Hope is often treated as a priceless human value anchored in goal-related cognitions. The experiment aimed to investigate whether current hopeful thinking is related to problem-solving performance and how induced goal-oriented thinking influences this problem-solving process. Participants (N = 410) were asked to recall and describe their successful or unsuccessful goal pursuit and complete a scale assessing current hopeful thinking. Subsequently, participants were instructed to (1) think about actions that would be taken to solve the societal problem (i.e., an insufficient number of volunteers in Social Welfare Centers) and (2) describe these actions. In general, people who recalled successful events felt more hopeful than those who recalled unsuccessful events. State Hope was positively correlated with both the quantity (i.e., the total number of solutions) and quality (i.e., usefulness) of participants’ offered solutions. No interaction between State Hope and type of conditions with solution quantity or solution quality was found. State hope, however, interacted with the type of recalled goal pursuit when sex differences were considered. More hopeful women had a better solution quality when they recalled an unsuccessful goal pursuit. For men, a similar pattern was found when they recalled a successful goal pursuit. Lastly, the findings were discussed in light of Snyder’s Theory of Hope.

Granulometrie composition of dust coming from main technological nodes - i.e. from the sinter plant, blast furnace and lead refinery - of the zinc smelter in Poland was investigated. Samples of dust trapped in bag filters were collected. The sieve analysis, sediment analysis and a laser analyzer of granulomeric composition were used in investigations. Mass and particle number contributions of the dust to nine granulometrie fractions having aerodynamic diameters in intervals: 0-2.5, 2.5-5, 5-10, 10-20, 20-32, 32-40, 40-63, 63-100, I 00-250 μm were determined. To determine mathematical functions describing (mass and particle number) changes in the fractional composition of each dust the results were statistically analyzed by applying the nonlinear estimation. Using of the polynomial regression provided a very good correlation between the sought functions and results of measurements. The results of measurements are presented in tables and charts. High degree of granulometrie diversity of the investigated dust samples, depending on the dust formation mechanisms, i.e. on the technology used and composition of raw materials, was noted. High share of the fine particles in the dust may be a serious hazard to human health, especially in the case of breakdown in functioning of dust collectors.

Research on the occurrence of polyporus fungi in Czaplinek were conducted in 2004 and 2005 in 6 designated regions, using the route method (area search). 363 sites containing polyporus fungi belonging to 24 species and 4 families - Coriolaceae, Ganodermataceae, Hymenochaeteceae and Polyporaceae - have been found. The most numerous among the species were Bjerkandera ac/us/a (Wills. Fr.) P. Karst. (87 sites) and Ganoderma applanat um (Pers.) Pat. (66 sites). Three species listed on the Red List of makrofungi in Poland tDotroma mol/is (Sommer. Fr.) Dank, l110110/11s hispidus (Bull. Fr.) P. Karst. and Ganoderma l ucidum (W. Curt. Fr.) P. Karst.) have been identified. It should be noted that C. lucidum is one of the fungi under strict legal protection.

The spontaneous diploidization rates in oilseed rape (Brassica napus L.) via in vitro androgenesis are too low for practical applications. In contrast, artificial doubling of chromosomes of the microspore has proven to be more successful and allows homozygous plants to be obtained in a short time. Here, we present the efficiency of diploidization of B. napus haploids using three different chromosome doubling methods.

Using the in vitro approach in microspores, the rate of chromosome doubling in 24 populations of androgenic plants ranged from 15.8% to 94.0%. An alternative in vivo method for the induction of chromosome doubling involves colchicine treatment of young haploid plants, and this yielded doubling rates ranging from 47.5% to 86.4% in 10 different plant populations. Another in vivo method of chromosome doubling is colchicine treatment of the excised young axillary shoots of haploid plants at the early flowering stage. The high efficiency of this method was confirmed in haploid plant populations from 11 genetically distinct donors in which the frequency of occurrence of diploids ranged from 53.3% to 100%. However, in this case, the time required for seed formation from doubled haploids increased by about 3–5 months. The availability of several methods of chromosome doubling at various stages of the androgenic process – from isolated microspores through to young plants and flowering plants – allows seeds to be obtained from nearly every selected individual haploid.

The article introduces a novel Internet diagnosis utility - an open source IP packet snifferwhich captures TCP and UDP packets sent and received by a single Linux process only. Preliminary evaluation results are presented. The utility can be applied in the field of IP traffic classification.