Uncovering the novel characteristics of Asian honey bee, Apis cerana, by whole genome sequencing

Citation: Park, D., Jung, J. W., Choi, B. S., Jayakodi, M., Lee, J., Lim, J., . . . Kwon, H. W. (2015). Uncovering the novel characteristics of Asian honey bee, Apis cerana, by whole genome sequencing. Bmc Genomics, 16, 16. doi:10.1186/1471-2164-16-1Background: The honey bee is an important model system for increasing understanding of molecular and neural mechanisms underlying social behaviors relevant to the agricultural industry and basic science. The western honey bee, Apis mellifera, has served as a model species, and its genome sequence has been published. In contrast, the genome of the Asian honey bee, Apis cerana, has not yet been sequenced. A. cerana has been raised in Asian countries for thousands of years and has brought considerable economic benefits to the apicultural industry. A cerana has divergent biological traits compared to A. mellifera and it has played a key role in maintaining biodiversity in eastern and southern Asia. Here we report the first whole genome sequence of A. cerana. Results: Using de novo assembly methods, we produced a 238 Mbp draft of the A. cerana genome and generated 10,651 genes. A. cerana-specific genes were analyzed to better understand the novel characteristics of this honey bee species. Seventy-two percent of the A. cerana-specific genes had more than one GO term, and 1,696 enzymes were categorized into 125 pathways. Genes involved in chemoreception and immunity were carefully identified and compared to those from other sequenced insect models. These included 10 gustatory receptors, 119 odorant receptors, 10 ionotropic receptors, and 160 immune-related genes. Conclusions: This first report of the whole genome sequence of A. cerana provides resources for comparative sociogenomics, especially in the field of social insect communication. These important tools will contribute to a better understanding of the complex behaviors and natural biology of the Asian honey bee and to anticipate its future evolutionary trajectory.Citation: Park et al.: Uncovering the novel characteristics of Asian honey bee, Apis cerana, by whole genome sequencing. BMC Genomics 2015 16:1

The giant diploid faba genome unlocks variation in a global protein crop

Publisher Copyright: © 2023, The Author(s).Increasing the proportion of locally produced plant protein in currently meat-rich diets could substantially reduce greenhouse gas emissions and loss of biodiversity1. However, plant protein production is hampered by the lack of a cool-season legume equivalent to soybean in agronomic value2. Faba bean (Vicia faba L.) has a high yield potential and is well suited for cultivation in temperate regions, but genomic resources are scarce. Here, we report a high-quality chromosome-scale assembly of the faba bean genome and show that it has expanded to a massive 13 Gb in size through an imbalance between the rates of amplification and elimination of retrotransposons and satellite repeats. Genes and recombination events are evenly dispersed across chromosomes and the gene space is remarkably compact considering the genome size, although with substantial copy number variation driven by tandem duplication. Demonstrating practical application of the genome sequence, we develop a targeted genotyping assay and use high-resolution genome-wide association analysis to dissect the genetic basis of seed size and hilum colour. The resources presented constitute a genomics-based breeding platform for faba bean, enabling breeders and geneticists to accelerate the improvement of sustainable protein production across the Mediterranean, subtropical and northern temperate agroecological zones.Peer reviewe

To Assess the Effectiveness of Raw Garlic Clove on Blood Pressure Level in Clients with Treated Uncontrolled Hypertension residing at Samayanallur, Madurai

INTRODUCTION: Non communicable disease play an important role in recent years because of life style changes, environmental condition food habit, work force, stress, high salt intake, aging are the major cause for the increasing the blood pressure. Hypertension is the great risk factor was the person health is concerned. It is not controlled in the early stage cardiovascular mortality and morbidity will occur due to urbanization and the associated health risk with sedentary lifestyle out of every four people at least one of them will be affected by hypertension in their lives. Adequate control of hypertension is essential and if not done so can culminate into uncontrolled hypertension. OBJECTIVES: 1. To assess the blood pressure level in clients with treated uncontrolled hypertension among experimental and control group. 2. To evaluate the effectiveness of raw garlic clove on blood pressure level in clients with treated uncontrolled hypertension among Experimental group. 3. To compare the pretest and post test level of blood pressure in clients with treated uncontrolled hypertension in experimental and control group. 4. To associate the post test level of blood pressure in clients with treated uncontrolled hypertension in experimental and control group with selected demographic variable. HYPOTHESIS: • There will be a significant difference in the level of blood pressure among hypertensive clients before and after raw garlic intervention. • There will be a significant association between blood pressure level in clients with treated uncontrolled hypertension with selected demographic variable. METHODOLOGY: The research approach used for this study quantitative approach simple random sampling techniques the research Design is quasi experimental pretest and posttest control group design. Setting of the study conducted in Samayanallur. The sample of 60 hypertensive clients from male and female the aged group 35 years to 66years and above. The 30 clients in experimental group and 30 clients in control group. Conceptual Framework Modified Roy’s adaptation theory model 1996. Outcome Measure blood pressure level measured before and after administration of raw garlic clove Intervention 4gm of Raw garlic clove is given to the experimental group. FINDINGS : The result of the Experimental client’s systolic blood pressure score reduced from 172.40 to 154 in post test due to raw garlic glove with the difference of 18.40. Whereas in Diastolic Blood Pressure, the score reduced from 106 to 94.60 in post test due to raw garlic glove with the difference of 11.40. Clients who received raw garlic clove reported highly significant reduction in the blood pressure level (P = 0.001). There was significant association between the posttest blood pressure level and age, income, food habit, hypertensive drug taking in experimental group. CONCLUSION: The results supported that raw garlic clove administration is very suitable and alternative therapy of non pharmacological measure of reduction in uncontrolled hypertension

An automatic classifier for exam questions in engineering : a process for Bloom's taxonomy

Assessment is an essential activity to achieve the objective of the course being taught and to improve the teaching and learning process. There are several educational taxonomies that can be used to assess the efficacy of assessment in engineering learning by aligning the assessment tasks in line with the intended learning outcomes and teaching and learning activities. This research is focused on using a learning taxonomy that fits well for computer science and engineering to categorize and assign weights to exam questions according to the taxonomy levels. Existing Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques, Wordnet similarity algorithms with NLTK and Wordnet package were used and a new set of rules were developed to identify the category and the weight for each exam question according to Bloom's taxonomy. Using the result the evaluators can analyze and design the question papers to measure the student knowledge from various aspects and levels. Prior evaluation was conducted to identify most suitable NLP preprocessing techniques to the context. A sample set of end semester examination questions of the Department of Computer science and Engineering (CSE), University of Moratuwa was used to evaluate the accuracy of the question classification; weight assignment and the main category assignment were validated against the manual classification by a domain expert. The outcome of classification is a set of weights assigned under each taxonomy category, indicating the likelihood of a question to fall into a certain category. The highest weight category was considered as the main category of the exam question. According to the generated rule set the accuracy of detecting the correct main category of a question is 82%

WordNet and cosine similarity based classifier of exam questions using bloom's taxonomy

Assessment usually plays an indispensable role in the education and it is the prime indicator of student learning achievement. Exam questions are the main form of assessment used in learning. Setting appropriate exam questions to achieve the desired outcome of the course is a challenging work for the examiner. Therefore this research is mainly focused to categorize the exam questions automatically into its learning levels using Bloom's taxonomy. Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques such as tokenization, stop word removal, lemmatization and tagging were used prior to generating the rule set to be used for this classification. WordNet similarity algorithms with NLTK and cosine similarity algorithm were developed to generate a unique set of rules to identify the question category and the weight for each exam question according to Bloom's taxonomy. These derived rules make it easy to analyze the exam questions. Evaluators can redesign their exam papers based on the outcome of this classification process. A sample of examination questions of the Department of Computing and Information Systems, Wayamba University, Sri Lanka was used for the evaluation; weight assignment was done based on the total value generated from both WordNet algorithm and the cosine algorithm. Identified question categories were confirmed by a domain expert. The generated rule set indicated over 70% accuracy

The Barley and Wheat Pan-Genomes.

To unlock the genetic potential in crops, multi-genome comparisons are an essential tool. Decreasing costs and improved sequencing technologies have democratized plant genome sequencing and led to a vast increase in the amount of available reference sequences on the one hand and enabled the assembly of even the largest and most complex and repetitive crops genomes such as wheat and barley. These developments have led to the era of pan-genomics in recent years. Pan-genome projects enable the definition of the core and dispensable genome for various crop species as well as the analysis of structural and functional variation and hence offer unprecedented opportunities for exploring and utilizing the genetic basis of natural variation in crops. Comparing, analyzing, and visualizing these multiple reference genomes and their diversity requires powerful and specialized computational strategies and tools

Prevalence of dental fluorosis among primary school children in rural areas of Chidambaram taluk, Cuddalore district, Tamil Nadu, India

<b>Background:</b> Fluorosis is one of the common but major emerging areas of research in the tropics. It is considered endemic in 17 states of India. However, the Cuddalore district of Tamil Nadu is categorised as a fluorosis non-endemic area. But clinical cases of dental fluorosis were reported in the field practice area of Department of Community Medicine, Rajah Muthiah Medical College, Annamalai University, Chidambaram. Since dental fluorosis has been described as a biomarker of exposure to fluoride, we assessed the prevalence and severity of dental fluorosis among primary school children in the service area. <b> Materials and</b> <b> Methods:</b> Children studying in six primary schools of six villages in the field practice area of Rural Health Centre of Faculty of Medicine, Annamalai University, Chidambaram, were surveyed. Every child was clinically examined at the school by calibrated examiners with Dean&#x2032;s fluorosis index recommended by WHO (1997). Chi-square test, Chi-square trend test and Spearman&#x2032;s rank correlation coefficient test were used for statistical analysis. <b> Results:</b> Five hundred and twenty-five 5- to 12-year-old school children (255 boys and 270 girls) were surveyed. The overall dental fluorosis prevalence was found to be 31.4&#x0025; in our study sample. Dental fluorosis increased with age <i> P</i> &lt; 0.001, whereas gender difference was not statistically significant. Aesthetically objectionable dental fluorosis was found in 2.1&#x0025; of the sample. Villages Senjicherry, Keezhaperambai and Kanagarapattu revealed a community fluorosis index (CFI) score of 0.43, 0.54 and 0.54 with 5.6&#x0025;, 4.8&#x0025; and 1.4&#x0025; of objectionable dental fluorosis, respectively. Correlation between water fluoride content and CFI values in four villages was noted to be positively significant. <b> Conclusion:</b> Three out of six villages studied were in &#x2032;borderline&#x2032; public health significance (CFI score 0.4-0.6). A well-designed epidemiological investigation can be undertaken to evaluate the risk factors associated with the condition in the study region