Insights into the Musa genome: Syntenic relationships to rice and between Musa species

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p><it>Musa </it>species (Zingiberaceae, Zingiberales) including bananas and plantains are collectively the fourth most important crop in developing countries. Knowledge concerning <it>Musa </it>genome structure and the origin of distinct cultivars has greatly increased over the last few years. Until now, however, no large-scale analyses of <it>Musa </it>genomic sequence have been conducted. This study compares genomic sequence in two <it>Musa </it>species with orthologous regions in the rice genome.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We produced 1.4 Mb of <it>Musa </it>sequence from 13 BAC clones, annotated and analyzed them along with 4 previously sequenced BACs. The 443 predicted genes revealed that Zingiberales genes share GC content and distribution characteristics with eudicot and Poaceae genomes. Comparison with rice revealed microsynteny regions that have persisted since the divergence of the Commelinid orders Poales and Zingiberales at least 117 Mya. The previously hypothesized large-scale duplication event in the common ancestor of major cereal lineages within the Poaceae was verified. The divergence time distributions for <it>Musa</it>-Zingiber (Zingiberaceae, Zingiberales) orthologs and paralogs provide strong evidence for a large-scale duplication event in the <it>Musa </it>lineage after its divergence from the Zingiberaceae approximately 61 Mya. Comparisons of genomic regions from <it>M. acuminata </it>and <it>M. balbisiana </it>revealed highly conserved genome structure, and indicated that these genomes diverged circa 4.6 Mya.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>These results point to the utility of comparative analyses between distantly-related monocot species such as rice and <it>Musa </it>for improving our understanding of monocot genome evolution. Sequencing the genome of <it>M. acuminata </it>would provide a strong foundation for comparative genomics in the monocots. In addition a genome sequence would aid genomic and genetic analyses of cultivated <it>Musa </it>polyploid genotypes in research aimed at localizing and cloning genes controlling important agronomic traits for breeding purposes.</p

Visual analysis of model in 3 and 4 years

At the age when the first controlled shapes productions appear, what are the visual analysis capacities of children? This article concentrated on the relation between visual analysis (number of gazes at the model) or the associated production in copy (conformity to the model) in children aged 3 and 4 and the production contexts. 53 children have to copy simple shapes (single shape copy task) and complex shapes (mixed shape copy task) in 3 contexts: graphic (producing a circle), drawing (completing a fish drawing with a bubble) or writing (completing a word with the letter “O”). Results showed that the number of gazes and the quality of copying in 3-4-year-old children depend both on model complexity and on the context in which the child must produce the target form. The results of this study highlight the role of representation and visual-graphic constraints in the copying task

Reconnaissance d’une émotion chez les enfants de 3 à 5 ans : effets de la nature du support (image/photographie) et du type d’indices visuels traités (globaux, dirigés, focalisés)

International audienc

L’acquisition de l’écriture chez les enfants de 3 à 8 ans: étude évolutive transverse

National audienc

Écrire avant de savoir écrire. Acquisition de l'écrit chez les enfants de trois à huit ans

A la suite des travaux de Tolchinsky Landsmann & Levin (1985) et Ferreiro et Gomez Palacio (1988), ce travail analyse le développement de l'écrit avant et au début de son apprentissage scolaire. Il explore, à travers une série d'expérimentations, la nature du lien initial entre le dessin et l'écriture, et la façon dont l'enfant différencie ces deux systèmes de notation pour s'approprier l'écrit de façon pratique et conceptuelle. La dynamique de cette acquisition est étudiée sous trois angles : (1) l'évolution du système écrit à partir des performances d'enfants d'âges différents dans des taches d'écriture, de choix de mots et d'explicitation, (2) l'influence, sur ces performances, de la difficulté vs facilité des notations (dessin et écriture) et (3) l'analyse des trajectoires individuelles susceptibles de renvoyer à différentes voies d'accès à l'écrit. Les résultats montrent que la façon dont les enfants de 3 ans écrivent est influencée par la difficulté du dessin alors que celle des enfants plus âgés varie en fonction de la difficulté " phonologique " du mot à écrire bien qu'elle reste longtemps " contaminée " par les propriétés spatiales de l'objet ou du dessin référent. Tous les enfants progressent d'une écriture " picturale " à l'établissement des rapports phonèmes/graphèmes. Cependant, les trajectoires individuelles et les changements de stratégie mis en évidence par l'étude évolutive transverse montrent que, entre 3 et 5 ans, il existe plusieurs voies d'entrée dans l'écrit qui, sous l'effet de l'apprentissage formel, convergent vers l'écriture phonographémique et orthographique. Les résultats sont discutés en terme de différenciation dessin-écriture et de variabilité inter et intra-individuelle (changements de stratégies ou adaptation d'une stratégie, connaissances implicites et explicitables). Des implications pédagogiques relatives aux rapports dessin-écriture et lecture-écriture dans l'apprentissage de l'écrit sont proposées.Following Tolchinsky Landsmann and Levin (1985) et Ferreiro and Gomez Palacio (1988) studies, this work focused on writing and reading development before school learning. Based on three experiments, our study explored the relationship between drawing and writting, and the way children differenciated these two notationnal systems as they acquired writting-reading, at both practical and conceptual levels. Writting acquisition dynamics was studied at three major levels: (1) the writting system evolution from different aged children performances who were administred writing, words choice and explicitation tasks, (2) the way the difficulty of the notation (drawing and writing) influenced children performances, (3) and the analysis of individual developmental patterns which should provide evidence of different ways to access writing. Our results showed that the way 3 years old children wrote was influenced by drawing difficulty whereas older children were influenced by the phonological difficulty level of target word. Nevertheless we still observed spatial properties effects from target object/drawing. Every children progress from pictural writing to phonemic awarness. Nevertheless, developmental patterns profiles and strategy changes, supported by our longitudinal study, revealed from 3 to 5, several ways to access writing-reading. Because of institutional learning, these different ways converged to phonographemic and spelling writing. Results were discussed in terms of writing-drawing differenciation as well as within and between variability (strategy changes or strategy adaptation, implicit and explicit knowledges). Teaching implications on drawing-wrting and writing-reading links on learning were proposed.MONTPELLIER-BU Lettres (341722103) / SudocSudocFranceF

Interventions éducatives, pédagogiques et thérapeutiques proposées dans l'autisme

Rapport

French Children’s emotional norms for a set of 180 stimuli

The present study provides a French child database for a corpus of 90 words and 90 pictures. These stimuli were rated on emotional valence (negative, neutral and positive) by 178 French children differing in age (4, 5 and 6-year-old) and sex (boys and girls). These ratings were collected into three modalities: words only, pictures only, and lastly, words and pictures combined

Belmon, J., Noyer-Martin, M. & Jhean-Larose, S. (2022). Differences in children emotional valence ratings of words and pictures

International audience"Words and pictures stimuli are often used in study of perception, language, and memory. More and more studies are being done on how emotional words or pictures influence different cognitive processing. However, the emotional rating process of these stimuli has rarely been studied in young children. Especially, no study has investigated emotional rating process on pre-schoolers. This research examines how young children process emotional words and pictures stimuli. More precisely, we measured age (4, 5, and 6-years-old) and sex differences (girls and boys) in emotional valence rating of pictures and words. A corpus of 90 words and 90 pictures was selected from among the emotional databases compiled by Alario & Ferrand (1999), Bonin et al. (2003), Cannard et al. (2006) Syssau & Monnier (2009). This corpus was rated by 92 French children (28 four-years-old children, 16 girls and 12 boys; 34 five-years-old children, 14 girls and 20 boys; and 30 six-years-old children, 13 girls and 17 boys). These ratings were made using a three points emotional valence rating scale (negative, neutral, and positive) based on AEJE scale (Largy, 2018). To keep the rating task simple for the children, the scale labels were using drawings of faces. The 90 Words and 90 pictures were divided in sets of 15 stimuli. Each child rated all sets of stimuli in separate sessions. These sessions were in a random order between words and pictures stimuli sets. Good response reliability was observed in the three age groups. We assessed age differences in the valence ratings: Four-year-old children shown lower mean scores in valence rating (positive, neutral, and negative) than did five-year-old ones who shown lower mean scores in valence rating than did six-year-old ones. Despite a lack of consensus in the literature, we found sex differences in the valence ratings. Girls in each age groups shown higher mean scores in valence rating than did boys. Moreover, results shown a significant difference between pictures and words ratings. Children better rated words than pictures in each age group and sex. Besides, analyses revealed significant differences in emotional valence rating between negative, neutral, and positive words and pictures stimuli. Positive words and pictures stimuli were better rated by children than negative ones which were better rated than neutral ones. Future research will compile this corpus in a database, and it could become a worthwhile tool to control emotional verbal and visual stimuli in experimental design for children.