Comparative analysis of differential gene expression in two species of crucian carps in response to Cyprinid herpesvirus 2 (CyHV-2) infection

We assessed the expressions of MHCI, LYZC, keratin8, MPO, DUSP1, IκBα, Rab21, and Rac2 between two species of carps (Erqisi river crucian carp and allogynogenetic crucian carp) after Cyprinid herpesvirus 2 (CyHV-2) infection. The relative expressions of MHCI, LYZC, and keratin8 in the virus-challenged groups were significantly higher than control groups. Moreover, the expression of IκBα in the virus-challenged groups was significantly lower than in the control groups. Compared with the virus-challenged ERO group, the expression of IκBα in the virus-challenged ZHO group decreased. The expression of Rab21 in the virus-challenged groups gradually increased and was significantly higher than in the control groups, and then its expression began to decrease after 24 h. At 72 h, the expression of IκBα in both virus-challenged groups was significantly lower than in the control groups. In addition, the expression of Rab21 in the virus-challenged ZHO group was significantly higher than the virus-challenged ERO group at all time points except for 72 h. Before 24 h, the expression of Rac2 remained unchanged in these four groups, and its expression in the virus-challenged ZHO group was significantly higher than in the other three groups. Nevertheless, its expression began to decrease after 24 h but was still slightly higher than the control group at 72 h. MPO showed a similar expression pattern as Rac2. The expression of DUSP1 in the four groups was the same at 0 h. However, its expression in the virus-challenged ZHO group was significantly higher than in the other three groups at other time points

Structural basis for energy transfer in a huge diatom PSI-FCPI supercomplex

Diatom is an important group of marine algae and contributes to around 20% of the global photosynthetic carbon fixation. Photosystem I (PSI) of diatoms is associated with a large number of fucoxanthin-chlorophyll a/c proteins (FCPIs). We report the structure of PSI-FCPI from a diatom Chaetoceros gracilis at 2.38 Å resolution by single-particle cryo-electron microscopy. PSI-FCPI is a monomeric supercomplex consisting of 12 core and 24 antenna subunits (FCPIs), and 326 chlorophylls a, 34 chlorophylls c, 102 fucoxanthins, 35 diadinoxanthins, 18 β-carotenes and some electron transfer cofactors. Two subunits designated PsaR and PsaS were found in the core, whereas several subunits were lost. The large number of pigments constitute a unique and huge network ensuring efficient energy harvesting, transfer and dissipation. These results provide a firm structural basis for unraveling the mechanisms of light-energy harvesting, transfer and quenching in the diatom PSI-FCPI, and also important clues to evolutionary changes of PSI-LHCI

Phonological and phonetic evidence for trochaic metrical structure in Standard Chinese

Native speakers of Standard Chinese have significant difficulty judging the prominence of words with tones in a consistent way. How then can metrical structure in the language be diagnosed? This study approaches the question by investigating how metrical structure interacts with other aspects of phonology, especially tone; what foot type is used in the prosodic morphology; and in which acoustic dimensions metrical structure is more faithfully reflected. It proposes that Standard Chinese has a generalized trochee system — syllabic trochees are first created regardless of syllable weight, but when syllabic trochees cannot be created, bimoraic trochees are constructed. This hypothesis allows syllables with tones to be in unstressed positions, which makes correct predictions about the distribution of tone alternations and systematic acoustic patterns in tonal and segmental realization. The primary contribution of this study lies in disentangling the relationship among the acoustic correlates of stress, reported prominence judgments, and metrical structure. It shows that prominence judgment may diverge from metrical structure under the influence of a variety of factors, including tone and final lengthening; therefore, it is necessary to distinguish prominence judgment from metrical structure. The novelty of this study lies in the research methods that are developed to diagnose metrical structure in Standard Chinese. It draws attention to the interaction of phonology and morphology, providing new data about tone alternations triggered by metrical structure in morphological processes. It also establishes a new type of phonological evidence from text setting by examining the alignment of stress in lyrics with the rhythmic patterns in the musical tune. Instead of directly requesting speakers\u27 prominence judgments, text setting offers a window into how speakers unconsciously employ their metrical knowledge to perform a task. Phonetically, based on a large corpus study of Mandarin broadcast news speech, it investigates the realization of tones and segments relative to their tonal templates and articulatory targets in different metrical positions of words of various lengths and morphological structures. These methodologies can be extended to studies that address similar research questions

The placement of second-position subject clitics in Alsea

This paper aims to spell out the post-syntactic operations involved in the placement of second-position subject clitics in Alsea, an extinct language of the central Oregon coast. It assumes that the subject clitic is a syntactic head that is moved to a complementizer position in syntax, but is linearized in a post-syntactic morphological component in PF; operations in morphology account for the deviation of the subject clitic from its syntactic output position. Based on Buckley (1994), this paper proposes a two-stage post-syntactic derivation to account for the subject clitic distribution in Alsea: (i) concatenation, in which the subject clitic adjoins to an adjacent head of the same type to satisfy its suffixal requirement, (ii) prosodic readjustment, whereby a clitic whose morphological host is non-overt, leans rightward to procliticize to the first prosodic constituent.The Coyote Papers are made available by the Arizona Linguistics Circle at the University of Arizona and the University of Arizona Libraries. Contact [email protected] with questions about these materials

Phonological and phonetic evidence for trochaic metrical structure in Standard Chinese

Native speakers of Standard Chinese have significant difficulty judging the prominence of words with tones in a consistent way. How then can metrical structure in the language be diagnosed? This study approaches the question by investigating how metrical structure interacts with other aspects of phonology, especially tone; what foot type is used in the prosodic morphology; and in which acoustic dimensions metrical structure is more faithfully reflected. It proposes that Standard Chinese has a generalized trochee system — syllabic trochees are first created regardless of syllable weight, but when syllabic trochees cannot be created, bimoraic trochees are constructed. This hypothesis allows syllables with tones to be in unstressed positions, which makes correct predictions about the distribution of tone alternations and systematic acoustic patterns in tonal and segmental realization. The primary contribution of this study lies in disentangling the relationship among the acoustic correlates of stress, reported prominence judgments, and metrical structure. It shows that prominence judgment may diverge from metrical structure under the influence of a variety of factors, including tone and final lengthening; therefore, it is necessary to distinguish prominence judgment from metrical structure. The novelty of this study lies in the research methods that are developed to diagnose metrical structure in Standard Chinese. It draws attention to the interaction of phonology and morphology, providing new data about tone alternations triggered by metrical structure in morphological processes. It also establishes a new type of phonological evidence from text setting by examining the alignment of stress in lyrics with the rhythmic patterns in the musical tune. Instead of directly requesting speakers\u27 prominence judgments, text setting offers a window into how speakers unconsciously employ their metrical knowledge to perform a task. Phonetically, based on a large corpus study of Mandarin broadcast news speech, it investigates the realization of tones and segments relative to their tonal templates and articulatory targets in different metrical positions of words of various lengths and morphological structures. These methodologies can be extended to studies that address similar research questions

How iron-bearing minerals affect the biological reduction of Sb(V): A newly discovered function of nitrate reductase

As a toxic element of global concern, the elevated concentration of antimony (Sb) in the environment has attracted increasing attention. Microorganisms have been reported as important driving forces for Sb transformation. Iron (Fe) is the most important metal associated element of Sb, however, how Fe-bearing minerals affect the biological transformation of Sb is still unclear. In this study, the effects of Fe-bearing minerals on biological Sb(V) reduction were investigated by employing a marine Shewanella sp. CNZ-1 (CNZ-1). Our results showed that the presence of hematite, magnetite and ferrihydrite (1 g/L) resulted in a decrease in Sb(III) concentration of similar to 19-31 % compared to the Fe(III)-minerals free system. The calculated Sb(V) reduction rates are 0.0256 (R-2 0.71), 0.0389 (R-2 0.87), 0.0299 (R-2 0.96) and 0.0428 (R-2 0.95) h(-1) in the hematite-, magnetite-, ferrihydrite-supplemented and Fe(III)-minerals free systems, respectively. The cube-shaped Sb2O3 was characterized as a reductive product by using XRD, XPS, FTIR, TG and SEM approaches. Differential proteomic analysis showed that flagellar protein, cytochrome c, electron transfer flavoprotein, nitrate reductase and polysulfide reductase (up-regulation >1.5-fold, p value <0.05) were supposed to be included in the electron transport pathway of Sb(V) reduction by strain CNZ-1, and the key role of nitrate reductases was further highlighted during this reaction process based on the RT-qPCR and confirmatory experiments. Overall, these findings are beneficial to understand the environmental fate of Sb in the presence of Fe-bearing minerals and provide guidance in developing the bacteria/enzyme-mediated control strategy for Sb pollution

N-P Fertilization Inhibits Growth of Root Hemiparasite Pedicularis kansuensis in Natural Grassland

Fertilization has been shown to affect interactions between root hemiparasitic plants and their host plants, alleviating damage to the hosts by parasitism. However, as a majority of studies were conducted in pot cultivation, the influence of fertilizer application on root hemiparasites and the surrounding plant community in field conditions as well as relevant mechanisms remain unclear. We manipulated soil nutrient resources in a semi-arid subalpine grassland in the Tianshan Mountains, northwestern China, to explore the links between fertilization and plant community composition, productivity, survival, and growth of a weedy root hemiparasite (Pedicularis kansuensis). Nitrogen (at a low rate, LN, 30 kg N ha-1 year-1 as urea; or at a high rate, HN, 90 kg N ha-1 year-1 as urea) and phosphorus [100 kg ha-1 year-1 as Ca(H2PO4)2⋅H2O] were added during two growing seasons. Patterns of foliar nutrient balances were described with isometric log ratios for the different plant functional groups receiving these fertilization regimes. Fertilization with LN, HN, and P reduced above-ground biomass of P. kansuensis, with above-ground biomass in the fertilization treatments, respectively, 12, 1, and 39% of the value found in the unfertilized control. Up to three times more above-ground biomass was produced in graminoids receiving fertilizers, whereas forb above-ground biomass was virtually unchanged by the fertilization regimes and forb species richness was reduced by 52% in the HN treatment. Fertilization altered foliar nutrient balances, and distinct patterns emerged for each plant functional group. Foliar [C | P,N] balance in the plant community was negatively correlated with above-ground biomass (P = 0.03). The inhibited competitiveness of P. kansuensis, which showed a much higher [C | P,N] balance, could be attributed to reduced C assimilation rather than mineral nutrient acquisition, as shown by significant increase in foliar N and P concentrations but little increase in C concentration following fertilization