Assessing Farmers' Diverse Preferences and Expectations for Tailoring Food and Nutrition Security Interventions in Southeastern Madagascar.

Background: Severe food and nutrition insecurity persists in Madagascar. The Atsimo Atsinanana region is among the most affected areas due to elevated poverty rates and low levels of resilience to frequent shocks. Implementing food and nutrition security (FNS) interventions could help to improve this situation, but to be effective and sustainable, intervention packages must fit the local context.

Endemic malagasy Dalbergia species inhibit quorum sensing in Pseudomonas aeruginosa PAO1.

Various species of the plant genus Dalbergia are traditionally used as medicine for sundry ailments and some of them have been shown recently to quench the virulence of Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. Cell-to-cell communication mechanisms, quorum sensing (QS) in particular, are key regulators of virulence in many pathogenic bacteria. Screening n-hexane extracts of leaves, roots and bark of endemic Malagasy Dalbergia species for their capacity to antagonize QS mechanisms in Pseudomonas aeruginosa PAO1 showed that many reduced the expression of the QS-regulated genes lasB and rhlA.

Study in vitro of the impact of endophytic bacteria isolated from Centella asiatica on the disease incidence caused by the hemibiotrophic fungus Colletotrichum higginsianum.

Thirty-one endophytic bacteria isolated from healthy leaves of Centella asiatica were screened in vitro for their ability to reduce the growth rate and disease incidence of Colletotrichum higginsianum, a causal agent of anthracnose. Isolates of Cohnella sp., Paenibacillus sp.

Comparative analysis of active constituents in Centella asiatica samples from Madagascar: application for ex situ conservation and clonal propagation.

A comparative quantitative analysis of the active triterpenoids in Centella asiatica samples collected in different locations in Madagascar was carried out to evaluate the natural variability in triterpenoid content and to select elite samples for further ex situ germplasm conservation and clonal propagation. The highest asiaticoside content (6.42%) was measured in samples collected in Mangoro region.