Crop Updates 2000 Cereals - part 3

This session covers eighteen papers from different authors: BARLEY AND OAT AGRONOMY 1. Unicorn barley must meet malting specifications to be a viable option, Roslyn Jettnerand Blakely Paynter, Agriculture Western Australia 2. Optimum oat seed rates, Glenn McDonald, Agriculture Western Australia 3. Production and Quality of export Oaten Hay (1998 and 1989), Pierre Fievez, Pierre Fievez and Associates FROST 4. Climatology of Frost in Southern Western Australia, Ian Foster, Agriculture Western Australia 5. Flowering calculator, David Tennant, Agriculture Western Australia 6. Some options for managing the risk of frost damage, Wal Anderson, Agriculture Western Australia PASTURE 7. TIMERITE® Control of redlegged earth mite in south western Australia with a spring spray to pastures, James Ridsdill-Smith and Celia Pavri, CSIRO Entomology, University of Western Australia 8. The pattern of seed softening in subterranean clover in relation to presicted false break risk, Ross Chapman and Senthold Asseng, CSIRO Plant Industry, Centre for Mediterranean Agricultural Research 9. Charano serradella – a viable option for 1:1 cropping, Steve Carr and Brad Nutt IAMA Agri-Services Western Australia and Centre for Legumes in Mediterranean Agriculture, University of Western Australia 10. Alfalfa mosaic virus in alternative annual pasture and forage legumes, Lindrea Latham and Roger Jones, Crop Improvement Institute, Agriculture Western Australia and Centre for Legumes in Mediterranean Agriculture, University of Western Australia 11. Pasture mixture performs better than single-species-based pasture – 1999, Anyou Liu, Clinton Revell and David Ferris, Centre for Cropping Systems, Agriculture Western Australia 12. Better pasture management improves performance of following crops – 1999, Anyou Liu, Clinton Revell and David Ferris, Centre for Cropping Systems, Agriculture Western Australia 13. Lucerne Benefits Crop Production, Roy Latta1, Lisa-Jane Blacklow2, Chris Matthews1 1Agriculture Western Australia 2University of Western Australia 14. Does size count? Determining optimum release number of red apion for biocontrol of doublegee, Tim Woodburn and Paul Yeoh, CSIRO Entomology/CRC Weed Management Systems, Perth 15. Herbicide tolerance of some new cultivars of annual pasture legumes, Clinton Revell and Ian Rose, Centre for Cropping Systems, Agriculture Western Australia 16. Lucerne – crop rotations in the Esperance region, Anita Lyons, Roy Latta and Chris Matthews,Agriculture Western Australia PRECISION AGRICULTURE 17. Assessing the results of on-farm experiments using yield monitors, Simon Cook and Matthew Adams, CSIRO Land and Water 18. Achiever: A GIS based achievable yield and fertiliser recommendation system for precision agriculture, Robert J. Corner, Matthew L. Adams, Precision Agriculture Research Group CSIRO Land and Wate

REVERBa couples the circadian clock to hepatic glucocorticoid action.

The glucocorticoid receptor (GR) is a major drug target in inflammatory disease. However, chronic glucocorticoid (GC) treatment leads to disordered energy metabolism, including increased weight gain, adiposity, and hepatosteatosis - all programs modulated by the circadian clock. We demonstrated that while antiinflammatory GC actions were maintained irrespective of dosing time, the liver was significantly more GC sensitive during the day. Temporal segregation of GC action was underpinned by a physical interaction of GR with the circadian transcription factor REVERBa and co-binding with liver-specific hepatocyte nuclear transcription factors (HNFs) on chromatin. REVERBa promoted efficient GR recruitment to chromatin during the day, acting in part by maintaining histone acetylation, with REVERBa-dependent GC responses providing segregation of carbohydrate and lipid metabolism. Importantly, deletion of Reverba inverted circadian liver GC sensitivity and protected mice from hepatosteatosis induced by chronic GC administration. Our results reveal a mechanism by which the circadian clock acts through REVERBa in liver on elements bound by HNF4A/HNF6 to direct GR action on energy metabolism

Case Reports1. A Late Presentation of Loeys-Dietz Syndrome: Beware of TGFβ Receptor Mutations in Benign Joint Hypermobility

Background: Thoracic aortic aneurysms (TAA) and dissections are not uncommon causes of sudden death in young adults. Loeys-Dietz syndrome (LDS) is a rare, recently described, autosomal dominant, connective tissue disease characterized by aggressive arterial aneurysms, resulting from mutations in the transforming growth factor beta (TGFβ) receptor genes TGFBR1 and TGFBR2. Mean age at death is 26.1 years, most often due to aortic dissection. We report an unusually late presentation of LDS, diagnosed following elective surgery in a female with a long history of joint hypermobility. Methods: A 51-year-old Caucasian lady complained of chest pain and headache following a dural leak from spinal anaesthesia for an elective ankle arthroscopy. CT scan and echocardiography demonstrated a dilated aortic root and significant aortic regurgitation. MRA demonstrated aortic tortuosity, an infrarenal aortic aneurysm and aneurysms in the left renal and right internal mammary arteries. She underwent aortic root repair and aortic valve replacement. She had a background of long-standing joint pains secondary to hypermobility, easy bruising, unusual fracture susceptibility and mild bronchiectasis. She had one healthy child age 32, after which she suffered a uterine prolapse. Examination revealed mild Marfanoid features. Uvula, skin and ophthalmological examination was normal. Results: Fibrillin-1 testing for Marfan syndrome (MFS) was negative. Detection of a c.1270G > C (p.Gly424Arg) TGFBR2 mutation confirmed the diagnosis of LDS. Losartan was started for vascular protection. Conclusions: LDS is a severe inherited vasculopathy that usually presents in childhood. It is characterized by aortic root dilatation and ascending aneurysms. There is a higher risk of aortic dissection compared with MFS. Clinical features overlap with MFS and Ehlers Danlos syndrome Type IV, but differentiating dysmorphogenic features include ocular hypertelorism, bifid uvula and cleft palate. Echocardiography and MRA or CT scanning from head to pelvis is recommended to establish the extent of vascular involvement. Management involves early surgical intervention, including early valve-sparing aortic root replacement, genetic counselling and close monitoring in pregnancy. Despite being caused by loss of function mutations in either TGFβ receptor, paradoxical activation of TGFβ signalling is seen, suggesting that TGFβ antagonism may confer disease modifying effects similar to those observed in MFS. TGFβ antagonism can be achieved with angiotensin antagonists, such as Losartan, which is able to delay aortic aneurysm development in preclinical models and in patients with MFS. Our case emphasizes the importance of timely recognition of vasculopathy syndromes in patients with hypermobility and the need for early surgical intervention. It also highlights their heterogeneity and the potential for late presentation. Disclosures: The authors have declared no conflicts of interes

A systematic review of randomised controlled trials assessing effectiveness of prosthetic and orthotic interventions.

BACKGROUND: Assistive products are items which allow older people and people with disabilities to be able to live a healthy, productive and dignified life. It has been estimated that approximately 1.5% of the world's population need a prosthesis or orthosis. OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to systematically identify and review the evidence from randomized controlled trials assessing effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of prosthetic and orthotic interventions. METHODS: Literature searches, completed in September 2015, were carried out in fourteen databases between years 1995 and 2015. The search results were independently screened by two reviewers. For the purpose of this manuscript, only randomized controlled trials which examined interventions using orthotic or prosthetic devices were selected for data extraction and synthesis. RESULTS: A total of 342 randomised controlled trials were identified (319 English language and 23 non-English language). Only 4 of these randomised controlled trials examined prosthetic interventions and the rest examined orthotic interventions. These orthotic interventions were categorised based on the medical conditions/injuries of the participants. From these studies, this review focused on the medical condition/injuries with the highest number of randomised controlled trials (osteoarthritis, fracture, stroke, carpal tunnel syndrome, plantar fasciitis, anterior cruciate ligament, diabetic foot, rheumatoid and juvenile idiopathic arthritis, ankle sprain, cerebral palsy, lateral epicondylitis and low back pain). The included articles were assessed for risk of bias using the Cochrane Risk of Bias tool. Details of the clinical population examined, the type of orthotic/prosthetic intervention, the comparator/s and the outcome measures were extracted. Effect sizes and odds ratios were calculated for all outcome measures, where possible. CONCLUSIONS: At present, for prosthetic and orthotic interventions, the scientific literature does not provide sufficient high quality research to allow strong conclusions on their effectiveness and cost-effectiveness

Toxicokinetics Of 2,3,7,8-TCDF and 2,3,4,7,8-PeCDF in mink (Mustela vison) at ecologically relevant exposures

Wild mink (Mustela vison) living along the Tittabawassee River in central Michigan exhibit elevated hepatic and dietary polychlorinated dibenzofuran (PCDF) concentrations exceeding mink-specific, literature-reported toxicity reference values (TRVs) on a toxicity equivalents basis. However, no apparent effects on individuals or population are evident, suggesting that available TRVs may overpredict risk for the site-specific mix of congeners. To investigate this discrepancy, a 180-day spiked feed study was conducted to assess: (1) the dosages of key congeners necessary to achieve liver concentrations bracketing those observed in wild mink, (2) time to achieve steady-state concentrations, and (3) effect of coadministration of 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzofuran (TCDF) and 2,3,4,7,8-pentachlorodibenzofuran (4-PeCDF) on the toxicokinetics and distribution of each congener. Adipose and hepatic PCDF concentrations were measured at 0, 90, and 180 days. PCDF concentrations in mink scat were determined at several time points and indicated nearly complete absorption of both TCDF and 4-PeCDF from the diet. Elimination half-times of TCDF were < 15 h and were inversely proportional to dose, while those for 4-PeCDF were approximately 7-9 days with no clear dose dependency in the tested dose range. Coadministration of 4-PeCDF and TCDF accelerated clearance of TCDF compared to administration of TCDF alone. Clearance of 4-PeCDF was not affected by TCDF coadministration. Distribution of 4-PeCDF, but not TCDF, demonstrated increased hepatic sequestration with increasing dose. 4-PeCDF toxicokinetics were described using a previously published two-compartment model. Overall, the toxicokinetic information gathered here illustrates the impact of CYP1A1 induction on bioaccumulation and toxicity potential of TCDF and 4-PeCDF. This information may provide insight into why the current TRVs do not appear to correctly characterize the risk for these two congeners when they are the primary components of an environmental mixture

Comparative performances of machine learning methods for classifying Crohn Disease patients using genome-wide genotyping data

Abstract: Crohn Disease (CD) is a complex genetic disorder for which more than 140 genes have been identified using genome wide association studies (GWAS). However, the genetic architecture of the trait remains largely unknown. The recent development of machine learning (ML) approaches incited us to apply them to classify healthy and diseased people according to their genomic information. The Immunochip dataset containing 18,227 CD patients and 34,050 healthy controls enrolled and genotyped by the international Inflammatory Bowel Disease genetic consortium (IIBDGC) has been re-analyzed using a set of ML methods: penalized logistic regression (LR), gradient boosted trees (GBT) and artificial neural networks (NN). The main score used to compare the methods was the Area Under the ROC Curve (AUC) statistics. The impact of quality control (QC), imputing and coding methods on LR results showed that QC methods and imputation of missing genotypes may artificially increase the scores. At the opposite, neither the patient/control ratio nor marker preselection or coding strategies significantly affected the results. LR methods, including Lasso, Ridge and ElasticNet provided similar results with a maximum AUC of 0.80. GBT methods like XGBoost, LightGBM and CatBoost, together with dense NN with one or more hidden layers, provided similar AUC values, suggesting limited epistatic effects in the genetic architecture of the trait. ML methods detected near all the genetic variants previously identified by GWAS among the best predictors plus additional predictors with lower effects. The robustness and complementarity of the different methods are also studied. Compared to LR, non-linear models such as GBT or NN may provide robust complementary approaches to identify and classify genetic markers