In the heart of Moroccan oases, date palm trees stand as the lifeblood of local communities, serving as both a livelihood cornerstone and a dietary treasure trove. Morocco has long been a leading date fruit producer. Yet, amidst the palm groves, several environmental, technical, and socio-economic challenges have threatened the sustainability of this ancient crop. This study assesses the constraints and limitations of the date palm production system in Tafilalet oases that have kept this crop from reaching its full potential. A total of 56 producers were interviewed using an open- closed survey, illuminating interviews with key informants, dynamic focus group discussions, and direct observations in palm groves. The findings reveal that primary restrictions and barriers impeding the progress of this sector are: producers’ moderate education level and the limited adoption of technological innovation, few opportunities given to young producers, palm groves’ fragmentation, poor management of date fruits, low imports of the necessary inputs (fertilisers, irrigation, etc.), and the poor organisation of the marketing circuit (storage and packaging). Advocate renewed commitment to preserve and modernise palm groves, blending heritage with modern practices for thriving, sustainable date palm production. It is entirely conceivable to produce organic dates in the region since producers use a few quantities of chemical products, notably fertilisers and phytosanitary products.

In this work a review of investigations concerning interaction of intense extreme ultraviolet (EUV) and soft X-ray (SXR) pulses with matter is presented. The investigations were performed using laser-produced plasma (LPP) EUV/SXR sources based on a double stream gas puff target. The sources are equipped with dedicated collectors allowing for efficient focusing of the EUV/SXR radiation pulses. Intense radiation in a wide spectral range, as well as a quasi-monochromatic radiation can be produced. In the paper different kinds of LPP EUV/SXR sources developed in the Institute of Optoelectronics, Military University of Technology are described.

Radiation intensities delivered by the sources are sufficient for different kinds of interaction experiments including EUV/SXR induced ablation, surface treatment, EUV fluorescence or photoionized plasma creation. A brief review of the main results concerning this kind of experiments performed by author of the paper are presented. However, since the LPP sources cannot compete with large scale X-ray sources like synchrotrons, free electron lasers or high energy density plasma sources, it was indicated that some investigations not requiring extreme irradiation parameters can be performed using the small scale installations. Some results, especially concerning low temperature photoionized plasmas are very unique and could be hardly obtained using the large facilities.

Small boats, possessing outboard engines, are widely used in tourism and mammal watching within marine protected areas. Noise generated by this type of vessels has the capacity to negatively affect marine fauna, especially marine mammals, which use sound throughout all the phases of their lives. These tourism boats used in mammal watching may use different propulsion systems, such as gas, diesel or electric engines. To characterize underwater noise emitted by this type of vessels becomes relevant not only when assessing the acoustic impact produced by these different propulsion systems over the marine fauna living inside these protected marine areas, but also when determining which one produces the least impact. A comparative study of underwater noise emissions coming from small touristic boats was made in this study. Boats were similar in capacity and functions, although possessing different propulsion systems. Measurements were made on two boats with a 50 Hp internal combustion engine and one 5 Hp electric boat. These boats were selected to be studied because they have practically the same size, possess the same passenger-capacity and are used to make similar jobs and routes inside the protected area where they are operated. The electric boat showed a considerable decrease in underwater noise emissions, especially in low frequencies. This boat will produce a lower accumulated exposition of the fauna to the noise or will allow a closer approach to the observed species. Measurements were made between September 2018 and January 2020.

An overview of our recent developments, regarding “water-window” soft X-ray (SXR) microscopy based on a laser-plasma double stream gas puff target sources is presented. The work, presented herein, describes two approaches to SXR microscopy. The first one is a low spatial resolution, achromatic SXR microscopy, employing Wolter type-I objective. The second one is a nanometer spatial resolution SXR microscopy, with the use of a Fresnel zone plate objective, for imaging various objects with quasimonochromatic light, emitted from a double stream gas puff target based short wavelength source. The developments regarding both systems are presented, as well as the possible applications, for which the SXR microscope was already employed. Such compact, table-top size, laboratory type microscopy setups may be employed in the near future for complementary-like studies to other, often used, microscopy techniques.