Early growth of field-grown swiss flint maize landraces

Mild cold stress (chilling) limits early growth of maize (Zea mays L.) in central and northern Europe. Introgression of chilling tolerance from landraces has been proposed, because the genetic basis for chilling tolerance of European Flint x Dent hybrids is small. Therefore, the aim of this study was a detailed characterization of the chilling toler¬ance of Swiss maize landraces, hypothesizing a relatively good performance in marginal thermal environments. The environments were set up by different sowing dates in two years. A functional growth analysis of the shoot from the one-leaf to the six-leaf stage was conducted with eight Swiss landraces and a check hybrid (Magister). The mean air temperature calculated across the six environments was above 15°C. Under these conditions, none of the landraces grew consistently better than Magister. Some landrace-specific relative growth reactions were observed compared to Magister, apparently due to strong changes in the temperature course. However, based on this study direct use of Swiss maize landraces in breeding for the improvement of chilling tolerance is not recom¬mended. More detailed investigations of promising landraces are proposed

Early growth of field-grown swiss flint maize landraces

Mild cold stress (chilling) limits early growth of maize (Zea mays L.) in central and northern Europe. Introgression of chilling tolerance from landraces has been proposed, because the genetic basis for chilling tolerance of European Flint x Dent hybrids is small. Therefore, the aim of this study was a detailed characterization of the chilling toler¬ance of Swiss maize landraces, hypothesizing a relatively good performance in marginal thermal environments. The environments were set up by different sowing dates in two years. A functional growth analysis of the shoot from the one-leaf to the six-leaf stage was conducted with eight Swiss landraces and a check hybrid (Magister). The mean air temperature calculated across the six environments was above 15°C. Under these conditions, none of the landraces grew consistently better than Magister. Some landrace-specific relative growth reactions were observed compared to Magister, apparently due to strong changes in the temperature course. However, based on this study direct use of Swiss maize landraces in breeding for the improvement of chilling tolerance is not recom¬mended. More detailed investigations of promising landraces are proposed

Genome-wide Analyses Identify KIF5A as a Novel ALS Gene

To identify novel genes associated with ALS, we undertook two lines of investigation. We carried out a genome-wide association study comparing 20,806 ALS cases and 59,804 controls. Independently, we performed a rare variant burden analysis comparing 1,138 index familial ALS cases and 19,494 controls. Through both approaches, we identified kinesin family member 5A (KIF5A) as a novel gene associated with ALS. Interestingly, mutations predominantly in the N-terminal motor domain of KIF5A are causative for two neurodegenerative diseases: hereditary spastic paraplegia (SPG10) and Charcot-Marie-Tooth type 2 (CMT2). In contrast, ALS-associated mutations are primarily located at the C-terminal cargo-binding tail domain and patients harboring loss-of-function mutations displayed an extended survival relative to typical ALS cases. Taken together, these results broaden the phenotype spectrum resulting from mutations in KIF5A and strengthen the role of cytoskeletal defects in the pathogenesis of ALS.Peer reviewe

Computational pan-genomics: Status, promises and challenges

Many disciplines, from human genetics and oncology to plant breeding, microbiology and virology, commonly face the challenge of analyzing rapidly increasing numbers of genomes. In case of Homo sapiens, the number of sequenced genomes will approach hundreds of thousands in the next few years. Simply scaling up established bioinformatics pipelines will not be sufficient for leveraging the full potential of such rich genomic data sets. Instead, novel, qualitatively different Computational methods and paradigms are needed.We will witness the rapid extension of Computational pan-genomics, a new sub-area of research in Computational biology. In this article, we generalize existing definitions and understand a pangenome as any collection of genomic sequences to be analyzed jointly or to be used as a reference. We examine already available approaches to construct and use pan-genomes, discuss the potential benefits of future technologies and methodologies and review open challenges from the vantage point of the above-mentioned biological disciplines. As a prominent example for a Computational paradigm shift, we particularly highlight the transition from the representation of reference genomes as strings to representations