In congruence with the idea of sustainable development, integrated soil fertility and plant nutrition management has received global attention. The challenges facing soil fertility and plant nutrition in Iran include low soil organic carbon and nutrient contents, imbalanced plant nutrition, low nutrient efficiency, ineffective soil fertility system, environmental stresses, non-efficient fertilizer application, and inadequate knowledge transfer to users. Under these conditions, recommending proper fertilizers will be a multi-faceted and complex task. The development of a framework that incorporates all the factors involved into a single management package is the prerequisite to the integrated soil fertility and plant nutrition management as a smart system for applying an optimal assortment of chemical, organic, and biological sources of nutrients well adapted to environmental and local conditions and aimed at optimized exploitation of inherent soil capacities in a cropping system while sparing negative effects on soil ecological services. The desired integrated management system must be capable of duly accounting for all the components including plant variety; chemical, organic, and biological fertilizers; cropping system; climatic and soil conditions; and socio-economic parameters. The present study introduces the following three steps to achieve an integrated management system: 1) participation of all the stakeholders in the design, prioritization, implementation, and monitoring processes; 2) integrated use of chemical, organic, and bio-fertilizers in terms of amounts, timing, and method of application well adapted to the nutritional requirements of the plant varieties grown in the established cropping system with due consideration of environmental stresses; and 3) dissemination of localized knowledge and know-how of the integrated management system with the help of local extensionists and volunteer farmers from a pilot farm for replication and achievement of the expected outcomes in other farming sites.

The sunflower is one of the most important oily plants in the world. To study different methods of chemical fertilizer, biological and manure nutrition with foliar application of plant biostimulant on grain yield in sunflower, a factorial arrangement of treatment in a randomized complete block design with three replications was carried out in a field of Payaam Nour Arak University in Markazi province in the year of 2013. Nutrition methods [N1= 300 Kg ha-1 Urea (Control), N2= 50% of nutrition by Urea + 50% of nutrition by FAM (15-ton ha-1), N3= 50% of nutrition by FAM + 50% of nutrition by nitrogen fixation of Phaseolus sp. ), N4= 50% of nutrition by Urea + 50% of nutrition by nitrogen fixation of Phaseolus sp. ) and plant bio-stimulants (B1= Foliar with wermiwash, N2= Foliar with enrich wermiwash, N3= Foliar with bio ferment, N4= Foliar with effective microorganisms + quail egg) were assigned in plots. Results indicated that the effect of different levels of nutrition methods on the characteristics such as stem height, dry weight of stem and leaves, grain yield, productivity index of plant and number of grain per m-2 were significant. The Effect of plant bio-stimulants treatment on the characteristics such as stem diameter, dry weight of stem and leaves, grain yield, productivity index of plant, 1000 grain weight and the number of grain per m-2 were also significant. The maximum and minimum of grain yield (3705 and 3133 kg ha-1) were obtained with the 300 Kg ha-1 Urea (Control) and (50% of nutrition by Urea + 50% of nutrition by nitrogen fixation of Phaseolus sp. ) treatments, respectively. In the biostimulant treatment, the most and least amount of grain yield with an average of 3744 and 3031 Kg ha-1, were spray of effective microorganisms and enriched vermiwash, respectively.

The advent of nanotechnology has led to new achievements in the different fields of science and technology. The minified size of materials under this technology discloses certain novel or hitherto ignored features and properties of these materials. It is true that nanotechnology has helped enhance certain features of fertilizers as evidenced by a number of studies reporting their positive effects on different plants. However, it should be noted that most of these studies were performed under laboratory conditions and considered only short periods of plant life, in many cases only up to germination. This is while there are many reports showing the adverse consequences of using nano-materials. For example, nanoparticles of aluminum, iron, zinc, titanium, nickel, and silver or hydroxyapatite nanoparticles and carbon nanotubes have caused reduced growth in onions, vetch, rye, rice, beans, corn, cucumber, sorghum, and tomato plants. These inconsistent reports call for exhaustive investigations to determine the interactions between nano-materials and plants and their final fate in the plant and food chain before they can be used as fertilizers. Since plants stand at the beginning of the food chain, introduction and accumulation of nano-materials inside them might help transfer these materials to higher levels of the chain to end up in the human body. This paper studies the effects of high concentrations of nano-materials on plant growth in certain species, the associated damages, and the uptake and accumulation of nanoparticles in plant.

In order to study the effects of different nutrition systems (organic, chemical, integrated) and plant growth promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR) on on the grain yield, seed oil content and fatty acid composition in Sunflower (Helianthus annuus L. cv. Alestar) an experiment was conducted using Alestar cultivar at the research farm of college of agriculture, Tarbiat modares university of in 2007. Five levels of nutrition systems including F1 (100% organic), F2 (75% organic+25% chemical), F3 (50% organic+50% chemical), F4 (25% organic+75% chemicaL), F5 (100% chemical) in main plot and two levels of biofertilizer I1 (inoculation) and I0 (control) as subplot were used in a split plot arranged in a randomized complete block design with three replications. Results showed that the integrated fertilizer system had higher grain yield than the other fertilizer systems (F3›F4›F2›F5›F1). Maximum and minimum oil content were obtained with the F3 treatment and F1 respectively. The oil saturated fatty acids (acid palmitic and acid stearic) decreased significantly, while insaturated fatty acids (linoleic acid and oleic acid) increased significantly in response to raising the FYM-rate. The highest linolenic acid and oleic acid were observed in F3 and F1 treatments respectively. The results revealed that PGPR improved plant productivity and quality in sunflower seed. The inoculation of PGPR (I1) increased, grain yield, oil content and unsaturated fatty acids and decreased saturated fatty acids compared with untreated plants I0.

In this paper, a novel risk-based, two-objective (technical and economical) optimal reactive power dispatch method in a wind-integrated power system is proposed which is more consistent with operational criteria.  The technical objective includes the minimization of the new voltage instability risk index. The economical objective includes cost minimization of reactive power generation and active power loss. The proposed voltage instability risk employs a hybrid possibilistic (Delphi-Fuzzy)-probabilistic approach that takes into consideration the operator’s experience, the wind speed and demand forecast uncertainties when quantifying the risk index. The decision variables are the reactive power resources of the system. To solve the problem, the modified multi-objective particle swarm optimization algorithm with sine and cosine acceleration coefficients is utilized. The method is implemented on the modified IEEE 30-bus system. The proposed method is compared with those in the previously published literature, and the results confirm that the proposed risk index is better at estimating the voltage instability risk of the system, especially in cases with severe impact and low probability. In addition, according to the simulation results compared to typical security-based planning, the proposed risk-based planning may increase the security and economy of the system due to better utilization of system resources.

Plant location selection has invariably a significant impact on the performance of many companies or manufacturing systems. In this paper, a new integrated methodology is structured to solve this selection problem. Two well-known decision making methods, namely analytic hierarchical process (AHP) and VlseKriterijumska Optimizacija I Kompromisno Resenje (VIKOR), are combined in order to make the best use of information available, either implicitly or explicitly. In addition, the Delphi method is utilized to select the most influential criteria by a few experts. The aim of using the AHP is to give the weights of the selected criteria. Finally, the VIKOR method is taken into account to rank potential alternatives. Finally, an application example demonstrates the suitability of the proposed methodology.

To investigate the response of corn to combined application of chemical fertilizers with rhizobacteria plant growth promoting, an experiment was conducted in 2017 at Research farm of Agricultural and Natural Resources Campus of Tehran University, Karaj, Iran, in a randomized complete block design with four replications. Four nutritional treatments including T1 (Control treatment without applying fertilizer), T2 (Just PGPRs), T3 (Use chemical fertilizers based on soil test) and T4 (T3 + PGPRs) were considered. According to the results, the highest total dry weight (3.9 kg/m2), crop growth rate (79.8 g.m-2.day-1), net assimilation rate (15.3 g.m-2.day-1) and grain yield (18.2 ton.ha-1) were observed in T4 treatment and T2 treatment produced the highest  leaf area index (5.3), leaf area duration (205.2) and specific leaf weight (78.5 g.m-2) . Also, the lowest value of all traits was observed in in T1 (control) treatment. The results showed that the presence of rhizobacteria plant growth promotioninduction in the corn nutrition program increased the growth and growth indices of the plant. Combined application of chemical fertilizers with rhizobacteria plant growth promoting resulted in the highest growth and final grain yield of corn.

This study examines the nutritional status of soil and grapevine leaves in vineyards across various regions of Iran, including East Azerbaijan, Qazvin, Shahroud, and West Azerbaijan. The results revealed that nutrient deficiencies in vineyard soils and leaves vary depending on soil characteristics and regional environmental conditions.In the soils of East Azerbaijan and Qazvin vineyards, deficiencies in organic carbon, phosphorus, and iron were observed. Conversely, the soils in Shahroud and West Azerbaijan faced greater challenges in nutrient availability due to high pH levels, excessive lime content, and saline irrigation water.Leaf analysis showed that potassium, nitrogen, and calcium—key macronutrients—were deficient in most regions, significantly impacting yield. Additionally, deficiencies in micronutrients such as magnesium, zinc, and iron were particularly pronounced in regions like West Azerbaijan.Plant tests indicated that unfavorable soil conditions, saline irrigation water, and poor plant nutrition management were the primary factors contributing to these deficiencies.

Iran has been active in human nutrition training for the past five decades, but the existing curricular programs do not equip the graduates with the knowledge and skills required for solving food security and nutritional problems of the country. Given this, the Nutrition Department (ND) of Iran's Ministry of Health and Medical Education (MOHME) initiated a curricular reform to develop responsive graduate programs in key areas of nutrition that fill the existing gaps in nutrition training with the goal of improving nutrition policy-making and program development, implementation and evaluation. ND called for a request for proposals for a project entitled "Graduate Level Training in Nutrition". Specifically, with technical assistance from leading academic institutions in Asia, North America and UK, seven new graduate programs were housed in three separate institutions, but coordinated so that together they form a broad multidisciplinary resource for graduate education and research. These seven-degree programs are MSc and PhD in Molecular/Cellular Nutrition, MSc and PhD in Nutritional Epidemiology, MSc and PhD in Food Policy and Nutrition Intervention, and MSc in Community Nutrition. The programs were prepared in collaboration and active participation of selected faculty members of the three Iranian universities, International Union of Nutritional Sciences and the University of Philippines at Los Banos. The development of these programs was made possible through a loan from the World Bank, under the Second Primary Health and Nutrition Project in the MOHME.