Fine Mapping of a Novel Heading Date Gene, TaHdm605, in Hexaploid Wheat

The heading date is critical in determining the adaptability of plants to specific natural environments. Molecular characterization of the wheat genes that regulate heading not only enhances our understanding of the mechanisms underlying wheat heading regulation but also benefits wheat breeding programs by improving heading phenotypes. In this study, we characterized a late heading date mutant, m605, obtained by ethyl methanesulfonate (EMS) mutation. Compared with its wild-type parent, YZ4110, m605 was at least 7 days late in heading when sown in autumn. This late heading trait was controlled by a single recessive gene named TaHdm605. Genetic mapping located the TaHdm605 locus between the molecular markers cfd152 and barc42 on chromosome 3DL using publicly available markers and then further mapped this locus to a 1.86 Mb physical genomic region containing 26 predicted genes. This fine genetic and physical mapping will be helpful for the future map-based cloning of TaHdm605 and for breeders seeking to engineer changes in the wheat heading date trait

Hand, foot and mouth disease in China: Evaluating an automated system for the detection of outbreaks

Objective To evaluate the performance of China's infectious disease automated alert and response system in the detection of outbreaks of hand, foot and mouth (HFM) disease. Methods We estimated size, duration and delay in reporting HFM disease outbreaks from cases notified between 1 May 2008 and 30 April 2010 and between 1 May 2010 and 30 April 2012, before and after automatic alert and response included HFM disease. Sensitivity, specificity and timeliness of detection of aberrations in the incidence of HFM disease outbreaks were estimated by comparing automated detections to observations of public health staff. Findings The alert and response system recorded 106 005 aberrations in the incidence of HFM disease between 1 May 2010 and 30 April 2012 - a mean of 5.6 aberrations per 100 days in each county that reported HFM disease. The response system had a sensitivity of 92.7% and a specificity of 95.0%. The mean delay between the reporting of the first case of an outbreak and detection of that outbreak by the response system was 2.1 days. Between the first and second study periods, the mean size of an HFM disease outbreak decreased from 19.4 to 15.8 cases and the mean interval between the onset and initial reporting of such an outbreak to the public health emergency reporting system decreased from 10.0 to 9.1 days. Conclusion The automated alert and response system shows good sensitivity in the detection of HFM disease outbreaks and appears to be relatively rapid. Continued use of this system should allow more effective prevention and limitation of such outbreaks in China

IGFBP2 Plays an Essential Role in Cognitive Development during Early Life

Identifying the mechanisms underlying cognitive development in early life is a critical objective. The expression of insulin-like growth factor binding protein 2 (IGFBP2) in the hippocampus increases during neonatal development and is associated with learning and memory, but a causal connection has not been established. Here, it is reported that neurons and astrocytes expressing IGFBP2 are distributed throughout the hippocampus. IGFBP2 enhances excitatory inputs onto CA1 pyramidal neurons, facilitating intrinsic excitability and spike transmission, and regulates plasticity at excitatory synapses in a cell-type specific manner. It facilitates long-term potentiation (LTP) by enhancing N-methyl-d-aspartate (NMDA) receptor-dependent excitatory postsynaptic current (EPSC), and enhances neurite proliferation and elongation. Knockout of igfbp2 reduces the numbers of pyramidal cells and interneurons, impairs LTP and cognitive performance, and reduces tonic excitation of pyramidal neurons that are all rescued by IGFBP2. The results provide insight into the requirement for IGFBP2 in cognition in early life

Molecular characterization of 60 isolated wheat MYB genes and analysis of their expression during abiotic stress

The proteins of the MYB superfamily play central roles in developmental processes and defence responses in plants. Sixty unique wheat MYB genes that contain full-length cDNA sequences were isolated. These 60 genes were grouped into three categories, namely one R1R2R3-MYB, 22 R2R3-MYBs, and 37 MYB-related members. The sequence composition of the R2 and R3 repeats was conserved among the 22 wheat R2R3-MYB proteins. Phylogenetic comparison of the members of this superfamily among wheat, rice, and Arabidopsis revealed that the putative functions of some wheat MYB proteins were clustered into the Arabidopsis functional clades. Tissue-specific expression profiles showed that most of the wheat MYB genes were expressed in all of the tissues examined, suggesting that wheat MYB genes take part in multiple cellular processes. The expression analysis during abiotic stress identified a group of MYB genes that respond to one or more stress treatments. The overexpression of a salt-inducible gene, TaMYB32, enhanced the tolerance to salt stress in transgenic Arabidopsis. This study is the first comprehensive study of the MYB gene family in Triticeae

Transcriptome Analysis of H2O2-Treated Wheat Seedlings Reveals a H2O2-Responsive Fatty Acid Desaturase Gene Participating in Powdery Mildew Resistance

Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) plays important roles in plant biotic and abiotic stress responses. However, the effect of H2O2 stress on the bread wheat transcriptome is still lacking. To investigate the cellular and metabolic responses triggered by H2O2, we performed an mRNA tag analysis of wheat seedlings under 10 mM H2O2 treatment for 6 hour in one powdery mildew (PM) resistant (PmA) and two susceptible (Cha and Han) lines. In total, 6,156, 6,875 and 3,276 transcripts were found to be differentially expressed in PmA, Han and Cha respectively. Among them, 260 genes exhibited consistent expression patterns in all three wheat lines and may represent a subset of basal H2O2 responsive genes that were associated with cell defense, signal transduction, photosynthesis, carbohydrate metabolism, lipid metabolism, redox homeostasis, and transport. Among genes specific to PmA, ‘transport’ activity was significantly enriched in Gene Ontology analysis. MapMan classification showed that, while both up- and down- regulations were observed for auxin, abscisic acid, and brassinolides signaling genes, the jasmonic acid and ethylene signaling pathway genes were all up-regulated, suggesting H2O2-enhanced JA/Et functions in PmA. To further study whether any of these genes were involved in wheat PM response, 19 H2O2-responsive putative defense related genes were assayed in wheat seedlings infected with Blumeria graminis f. sp. tritici (Bgt). Eight of these genes were found to be co-regulated by H2O2 and Bgt, among which a fatty acid desaturase gene TaFAD was then confirmed by virus induced gene silencing (VIGS) to be required for the PM resistance. Together, our data presents the first global picture of the wheat transcriptome under H2O2 stress and uncovers potential links between H2O2 and Bgt responses, hence providing important candidate genes for the PM resistance in wheat

A Space-Time Fully Decoupled Wavelet Integral Collocation Method with High-Order Accuracy for a Class of Nonlinear Wave Equations

A space-time fully decoupled wavelet integral collocation method (WICM) with high-order accuracy is proposed for the solution of a class of nonlinear wave equations. With this method, wave equations with various nonlinearities are first transformed into a system of ordinary differential equations (ODEs) with respect to the highest-order spatial derivative values at spatial nodes, in which all the matrices in the resulting nonlinear ODEs are constants over time. As a result, these matrices generated in the spatial discretization do not need to be updated in the time integration, such that a fully decoupling between spatial and temporal discretization can be achieved. A linear multi-step method based on the same wavelet approximation used in the spatial discretization is then employed to solve such a semi-discretization system. By numerically solving several widely considered benchmark problems, including the Klein/sine–Gordon equation and the generalized Benjamin–Bona–Mahony–Burgers equation, we demonstrate that the proposed wavelet algorithm possesses much better accuracy and a faster convergence rate than many existing numerical methods. Most interestingly, the space-associated convergence rate of the present WICM is always about order 6 for different equations with various nonlinearities, which is in the same order with direct approximation of a function in terms of the proposed wavelet approximation scheme. This fact implies that the accuracy of the proposed method is almost independent of the equation order and nonlinearity

An Explicit Wavelet Method for Solution of Nonlinear Fractional Wave Equations

An explicit method for solving time fractional wave equations with various nonlinearity is proposed using techniques of Laplace transform and wavelet approximation of functions and their integrals. To construct this method, a generalized Coiflet with N vanishing moments is adopted as the basis function, where N can be any positive even number. As has been shown, convergence order of these approximations can be N. The original fractional wave equation is transformed into a time Volterra-type integro-differential equation associated with a smooth time kernel and spatial derivatives of unknown function by using the technique of Laplace transform. Then, an explicit solution procedure based on the collocation method and the proposed algorithm on integral approximation is established to solve the transformed nonlinear integro-differential equation. Eventually the nonlinear fractional wave equation can be readily and accurately solved. As examples, this method is applied to solve several fractional wave equations with various nonlinearities. Results show that the proposed method can successfully avoid difficulties in the treatment of singularity associated with fractional derivatives. Compared with other existing methods, this method not only has the advantage of high-order accuracy, but it also does not even need to solve the nonlinear spatial system after time discretization to obtain the numerical solution, which significantly reduces the storage and computation cost

Erythrocyte stiffness during morphological remodeling induced by carbon ion radiation.

The adverse effect induced by carbon ion radiation (CIR) is still an unavoidable hazard to the treatment object. Thus, evaluation of its adverse effects on the body is a critical problem with respect to radiation therapy. We aimed to investigate the change between the configuration and mechanical properties of erythrocytes induced by radiation and found differences in both the configuration and the mechanical properties with involving in morphological remodeling process. Syrian hamsters were subjected to whole-body irradiation with carbon ion beams (1, 2, 4, and 6 Gy) or X-rays (2, 4, 6, and 12 Gy) for 3, 14 and 28 days. Erythrocytes in peripheral blood and bone marrow were collected for cytomorphological analysis. The mechanical properties of the erythrocytes were determined using atomic force microscopy, and the expression of the cytoskeletal protein spectrin-α1 was analyzed via western blotting. The results showed that dynamic changes were evident in erythrocytes exposed to different doses of carbon ion beams compared with X-rays and the control (0 Gy). The magnitude of impairment of the cell number and cellular morphology manifested the subtle variation according to the irradiation dose. In particular, the differences in the size, shape and mechanical properties of the erythrocytes were well exhibited. Furthermore, immunoblot data showed that the expression of the cytoskeletal protein spectrin-α1 was changed after irradiation, and there was a common pattern among its substantive characteristics in the irradiated group. Based on these findings, the present study concluded that CIR could induce a change in mechanical properties during morphological remodeling of erythrocytes. According to the unique characteristics of the biomechanical categories, we deduce that changes in cytomorphology and mechanical properties can be measured to evaluate the adverse effects generated by tumor radiotherapy. Additionally, for the first time, the current study provides a new strategy for enhancing the assessment of the curative effects and safety of clinical radiotherapy, as well as reducing adverse effects

Graphene Oxide Reinforced Polylactic Acid/Polyurethane Antibacterial Composites

Nanocomposites from PLA/PU containing small concentrations of graphene oxide (GO) were prepared by simple liquid-phase mixing followed by casting. The as-prepared ternary PLA/PU/GO composite films exhibited good antibacterial activity against the gram-positive Staphylococcus aureus and the gram-negative Escherichia coli, due to the excellent antibacterial property of GO sheets with high specific surface area. The addition of GO inhibited the attachment and proliferation of microbes on the film surfaces, resulting in that the PLA/PU/GO composite films show remarkably improved antibacterial activity compared with PLA/PU composite film. The inhibition efficiency is proportional to the amount of GO. Furthermore, PLA/PU/GO composite fibrous paper was fabricated using electrospinning and exhibited good biocompatibility. The addition of GO does not destroy normal cell’s proliferation and differentiation. PLA/PU/GO composites with good antibacterial activity and biocompatibility make it attractive for the environmental and clinical applications and also provide a candidate for future application of tissue engineering

2014-BM myelogram data

BM analysis data and myelogram pi