Structural and Financial Characteristics of U.S. Farms: 2001 Family Farm Report

Family farms vary widely in size and other characteristics, ranging from very small retirement and residential farms to establishments with sales in the millions of dollars. The farm typology developed by the Economic Research Service (ERS) categorizes farms into groups based primarily on occupation of the operator and sales class of the farm. The typology groups reflect operators' expectations from farming, position in the life cycle, and dependence on agriculture. The groups differ in their importance to the farm sector, product specialization, program participation, and dependence on farm income. These (and other) differences are discussed in this report.Agricultural Resource Management Study (ARMS), family farms, farm businesses, farm financial situation, farm operator household income, farm operators, farm structure, farm typology, female farm operators, government payments, spouses of farm operators, taxes, Agricultural Finance, Farm Management,

Updated November 6, 2008

This report provides a summary of 2008 farm bill implementation, discusses provisions, and includes a farm bill debate timeline

Global Analysis of Gene Expression Profiles in Developing Physic Nut (Jatropha curcas L.) Seeds

Background: Physic nut (Jatropha curcas L.) is an oilseed plant species with high potential utility as a biofuel. Furthermore, following recent sequencing of its genome and the availability of expressed sequence tag (EST) libraries, it is a valuable model plant for studying carbon assimilation in endosperms of oilseed plants. There have been several transcriptomic analyses of developing physic nut seeds using ESTs, but they have provided limited information on the accumulation of stored resources in the seeds. Methodology/Principal Findings: We applied next-generation Illumina sequencing technology to analyze global gen

Evolution of the B3 DNA Binding Superfamily: New Insights into REM Family Gene Diversification

Background: The B3 DNA binding domain includes five families: auxin response factor (ARF), abscisic acid-insensitive3 (ABI3), high level expression of sugar inducible (HSI), related to ABI3/VP1 (RAV) and reproductive meristem (REM). The release of the complete genomes of the angiosperm eudicots Arabidopsis thaliana and Populus trichocarpa, the monocot Orysa sativa, the bryophyte Physcomitrella patens,the green algae Chlamydomonas reinhardtii and Volvox carteri and the red algae Cyanidioschyzon melorae provided an exceptional opportunity to study the evolution of this superfamily. Methodology: In order to better understand the origin and the diversification of B3 domains in plants, we combined comparative phylogenetic analysis with exon/intron structure and duplication events. In addition, we investigated the conservation and divergence of the B3 domain during the origin and evolution of each family. Conclusions: Our data indicate that showed that the B3 containing genes have undergone extensive duplication events, and that the REM family B3 domain has a highly diverged DNA binding. Our results also indicate that the founding member of the B3 gene family is likely to be similar to the ABI3/HSI genes found in C. reinhardtii and V. carteri. Among the B3 families, ABI3, HSI, RAV and ARF are most structurally conserved, whereas the REM family has experienced a rapid divergence. Thes