Generalized Geologic Map for Land-Use Planning: Jessamine County, Kentucky

This map is not intended to be used for selecting individual sites. Its purpose is to inform land-use planners, government officials, and the public in a general way about geologic bedrock conditions that affect the selection of sites for various purposes. The properties of thick soils may supercede those of the underlying bedrock and should be considered on a site to site basis. At any site, it is important to understand both the soils, and the underlying rock

Generalized Geologic Map for Land-Use Planning: Berea 7.5-Minute Quadrangle, Kentucky

This map is not intended to be used for selecting individual sites. Its purpose is to inform land-use planners, government officials, and the public in a general way about geologic conditions that affect the selection of sites for various purposes. Site-specific investigations should be made by a professional geologist

Generalized Geologic Map for Land-Use Planning: Lexington and Fayette County, Kentucky

This map is not intended to be used for selecting individual sites. Its purpose is to inform land-use planners, government officials, and the public in a general way about geologic bedrock conditions that affect the selection of sites for various purposes

Generalized Geologic Map for Land-Use Planning: Woodford County, Kentucky

This map is not intended to be used for selecting individual sites. Its purpose is to inform land-use planners, government officials, and the public in a general way about geologic bedrock conditions that affect the selection of sites for various purposes. The properties of thick soils may supercede those of the underlying bedrock and should be considered on a site to site basis. At any site, it is important to understand both the soils, and the underlying rock

Correction: The Complete Sequence of the Acacia ligulata Chloroplast Genome Reveals a Highly Divergent clpP1 Gene

The authors would like to amend this article based on the discovery that the originally published Acacia ligulata sequence contains assembly errors, which came to light after the publication of the article

Authentication scheme for routine verification of genetically similar laboratory colonies: a trial with Anopheles gambiae

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>When rearing morphologically indistinguishable laboratory strains concurrently, the threat of unintentional genetic contamination is constant. Avoidance of accidental mixing of strains is difficult due to the use of common equipment, technician error, or the possibility of self relocation by adult mosquitoes ("free fliers"). In many cases, laboratory strains are difficult to distinguish because of morphological and genetic similarity, especially when laboratory colonies are isolates of certain traits from the same parental strain, such as eye color mutants, individuals with certain chromosomal arrangements or high levels of insecticide resistance. Thus, proving genetic integrity could seem incredibly time-consuming or impossible. On the other hand, lacking proof of genetically isolated laboratory strains could question the validity of research results.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We present a method for establishing authentication matrices to routinely distinguish and confirm that laboratory strains have not become physically or genetically mixed through contamination events in the laboratory. We show a specific example with application to <it>Anopheles gambiae sensu stricto </it>strains at the Malaria Research and Reference Reagent Resource Center. This authentication matrix is essentially a series of tests yielding a strain-specific combination of results.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>These matrix-based methodologies are useful for several mosquito and insect populations but must be specifically tailored and altered for each laboratory based on the potential contaminants available at any given time. The desired resulting authentication plan would utilize the least amount of routine effort possible while ensuring the integrity of the strains.</p

Maternal age effect and severe germ-line bottleneck in the inheritance of human mitochondrial DNA

The manifestation of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) diseases depends on the frequency of heteroplasmy (the presence of several alleles in an individual), yet its transmission across generations cannot be readily predicted owing to a lack of data on the size of the mtDNA bottleneck during oogenesis. For deleterious heteroplasmies, a severe bottleneck may abruptly transform a benign (low) frequency in a mother into a disease-causing (high) frequency in her child. Here we present a high-resolution study of heteroplasmy transmission conducted on blood and buccal mtDNA of 39 healthy mother–child pairs of European ancestry (a total of 156 samples, each sequenced at ∼20,000× per site). On average, each individual carried one heteroplasmy, and one in eight individuals carried a disease-associated heteroplasmy, with minor allele frequency ≥1%. We observed frequent drastic heteroplasmy frequency shifts between generations and estimated the effective size of the germ-line mtDNA bottleneck at only ∼30–35 (interquartile range from 9 to 141). Accounting for heteroplasmies, we estimated the mtDNA germ-line mutation rate at 1.3 × 10−8 (interquartile range from 4.2 × 10−9 to 4.1 × 10−8) mutations per site per year, an order of magnitude higher than for nuclear DNA. Notably, we found a positive association between the number of heteroplasmies in a child and maternal age at fertilization, likely attributable to oocyte aging. This study also took advantage of droplet digital PCR (ddPCR) to validate heteroplasmies and confirm a de novo mutation. Our results can be used to predict the transmission of disease-causing mtDNA variants and illuminate evolutionary dynamics of the mitochondrial genome

The Evolution of the Anopheles 16 Genomes Project

We report the imminent completion of a set of reference genome assemblies for 16 species of Anopheles mosquitoes. In addition to providing a generally useful resource for comparative genomic analyses, these genome sequences will greatly facilitate exploration of the capacity exhibited by some Anopheline mosquito species to serve as vectors for malaria parasites. A community analysis project will commence soon to perform a thorough comparative genomic investigation of these newly sequenced genomes. Completion of this project via the use of short next-generation sequence reads required innovation in both the bioinformatic and laboratory realms, and the resulting knowledge gained could prove useful for genome sequencing projects targeting other unconventional genomes

Increased ventral striatal volume in college-aged binge drinkers

BACKGROUND Binge drinking is a serious public health issue associated with cognitive, physiological, and anatomical differences from healthy individuals. No studies, however, have reported subcortical grey matter differences in this population. To address this, we compared the grey matter volumes of college-age binge drinkers and healthy controls, focusing on the ventral striatum, hippocampus and amygdala. METHOD T1-weighted images of 19 binge drinkers and 19 healthy volunteers were analyzed using voxel-based morphometry. Structural data were also covaried with Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) scores. Cluster-extent threshold and small volume corrections were both used to analyze imaging data. RESULTS Binge drinkers had significantly larger ventral striatal grey matter volumes compared to controls. There were no between group differences in hippocampal or amygdalar volume. Ventral striatal, amygdalar, and hippocampal volumes were also negatively related to AUDIT scores across groups. CONCLUSIONS Our findings stand in contrast to the lower ventral striatal volume previously observed in more severe forms of alcohol use disorders, suggesting that college-age binge drinkers may represent a distinct population from those groups. These findings may instead represent early sequelae, compensatory effects of repeated binge and withdrawal, or an endophenotypic risk factor

Introducing a new breed of wine yeast: interspecific hybridisation between a commercial Saccharomyces cerevisiae wine yeast and Saccharomyces mikatae

Interspecific hybrids are commonplace in agriculture and horticulture; bread wheat and grapefruit are but two examples. The benefits derived from interspecific hybridisation include the potential of generating advantageous transgressive phenotypes. This paper describes the generation of a new breed of wine yeast by interspecific hybridisation between a commercial Saccharomyces cerevisiae wine yeast strain and Saccharomyces mikatae, a species hitherto not associated with industrial fermentation environs. While commercially available wine yeast strains provide consistent and reliable fermentations, wines produced using single inocula are thought to lack the sensory complexity and rounded palate structure obtained from spontaneous fermentations. In contrast, interspecific yeast hybrids have the potential to deliver increased complexity to wine sensory properties and alternative wine styles through the formation of novel, and wider ranging, yeast volatile fermentation metabolite profiles, whilst maintaining the robustness of the wine yeast parent. Screening of newly generated hybrids from a cross between a S. cerevisiae wine yeast and S. mikatae (closely-related but ecologically distant members of the Saccharomyces sensu stricto clade), has identified progeny with robust fermentation properties and winemaking potential. Chemical analysis showed that, relative to the S. cerevisiae wine yeast parent, hybrids produced wines with different concentrations of volatile metabolites that are known to contribute to wine flavour and aroma, including flavour compounds associated with non-Saccharomyces species. The new S. cerevisiae x S. mikatae hybrids have the potential to produce complex wines akin to products of spontaneous fermentation while giving winemakers the safeguard of an inoculated ferment.Jennifer R. Bellon, Frank Schmid, Dimitra L. Capone, Barbara L. Dunn, Paul J. Chamber