The reproductive capacity of Monk Parakeets Myiopsitta monachus is higher in their invasive range

Breeding parameters for Monk Parakeets Myiopsitta monachus nesting in Barcelona, Spain, were collected for 651 nests over five breeding seasons. This invasive population has a high reproductive capacity compared with the species in the native range: fledging success was double, the percentage of pairs attempting second broods three times higher and 55% of first-year birds bred compared with almost zero in South America

Perfil comparativo do transcriptoma em Psidium guajava L. e Psidium friedrichsthalianum fornece expressão gênica em resposta à resistencia ao Meloidogyne enterolobii.

A goiabeira (Psidium guajava L.), espécie tropical da América do Sul, é considerada uma frutífera de relevância econômica no Brasil. Entretanto, interações sinérgicas entre o nematoide Meloidogyne enterolobii e o fungo Fusarium solani nas raízes destas lantas acarretam a formação de galhas e apodrecimento das raízes. Nesse contexto, P. friedrichsthalianum (Araçá Costa Rica) foi identificada como espécie resistente ao nematoide. Para melhor entender a relação de suscetibilidade e resistência à infecção por M. enterolobii, foi realizado o sequenciamento do transcriptoma de folhas das espécies P. guajava L. e P. friedrichsthalianum (de plantas controle e de plantas inoculadas com o nematoide) pela metodologia de RNA-seq, seguida pela montagem de sequências. Foram obtidos 60.836 contigs com N50 de 786 pb utilizando o sequenciador ILLUMINA (Illumina HiSeq 2000). As transcrições foram anotadas via Genomes Kyoto (KEGG) e Gene Ontology (GO). Para as quatro bibliotecas disponibilizadas no NCBI (National Center for Biotetchnology Information) sob acesso PRJNA779437, realizou-se o mapeamento comparativo com o genoma de Eucalyptus grandis v2.0, por meio de ferramentas de bioinformática. Considerando os genes que possuem anotação no Phytozome e com expressão acima de 50 TPM, construíram-se um heatmap e uma rede de interação do tipo interactoma, com 68 genes. Desses, 21 estão intimamente relacionados à regulação dos fotossistemas I e II. Os demais estão envolvidos na produção de clorofila, rubisco e cadeia transportadora de elétrons. Também verificou-se alteração da expressão gênica relacionada às enzimas do estresse oxidativo, com redução de catalase, peroxidase e tiredoxina (mRNA splicing) em plantas de P. guajava inoculadas e aumento das mesmas enzimas em P. friedrichsthalianum na mesma condição. Com isso, sugere-se a ocorrência de um efeito sistêmico nas folhas de Psidium spp. como resposta à infecção nas raízes, refletido por alterações nas vias fotossintéticas. Adicionalmente, também ocorre alteração da expressão de genes relacionados ao metabolismo fenólico, atuante na defesa de plantas contra os estresses bióticos e abiótico

Repression of Flowering by the miR172 Target SMZ

The flowering repressors SMZ and FLM, members of the AP-2 and MADS domain transcription factor families, unexpectedly work together to regulate flowering time via their effects on expression of the FT gene

SEROLOGICAL DETECTION OF HEPATITIS A VIRUS IN FREE-RANGING NEOTROPICAL PRIMATES (Sapajus spp., Alouatta caraya) FROM THE PARANÁ RIVER BASIN, BRAZIL

Nonhuman primates are considered as the natural hosts of Hepatitis A virus (HAV), as well as other pathogens, and can serve as natural sentinels to investigate epizootics and endemic diseases that are of public health importance. During this study, blood samples were collected from 112 Neotropical primates (NTPs) (Sapajus nigritus and S. cay, n = 75; Alouatta caraya, n = 37) trap-captured at the Paraná River basin, Brazil, located between the States of Paraná and Mato Grosso do Sul. Anti-HAV IgG antibodies were detected in 4.5% (5/112) of NTPs, specifically in 6.7% (5/75) of Sapajus spp. and 0% (0/37) of A. caraya. In addition, all samples were negative for the presence of IgM anti-HAV antibodies. These results suggest that free-ranging NTPs were exposed to HAV within the geographical regions evaluated

Repression of FLOWERING LOCUS C and FLOWERING LOCUS T by the Arabidopsis Polycomb Repressive Complex 2 Components

Polycomb group (PcG) proteins are evolutionarily conserved in animals and plants, and play critical roles in the regulation of developmental gene expression. Here we show that the Arabidopsis Polycomb repressive complex 2 (PRC2) subunits CURLY LEAF (CLF), EMBRYONIC FLOWER 2 (EMF2) and FERTILIZATION INDEPENDENT ENDOSPERM (FIE) repress the expression of FLOWERING LOCUS C (FLC), a central repressor of the floral transition in Arabidopsis and FLC relatives. In addition, CLF directly interacts with and mediates the deposition of repressive histone H3 lysine 27 trimethylation (H3K27me3) into FLC and FLC relatives, which suppresses active histone H3 lysine 4 trimethylation (H3K4me3) in these loci. Furthermore, we show that during vegetative development CLF and FIE strongly repress the expression of FLOWERING LOCUS T (FT), a key flowering-time integrator, and that CLF also directly interacts with and mediates the deposition of H3K27me3 into FT chromatin. Our results suggest that PRC2-like complexes containing CLF, EMF2 and FIE, directly interact with and deposit into FT, FLC and FLC relatives repressive trimethyl H3K27 leading to the suppression of active H3K4me3 in these loci, and thus repress the expression of these flowering genes. Given the central roles of FLC and FT in flowering-time regulation in Arabidopsis, these findings suggest that the CLF-containing PRC2-like complexes play a significant role in control of flowering in Arabidopsis