Japanese Irrigation Management at the Crossroads

To achieve the goals of irrigation projects, governments need to ensure appropriate operations and maintenance. The Japanese government has established a national-level participatory irrigation management (PIM) approach since 17th century and the Japanese farmers presently operate and maintain entire irrigation systems at their own cost under the Land Improvement Act enacted in 1949. However, whether this Japanese system is relevant to other countries remains unclear. This paper aims to characterise the PIM system in detail; it analyses its background conditions and extracts implications for successful PIM methodology. To that end, we mobilised and compared all relevant information regarding legal aspects, practices and statistics. We concluded that: 1) farmers’ involvement from the initial planning stages – which is a requirement of the Japanese government’s application system for irrigation projects – is critical if projects are to succeed; 2) resolving farmers’ conflicts and coordination in advance are the key to success; 3) while transferring all facility management to the farmer irrigation association known as the Land Improvement District (LID), the government must constantly supervise and support the LID; 4) the experiences of Japan are relevant to countries that have small-scale farming systems; and 5) there is a rapid shift underway in the primary actors of Japanese agriculture in rural villages, from many small-scale farmers to a limited number of large-scale farmers. This transformation may require reshaping the Japanese model to adapt to new circumstances

Role of the Carboxy-Terminal Region of the GluRε2 Subunit in Synaptic Localization of the NMDA Receptor Channel

AbstractThe synaptic localization of the N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) type glutamate receptor (GluR) channel is a prerequisite for synaptic plasticity in the brain. We generated mutant mice carrying the carboxy-terminal truncated GluRε2 subunit of the NMDA receptor channel. The mutant mice died neonatally and failed to form barrelette structures in the brainstem. The mutation greatly decreased the NMDA receptor–mediated component of hippocampal excitatory postsynaptic potentials and punctate immunofluorescent labelings of GluRε2 protein in the neuropil regions, while GluRε2 protein expression was comparable. Immunostaining of cultured cerebral neurons showed the reduced punctate staining of the truncated GluRε2 protein at synapses. These results suggest that the carboxy-terminal region of the GluRε2 subunit is important for efficient clustering and synaptic localization of the NMDA receptor channel

The Fab portion of immunoglobulin G contributes to its binding to Fcγ receptor III

Most cells active in the immune system express receptors for antibodies which mediate a variety of defensive mechanisms. These receptors interact with the Fc portion of the antibody and are therefore collectively called Fc receptors. Here, using high-speed atomic force microscopy, we observe interactions of human, humanized, and mouse/human-chimeric immunoglobulin G1 (IgG1) antibodies and their cognate Fc receptor, FcγRIIIa. Our results demonstrate that not only Fc but also Fab positively contributes to the interaction with the receptor. Furthermore, hydrogen/deuterium exchange mass spectrometric analysis reveals that the Fab portion of IgG1 is directly involved in its interaction with FcγRIIIa, in addition to the canonical Fc-mediated interaction. By targeting the previously unidentified receptor-interaction sites in IgG-Fab, our findings could inspire therapeutic antibody engineering

The Constrained Maximal Expression Level Owing to Haploidy Shapes Gene Content on the Mammalian X Chromosome.

X chromosomes are unusual in many regards, not least of which is their nonrandom gene content. The causes of this bias are commonly discussed in the context of sexual antagonism and the avoidance of activity in the male germline. Here, we examine the notion that, at least in some taxa, functionally biased gene content may more profoundly be shaped by limits imposed on gene expression owing to haploid expression of the X chromosome. Notably, if the X, as in primates, is transcribed at rates comparable to the ancestral rate (per promoter) prior to the X chromosome formation, then the X is not a tolerable environment for genes with very high maximal net levels of expression, owing to transcriptional traffic jams. We test this hypothesis using The Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) and data from the Functional Annotation of the Mammalian Genome (FANTOM5) project. As predicted, the maximal expression of human X-linked genes is much lower than that of genes on autosomes: on average, maximal expression is three times lower on the X chromosome than on autosomes. Similarly, autosome-to-X retroposition events are associated with lower maximal expression of retrogenes on the X than seen for X-to-autosome retrogenes on autosomes. Also as expected, X-linked genes have a lesser degree of increase in gene expression than autosomal ones (compared to the human/Chimpanzee common ancestor) if highly expressed, but not if lowly expressed. The traffic jam model also explains the known lower breadth of expression for genes on the X (and the Z of birds), as genes with broad expression are, on average, those with high maximal expression. As then further predicted, highly expressed tissue-specific genes are also rare on the X and broadly expressed genes on the X tend to be lowly expressed, both indicating that the trend is shaped by the maximal expression level not the breadth of expression per se. Importantly, a limit to the maximal expression level explains biased tissue of expression profiles of X-linked genes. Tissues whose tissue-specific genes are very highly expressed (e.g., secretory tissues, tissues abundant in structural proteins) are also tissues in which gene expression is relatively rare on the X chromosome. These trends cannot be fully accounted for in terms of alternative models of biased expression. In conclusion, the notion that it is hard for genes on the Therian X to be highly expressed, owing to transcriptional traffic jams, provides a simple yet robustly supported rationale of many peculiar features of X's gene content, gene expression, and evolution

Participatory Management Structure of Large-Scale People's Irrigation System: The Case of the Soprong Muang Fai System, Northern Thailand

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the management structure used by farmers in a large-scale muang fai irrigation system in northern Thailand in developing, managing, operating, and maintaining their irrigation system. A qualitative analysis of empirical data on the historical development, physical conditions, water distribution and maintenance practices as well as the organizational management of the Soprong muang fai group revealed that this system uses a participatory management structure. In order to cope with the large number of irrigation water users and widely dispersed irrigation areas, social organization, based on a village representation system, precedes hydraulic manipulation. Village irrigation delegates are nominated by village irrigation water users and endorsed by their village headmen to participate in inter-village irrigation management planning and to take charge of irrigation management within their villages. The effectiveness of this management structure hinges on the skills of the delegates and the muang fai manager, who is directly elected by members and thus accountable to all irrigation members regardless of their villages, in building a consensus on a practical inter-village irrigation management plan. The existence of a forum in which the delegates meet reduces information asymmetry across villages regarding water requirements and availability as well as physical and human conditions, and any issues that may cause distrust can be worked out. The common goal of the forum is to treat every village irrigation group and irrigation user equally by providing all of them with necessary irrigation water and with a clear, common water management, maintenance and cost-sharing plan. This plan, subsequently announced publicly by the muang fai manager as the agreement of the muang fai group, frames how each village irrigation delegate should organize the water management and maintenance in their respective villages and contribute to the Soprong group. The status of village irrigation delegates is such that they can use social sanctions against potential violators of the agreement with support from the muang fai manager and village headmen as needed. The peculiar distribution of canal maintenance costs in this system points out the delicacy needed in applying the principle of equality in large-scale systems