macedonia were chosen for the comparison and identification of possible duplicates, through coupling with the 16 MRIZP gene bank accessions from the same area and kernel characteristics. Phenotypic characterization was done for 21 traits according to International Board for Plant Genetic Resources descriptors for maize. The Principal Component Analysis (PCA) identifies five PCs with Eigenvalue > 1, explaining 80% of the total phenotypic variation. The most discriminative traits with the strongest positive associations were tasseling and silking dates, plant height, leaf length and ear length. Compared to the exsitu populations, the number of alleles and the number of specific alleles, showed a significant decrease in the in situ populations. Twelve unique alleles were detected in samples from MRIZP gene bank, and only four were found in new Macedonian samples. Cluster analysis of morphological and molecular markers distinguished groups of maize accessions with distinctive morphological traits and genetic profiles that will be useful for conservation, and management of gene bank collection, as well as for possible utilization in breeding.

One hundred and twenty-three isolates of Botrytis cinerea were collected from 7 different areas in the Republic of Macedonia, where tomato is mostly grown in greenhouses and high tunnels. Based on the mycelial formation, intensity of sporulation and sclerotial production, 9 different phenotypes were detected: 4 mycelial and 5 sclerotial. One sclerotial morphological type has not been previously reported. The presence or absence of two transposable elements, boty and flipper, was detected by PCR. Out of 123 isolates, 20 had two transposable elements, boty and flipper (transposa genotype), 48 had neither of these elements (vacuma genotype) and 55 had only the flipper element (flipper genotype). Isolates that contain only boty element were not detected. No relationship between the phenotypes, origin of isolates and the presence/absence of transposable elements, boty and flipper, was found