Functional analysis of short linear motifs in the plant cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor SIAMESE

© 2018 American Society of Plant Biologists. All rights reserved. Endoreplication, a modified cell cycle in which DNA is replicated without subsequent cell division, plays an important but poorly understood role in plant growth and in plant responses to biotic and abiotic stress. The Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) SIAMESE (SIM) gene encodes the first identified member of the SIAMESE-RELATED (SMR) family of cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitors. SIM controls endoreplication during trichome development, and sim mutant trichomes divide several times instead of endoreplicating their DNA. The SMR family is defined by several short linear amino acid sequence motifs of largely unknown function, and family members have little sequence similarity to any known protein functional domains. Here, we investigated the roles of the conserved motifs in SIM site-directed Arabidopsis mutants using several functional assays. We identified a potential cyclin-dependent kinase (CDK)-binding site, which bears no resemblance to other known CDK interaction motifs. We also identified a potential site of phosphorylation and two redundant nuclear localization sequences. Surprisingly, the only motif with similarity to the other family of plant CDK inhibitors, the INHIBITOR/INTERACTOR OF CDC2 KINASE/KIP-RELATED PROTEIN proteins, is not required for SIM function in vivo. Because even highly divergent members of the SMR family are able to replace SIM function in Arabidopsis trichomes, it is likely that the results obtained here for SIM will apply to other members of this plant-specific family of CDK inhibitors

Citizen science pioneers in Kenya – A crowdsourced approach for hydrological monitoring

Although water is involved in many ecosystem services, the absence of monitoring data restricts the development of effective water management strategies especially in remote regions. Traditional monitoring networks can be expensive, with unaffordable costs in many low-income countries. Involving citizens in monitoring through crowdsourcing has the potential to reduce these costs but remains uncommon in hydrology. This study evaluates the quality and quantity of data generated by citizens in a remote Kenyan basin and assesses whether crowdsourcing is a suitable method to overcome data scarcity. We installed thirteen water level gauges equipped with signboards explaining the monitoring process to passers-by. Results were sent via a text-message-based data collection framework that included an immediate feedback to citizens. A public web interface was used to visualize the data. Within the first year, 124 citizens reported 1175 valid measurements. We identified thirteen citizens as active observers providing more than ten measurements, whereas 57% only sent one record. A comparison between the crowdsourced water level data and an automatic gauging station revealed high data quality. The results of this study indicate that citizens can provide water level data of sufficient quality and with high temporal resolution

Flavonoids from the genus Euphorbia : isolation, structure, pharmacological activities and structure–activity relationships

Plants of the genus Euphorbia are widely distributed across temperate, tropical and subtropical regions of South America, Asia and Africa with established Ayurvedic, Chinese and Malay ethnomedical records. The present review reports the isolation, occurrence, phytochemistry, biological properties, therapeutic potential and structure–activity relationship of Euphorbia flavonoids for the period covering 2000–2020, while identifying potential areas for future studies aimed at development of new therapeutic agents from these plants. The findings suggest that the extracts and isolated flavonoids possess anticancer, antiproliferative, antimalarial, antibacterial, anti-venom, anti-inflammatory, anti-hepatitis and antioxidant properties and have different mechanisms of action against cancer cells. Of the investigated species, over 80 different types of flavonoids have been isolated to date. Most of the isolated flavonoids were flavonols and comprised simple O-substitution patterns, C-methylation and prenylation. Others had a glycoside, glycosidic linkages and a carbohydrate attached at either C-3 or C-7, and were designated as D-glucose, L-rhamnose or glucorhamnose. The structure–activity relationship studies showed that methylation of the hydroxyl groups on C-3 or C-7 reduces the activities while glycosylation loses the activity and that the parent skeletal structure is essential in retaining the activity. These constituents can therefore offer potential alternative scaffolds towards development of new Euphorbia-based therapeutic agents.NRF-TWAS, South Africa, National Research Foundation Research and Tshwane University of Technology, Pretoria, South Africa.http://www.mdpi.com/journal/pharmaceuticalspm2022Paraclinical Science

Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) and Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) Conceptual Design Report Volume 2: The Physics Program for DUNE at LBNF

The Physics Program for the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) at the Fermilab Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) is described

Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) and Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) Conceptual Design Report Volume 1: The LBNF and DUNE Projects

This document presents the Conceptual Design Report (CDR) put forward by an international neutrino community to pursue the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment at the Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF/DUNE), a groundbreaking science experiment for long-baseline neutrino oscillation studies and for neutrino astrophysics and nucleon decay searches. The DUNE far detector will be a very large modular liquid argon time-projection chamber (LArTPC) located deep underground, coupled to the LBNF multi-megawatt wide-band neutrino beam. DUNE will also have a high-resolution and high-precision near detector

Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) and Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) Conceptual Design Report Volume 2: The Physics Program for DUNE at LBNF

The Physics Program for the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) at the Fermilab Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) is described

Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) and Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) Conceptual Design Report, Volume 4 The DUNE Detectors at LBNF

A description of the proposed detector(s) for DUNE at LBN

Estimation Of Orthometric Height Using EGM2008 and GPS Over Nairobi County and Its Environs

Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) have been used widely in 3-dimensional positioning globally, regionally and locally. Global Positioning System (GPS) is one of the most extensively used GNSS in Earth sciences. GPS which employs World Geodetic System adopted in 1984 (WGS84) as the reference system has extensively been used for height determination and has brought a revolution on how relative and absolute heights on earth’s surface are determined. GPS measures ellipsoidal heights above a reference ellipsoid (WGS84). Although these heights can be useful in deformation surveys, machine monitoring and guidance, they are not applicable in engineering projects (e.g. sewer lines, pipelines and road construction among others) where heights referenced to an equipotential surface (geoid) are required. The separation between the geoid and a reference ellipsoid (geoid undulation) is necessary in converting ellipsoidal height into orthometric height. In this study we determine geoid undulation from Earth Gravitational Model of 2008 (EGM2008) using freely available Alltrans EGM2008 calculator software version 3.002 at 18 GPS/levelling points. The determined geoid undulations are used to determine estimated orthometric heights from ellipsoidal heights. We then model the differences between spirit-levelled orthometric and estimated orthometric heights by a four parameter model (first order polynomial) at 11 GPS/levelling points using least squares technique for improvement on the estimated orthometric heights. 7 GPS/levelling points are used for testing the performance of the four parameter model over Nairobi County and its environs. The standard deviations of the differences between observed and estimated orthometric heights (obtained from EGM2008 and GPS) at all GPS/levelling points (18) and 7 test points are ±0.52 and ±0.35 m respectively. When the four parameter model is applied, the standard deviations of the differences between spirit-levelled and improved estimated orthometric heights at the 7 test points reduces to ±0.10 m, representing an improvement of 71%. The accuracy of ±0.10 m obtained at the test points may be sufficient for some engineering projects that do not require very high orthometric height accuracy. &nbsp

Factors Affecting Adoption of Climate-Smart Agricultural Technologies: Evidence from Nandi County, Kenya

Adoption of Climate Smart Agricultural Technologies (CSAT) such as Biogas production, silage making, agroforestry, and water conservation help in improving smallholder production. However, in rural areas of Nandi County of Kenya, the adoption of CSAT amongst smallholder dairy farmers is low. In this study, we analyze factors that affect the adoption of CSAT using information drawn from 350 smallholder dairy farmers participating in the East Africa Dairy Development program.  Using the ordered Logit model, we find that the intensity of adoption of CSAT is partly affected by access to extension and credit services. Specifically, we showed that farmers who had access to extension services and credit lines were more likely to adopt drought-resistant crops but not biogas production, agro-forestry, and silage making. Moreover, our result showed that owning a stable tenure system allows farmers to adopt technologies that require more land and take more time like biogas production, drought crops, agroforestry, water storage, and silage making. Finally, we showed that distance between a farmer’s home and the farm is an important factor in adopting agricultural technology. This effect is more pronounced amongst technologies that are heavy to transport like biogas production, water storage and conservation, zero-grazing, and silage making

Functional Analysis of Short Linear Motifs in the Plant Cyclin-Dependent Kinase Inhibitor SIAMESE

© 2018 American Society of Plant Biologists. All rights reserved. Endoreplication, a modified cell cycle in which DNA is replicated without subsequent cell division, plays an important but poorly understood role in plant growth and in plant responses to biotic and abiotic stress. The Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) SIAMESE (SIM) gene encodes the first identified member of the SIAMESE-RELATED (SMR) family of cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitors. SIM controls endoreplication during trichome development, and sim mutant trichomes divide several times instead of endoreplicating their DNA. The SMR family is defined by several short linear amino acid sequence motifs of largely unknown function, and family members have little sequence similarity to any known protein functional domains. Here, we investigated the roles of the conserved motifs in SIM site-directed Arabidopsis mutants using several functional assays. We identified a potential cyclin-dependent kinase (CDK)-binding site, which bears no resemblance to other known CDK interaction motifs. We also identified a potential site of phosphorylation and two redundant nuclear localization sequences. Surprisingly, the only motif with similarity to the other family of plant CDK inhibitors, the INHIBITOR/INTERACTOR OF CDC2 KINASE/KIP-RELATED PROTEIN proteins, is not required for SIM function in vivo. Because even highly divergent members of the SMR family are able to replace SIM function in Arabidopsis trichomes, it is likely that the results obtained here for SIM will apply to other members of this plant-specific family of CDK inhibitors