Deep Sequencing Analysis Of Rnas From Citrus Plants Grown In A Citrus Sudden Death–affected Area Reveals Diverse Known And Putative Novel Viruses

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)Citrus sudden death (CSD) has caused the death of approximately four million orange trees in a very important citrus region in Brazil. Although its etiology is still not completely clear, symptoms and distribution of affected plants indicate a viral disease. In a search for viruses associated with CSD, we have performed a comparative high-throughput sequencing analysis of the transcriptome and small RNAs from CSD-symptomatic and -asymptomatic plants using the Illumina platform. The data revealed mixed infections that included Citrus tristeza virus (CTV) as the most predominant virus, followed by the Citrus sudden death-associated virus (CSDaV), Citrus endogenous pararetrovirus (CitPRV) and two putative novel viruses tentatively named Citrus jingmen-like virus (CJLV), and Citrus virga-like virus (CVLV). The deep sequencing analyses were sensitive enough to differentiate two genotypes of both viruses previously associated with CSD-affected plants: CTV and CSDaV. Our data also showed a putative association of the CSD-symptomatic plants with a specific CSDaV genotype and a likely association with CitPRV as well, whereas the two putative novel viruses showed to be more associated with CSD-asymptomatic plants. This is the first high-throughput sequencing-based study of the viral sequences present in CSD-affected citrus plants, and generated valuable information for further CSD studies. © 2017 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license.94119CNPq, Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e TecnológicoConselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq

Classificação dos Sedimentos Superficiais de Fundo do Rio de la Plata e Plataforma Continental Adjacente através da Análise de Agrupamento

A aplicação da análise de agrupamento (Cluster Analysis) sobre os parâmetros estatísticos (média, mediana, desvio padrão, curtose, assimetria e primeiro percentil) correspondente aos sedimentos superficiais do fundo do Rio de la Plata e da plataforma continental interna adjacente permitiu observar a presença de três tipos diferentes de agrupamentos. Para o primeiro agrupamento, onde foram considerados os parâmetros estatísticos categorizados sem incluir a profundidade e com distância de corte do dendrograma dij = 10, foi possível distinguir cinco grupos de sedimentos diferentes: 1. lama arenosa; 2. areias; 3. cascalho arenoso; 4. lamas e lamas arenosas e 5. argila siltosa. No segundo agrupamento, além dos parâmetros estatísticos, foi também considerada a profundidade, obtendo-se a seguinte classificação dos sedimentos: 1. sedimentos de zonas costeiras até a isóbata de -20m; 2. sedimentos de zonas rasas entre -20 e -30m; 3. sedimentos de zonas intermediárias entre -30 e -55m; 4. sedimentos de plataforma interna entre -55 e -70m e 5. sedimentos transicionais em profundidades superiores a -70m. Para o terceiro agrupamento, foram utilizados somente os parâmetros estatísticos, diminuindo a distância do corte do dendrograma para dij = 5. Foram identificados 7 grupos: 1. siltes  finos e argilas com areias; 2. areias finas lamosas; 3. areias médias ou grossas; 4. areias finas e muito finas; 5. cascalho arenoso; 6. siltes e 7. argila siltosa. A aplicação da análise de agrupamento hierárquico sobre os parâmetros texturais, sem considerar a profundidade, permitiram diferenciar os principais mecanismos deposicionais e de transporte que atuaram para gerar os depósitos dos sedimentos superficiais de fundo na área em estudo, bem como definir a presença dos mesmos, produzidos por processos diferentes dos atuais

D-braneworld cosmology

We discuss D-braneworld cosmology, that is, the brane is described by the Born-Infeld action. Compared with the usual Randall-Sundrum braneworld cosmology where the brane action is the Nambu-Goto one, we can see some drastic changes at the very early universe: (i)universe may experience the rapid accelerating phase (ii)the closed universe may avoid the initial singularity. We also briefly address the dynamics of the cosmology in the open string metric, which might be favorer than the induced metric from the view point of the D-brane.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, minor corrections, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.

Observational Constraints on Chaplygin Quartessence: Background Results

We derive the constraints set by several experiments on the quartessence Chaplygin model (QCM). In this scenario, a single fluid component drives the Universe from a nonrelativistic matter-dominated phase to an accelerated expansion phase behaving, first, like dark matter and in a more recent epoch like dark energy. We consider current data from SNIa experiments, statistics of gravitational lensing, FR IIb radio galaxies, and x-ray gas mass fraction in galaxy clusters. We investigate the constraints from this data set on flat Chaplygin quartessence cosmologies. The observables considered here are dependent essentially on the background geometry, and not on the specific form of the QCM fluctuations. We obtain the confidence region on the two parameters of the model from a combined analysis of all the above tests. We find that the best-fit occurs close to the $\Lambda$CDM limit ($\alpha=0$). The standard Chaplygin quartessence ($\alpha=1$) is also allowed by the data, but only at the $\sim2\sigma$ level.Comment: Replaced to match the published version, references update

Kinase Inhibitor Profile For Human Nek1, Nek6, And Nek7 And Analysis Of The Structural Basis For Inhibitor Specificity

Human Neks are a conserved protein kinase family related to cell cycle progression and cell division and are considered potential drug targets for the treatment of cancer and other pathologies. We screened the activation loop mutant kinases hNek1 and hNek2, wild-type hNek7, and five hNek6 variants in different activation/phosphorylation statesand compared them against 85 compounds using thermal shift denaturation. We identified three compounds with significant Tm shifts: JNK Inhibitor II for hNek1(Ä262-1258)-(T162A), Isogranulatimide for hNek6(S206A), and GSK-3 Inhibitor XIII for hNek7wt. Each one of these compounds was also validated by reducing the kinases activity by at least 25%. The binding sites for these compounds were identified by in silico docking at the ATP-binding site of the respective hNeks. Potential inhibitors were first screened by thermal shift assays, had their efficiency tested by a kinase assay, and were finally analyzed by molecular docking. 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