Developing molecular genetic markers for grape breeding; using polymerase chain reaction procedures

Research Not

The degrees of development of the seed-coat and the endosperm as separate subtraits of stenospermocarpic seedlessness in grapes

The degree of development of the seed components, viz. seed coat and endosperm, were evaluated in seeds and seed traces of stenospermocarpic grapes of Vitis vinifera. The seeds in seedless and in seeded berries were classified visually into four categories of size: normal seeds, large traces, medium traces and small traces. Seeds with fully developed and sclerified seed coats were observed to bear endosperm at various developmental stages, and in seeds with soft and less developed seed coats also fully developed endosperms were observed. We found that the hardness of the seed coat and the degree of development of the endosperm were transmitted as separate traits to the progenies. Two seeded cultivars (Oz, Early Muscat) were chosen as female parents because they differed in seed hardness and in degree of development of their endosperm. The normal seeds of Oz are comparatively harder and contain less developed endosperm than those of Early Muscat. Each cultivar was crossed with the same pollen donor parent (Flame Seedless). 23.7 % of the Oz progeny were normally seeded offsprings bearing undeveloped or partially developed endosperm, while only 1.2 % of the Early Muscat progeny had such a composition of seed components. This suggests that seedlessness in grapes could be more precisely analysed using the hardness of the seed coat and the degree of development of the endosperm as subtraits of seedlessness.Die Entwicklungsgrade von Kernhülle und Endosperm als separate Untereigenschaften von stenospermokarper Kernlosigkeit bei RebenDie Entwicklungsgrade von Kernhüllen und Endosperm stenospermokarper Vitis vinifera-Sorten wurden untersucht. Die Kerne kernloser und kernhaltiger Beeren wurden visuell in 4 Größenkategorien eingeteilt: normal entwickelte Kerne, große, mittlere und kleine Kernspuren. Es wurde festgestellt, daß Kerne mit erhärteten, sklerifizierten und vollentwikkelten Kernhüllen mit Endosperm unterschiedlicher Entwicklungsgrade auftreten. In Kernen mit weichen oder wenig entwickelten Hüllen wurde auch vollentwickeltes Endosperm gefunden. Wir fanden, daß die Härte der Kernhülle und der Entwicklungsgrad des Endosperms den Nachkommen getrennt vererbt werden. Zwei kernhaltige Rebsorten (Oz und Early Muscat) wurden als weibliche Eltern gewählt, weil sie sich klar unterscheiden: die normalen Kerne von Oz sind härter und enthalten weniger entwickeltes Endosperm als die von Early Muscat. Jede Rehsorte wurde mit demselben Pollenspender (Flame Seedless) gekreuzt. 23,7% der Oz, aber nur 1,2% der Early Muscat hatten normale Kerne mit teilweise unentwickeltem Endosperm. Unsere Resultate deuten darauf hin, daß Kernlosigkeit in Weintrauben besser analysiert werden kann, wenn man Untereigenschaften (Härtegrad der Kernhülle und Entwicklungsgrad des Endosperms) benutzt

Genomic DNA fingerprinting of Vitis vinifera by the use of multi-loci probes

Charakterisierung genomischer DNA von Vitis vinifera mit Hilfe von ,,Multi-loci-Sonden"Durch Southern-Transfer von Restriktionsfragmenten genomischer DNA aus Vitis vinifera ließen sich Unterschiede zwischen verschiedenen Rebsorten aufzeigen; für die Hybridisierung wurden Sonden aus M 13-DNA und Human-33.6-Minisatelliten-DNA verwendet. Die Restriktionsenzyme Hinf I und Hae III waren für die Bestimmung sortenspezifischer DNA-Muster gleichermaßen geeignet. Die M 13-Sonde identifizierte in Verbindung mit beiden Enzymen etwa 3mal soviele Banden und zeigte viel mehr Abweichungen zwischen den Sorten auf als die Human-Minisatelliten-Sonde. Das Differenzierungsverfahren kann bei der Rebe zur Analyse der Abstammung, zur Definition von Merkmalen bei sortengeschützten Reben sowie für Züchtungsprogramme eingesetzt werden, sobald Korrelationen mit wirtschaftlich wichtigen Eigenschaften gesichert sind.

Organization of high-level visual cortex in human infants

How much of the structure of the human mind and brain is already specified at birth, and how much arises from experience? In this article, we consider the test case of extrastriate visual cortex, where a highly systematic functional organization is present in virtually every normal adult, including regions preferring behaviourally significant stimulus categories, such as faces, bodies, and scenes. Novel methods were developed to scan awake infants with fMRI, while they viewed multiple categories of visual stimuli. Here we report that the visual cortex of 4–6-month-old infants contains regions that respond preferentially to abstract categories (faces and scenes), with a spatial organization similar to adults. However, precise response profiles and patterns of activity across multiple visual categories differ between infants and adults. These results demonstrate that the large-scale organization of category preferences in visual cortex is adult-like within a few months after birth, but is subsequently refined through development.National Science Foundation (U.S.) (CCF-1231216

A high resolution genome-wide scan for significant selective sweeps: an application to pooled sequence data in laying chickens

In most studies aimed at localizing footprints of past selection, outliers at tails of the empirical distribution of a given test statistic are assumed to reflect locus-specific selective forces. Significance cutoffs are subjectively determined, rather than being related to a clear set of hypotheses. Here, we define an empirical p-value for the summary statistic by means of a permutation method that uses the observed SNP structure in the real data. To illustrate the methodology, we applied our approach to a panel of 2.9 million autosomal SNPs identified from re-sequencing a pool of 15 individuals from a brown egg layer line. We scanned the genome for local reductions in heterozygosity, suggestive of selective sweeps. We also employed a modified sliding window approach that accounts for gaps in the sequence and increases scanning resolution by moving the overlapping windows by steps of one SNP only, and suggest to call this a "creeping window" strategy. The approach confirmed selective sweeps in the region of previously described candidate genes, i.e. TSHR, PRL, PRLHR, INSR, LEPR, IGF1, and NRAMP1 when used as positive controls. The genome scan revealed 82 distinct regions with strong evidence of selection (genome-wide p-value<0.001), including genes known to be associated with eggshell structure and immune system such as CALB1 and GAL cluster, respectively. A substantial proportion of signals was found in poor gene content regions including the most extreme signal on chromosome 1. The observation of multiple signals in a highly selected layer line of chicken is consistent with the hypothesis that egg production is a complex trait controlled by many genes

Consensus Paper: Cerebellum and Social Cognition.

The traditional view on the cerebellum is that it controls motor behavior. Although recent work has revealed that the cerebellum supports also nonmotor functions such as cognition and affect, only during the last 5 years it has become evident that the cerebellum also plays an important social role. This role is evident in social cognition based on interpreting goal-directed actions through the movements of individuals (social "mirroring") which is very close to its original role in motor learning, as well as in social understanding of other individuals' mental state, such as their intentions, beliefs, past behaviors, future aspirations, and personality traits (social "mentalizing"). Most of this mentalizing role is supported by the posterior cerebellum (e.g., Crus I and II). The most dominant hypothesis is that the cerebellum assists in learning and understanding social action sequences, and so facilitates social cognition by supporting optimal predictions about imminent or future social interaction and cooperation. This consensus paper brings together experts from different fields to discuss recent efforts in understanding the role of the cerebellum in social cognition, and the understanding of social behaviors and mental states by others, its effect on clinical impairments such as cerebellar ataxia and autism spectrum disorder, and how the cerebellum can become a potential target for noninvasive brain stimulation as a therapeutic intervention. We report on the most recent empirical findings and techniques for understanding and manipulating cerebellar circuits in humans. Cerebellar circuitry appears now as a key structure to elucidate social interactions

Learning new sensorimotor contingencies:Effects of long-term use of sensory augmentation on the brain and conscious perception

Theories of embodied cognition propose that perception is shaped by sensory stimuli and by the actions of the organism. Following sensorimotor contingency theory, the mastery of lawful relations between own behavior and resulting changes in sensory signals, called sensorimotor contingencies, is constitutive of conscious perception. Sensorimotor contingency theory predicts that, after training, knowledge relating to new sensorimotor contingencies develops, leading to changes in the activation of sensorimotor systems, and concomitant changes in perception. In the present study, we spell out this hypothesis in detail and investigate whether it is possible to learn new sensorimotor contingencies by sensory augmentation. Specifically, we designed an fMRI compatible sensory augmentation device, the feelSpace belt, which gives orientation information about the direction of magnetic north via vibrotactile stimulation on the waist of participants. In a longitudinal study, participants trained with this belt for seven weeks in natural environment. Our EEG results indicate that training with the belt leads to changes in sleep architecture early in the training phase, compatible with the consolidation of procedural learning as well as increased sensorimotor processing and motor programming. The fMRI results suggest that training entails activity in sensory as well as higher motor centers and brain areas known to be involved in navigation. These neural changes are accompanied with changes in how space and the belt signal are perceived, as well as with increased trust in navigational ability. Thus, our data on physiological processes and subjective experiences are compatible with the hypothesis that new sensorimotor contingencies can be acquired using sensory augmentation

Sweet tastants stimulate adenylate cyclase coupled to GTP-binding protein in rat tongue membranes.

Sucrose and other saccharides, which produce an appealing taste in rats, were found to significantly stimulate the activity of adenylate cyclase in membranes derived from the anterior-dorsal region of rat tongue. In control membranes derived from either tongue muscle or tongue non-sensory epithelium, the effect of sugars on adenylate cyclase activity was either much smaller or absent. Sucrose enhanced adenylate cyclase activity in a dose-related manner, and this activation was dependent on the presence of guanine nucleotides, suggesting the involvement of a GTP-binding protein ('G-protein'). The activation of adenylate cyclase by various mono- and di-saccharides correlated with their electrophysiological potency. Among non-sugar sweeteners, sodium saccharin activated the enzyme, whereas aspartame and neohesperidin dihydrochalcone did not, in correlation with their sweet-taste effectiveness in the rat. Sucrose activation of the enzyme was partly inhibited by Cu2+ and Zn2+, in agreement with their effect on electrophysiological sweet-taste responses. Our results are consistent with a sweet-taste transduction mechanism involving specific receptors, a guanine-nucleotide-binding protein and the cyclic AMP-generating enzyme adenylate cyclase