But a new Duke university study says it can link what is in a patient's urine to gene mutations that cause retinitis pigmentosa or RP an inherited degenerative disease that results in severe vision impairment and often blindness.
in which three out of the four siblings suffer from RP said Ziqiang Guan an associate research professor of biochemistry in the Duke university Medical school and a contributing author of the study.
Guan's collaborators had sequenced previously the genome of this family and found that the children with RP carry two copies of a mutation at the dehydrodolichol diphosphate synthase (DHDDS) gene which makes the enzyme that synthesizes organic compounds called dolichols.
In humans dolichol-19 containing 19 isoprene units is the most abundant species. The DHDDS mutation
which was found in 2011 is the latest addition to more than 60 gene mutations that have been implicated in RP.
and found that instead of dolichol-19 the profiles from the three siblings with RP showed dolichol-18 as the dominant species. The parents who each carry one copy of the mutated DHDDS gene showed intermediate levels of dolichol-19 and higher
and will be published Oct 21 in the print version of the journal Current Biology. Using state-of-the-art genome sequencing
and bioinformatics the researchers resolved a longstanding unanswered evolutionary question. Scientists previously thought that ants
of Entomology and Nematology and visiting scientist Ernest K. Lee of the Sackler Institute for Comparative Genomics American Museum of Natural history.
and even examine the genetic basis of these phenotypic changes Chiu said. Johnson whose lab studies the genetics behavior evolution
and health of honeybees noted that the study showed that ants and bees are related more closely than previously thought.
which genes are active and being transcribed from DNA into RNA --and genomic (DNA) data from a number of species of ants bees and wasps including bradynobaenid wasps a cuckoo wasp a spider wasp a scoliid wasp a mud dauber wasp a tiphiid wasp
What underlying biological mechanisms account for our seemingly instant almost unconscious ability to determine how attractive
Led by scientists at the American Museum of Natural history the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology
Bats which are important reservoir hosts for many pathogens particularly viruses have been hosts to malaria parasites for more than a century said coauthor Susan Perkins an associate curator in the Museum's Division of Invertebrate Zoology.
Experimental research on drugs immunology and the development of malaria is done typically on related Plasmodium species that infect rodents including laboratory-reared mice.
The DNA from several genes of the bat parasites was sequenced at the Museum's Sackler Institute for Comparative Genomics resulting in the most comprehensive evolutionary tree of life for malaria parasites of bats to date.
for Infection Biology and the Museum fuì r Naturkunde Berlin. Other work has suggested that the evolution of flight may have triggered parallel strengthening of the immune system of bats
and may explain why they are able to host viruses such as Ebola rabies and the recently discovered Middle east Respiratory system (MERS) virus
Now scientists at the University of Glasgow have identified the genetic basis for at least one form of resistance to amitraz
which will allow a genetic test for resistance to be developed. Professor Nicholas Jonsson of the Institute of Biodiversity Animal health and Comparative Medicine said:
Resistance to all the main acaricides is documented well--for example amitraz resistance is seen in about 20%of Australian tick populations and more than 50%of Mexican ticks.
Although a genetic test for resistance is not likely to be perfect the existing bioassays are technically challenging expensive
This research paves the way for a new genetic test for resistance that will help farmers to make management decisions for the control of ticks as well as enable empirical studies on field
Biological sciences. Since the invention of the earliest light microscopes the classification and identification of pollen and spores has been a highly subjective venture for those who use these tiny particles to study vegetation in their field palynology.
However according to the lead author of the study Luke Mander a former postdoctoral researcher in the laboratory of Illinois professor of plant biology Surangi Punyasena the limitations imposed by these descriptive rather than numerical methods have kept researchers from classifying pollen
Punyasena also believes that those who conduct qualitative research in fields beyond palynology from the description of fossil species to the recognition of mutant phenotypes in genetic research will be able to apply the new approach to their work.
Developing better quantitative ways of describing biological shape and texture would allow many fields to establish more rigorous and consistent criteria for working with morphology
and understanding how environmental and biological factors affect root structure is of key importance for plant scientists--particularly agricultural scientists.
One in three mouthfuls of our food depend on bee pollination said lead author Dr John Bryden from the School of Biological sciences at Royal Holloway.
Our research provides important insights to the biology of pollinators said co-author Professor Vincent Jansen.
and safer for farm workerssince 1996 corn containing a gene that allows it to create a protein that is toxic to certain insects yet safe for human consumption has been grown in the United states
The focus thereby was on microrna--a short single-stranded RNA molecule that is now recognised as playing an important role in gene regulation.
and Clinical Immunology one thing is certain: For the first time we were able to describe the effect of prenatal environmental stressors on the regulation of microrna.
From the early 1990's these cell components started to become more and more of a focus in molecular and cell biology.
and the Technical University of Munich (TUM) has shown how temporal control of a single gene solves two problems during fruit ripening in strawberry.
Dr. Thilo Fischer Privatdozent at The chair of Plant Biochemistry and Physiology at LMU and Professor Wilfried Schwab of the Center for Life and Food Sciences Weihenstephan at the Technische Universitã¤t
When the seeds are ripe the Anr gene is turned off. This makes precursors of proanthocyanidins available for use in the production of anthocyanins the red pigments that give the mature fruit its alluring Color in their new study Thilo Fischer
#Salt-tolerant bacteria improve crop yieldsuzbek microbiologist Dilfuza Egamberdieva hopes to apply her new agricultural technique soon in Uzbekistan to boost the yield of economically important crops such as wheat cotton tomato and cucumber.
To better exploit these useful bacterial strains the Uzbek microbiologist has come up with a technique that allows the selective enrichment of Pseudomonas strains.
This insects alongside some fungi bacteria and viruses cause annual loses of between four and ten percent of all the stored grains worldwide mainly corn wheat sorghum rice and beans.
#Biochar in soils cuts greenhouse gas emissionsuniversity of TÃ bingen microbiologists show soil microbe communities can be influenced to decrease nitrous oxide emissions.
Their study was supervised by environmental microbiologist Dr. Sebastian Behrens and geomicrobiologist Professor Andreas Kappler of the Center for Applied Geosciences at the University of TÃ bingen in cooperation with researchers from the University of Hohenheim.
and activity of microorganisms in the soil which form complex biological communities involving plants and animals.
or discovered have been said proteins lead author Hailing Jin a professor of plant pathology and microbiology. Ours is the first study to add the RNA molecule to the list of effectors.
Small RNAS guide gene silencing in a wide range of eukaryotic organisms. In the case of Botrytis cinerea small RNAS silence the expression of host defense genes resulting in the host plant cells being less able to resist the fungal attack.
The process is similar to how protein effectors weaken host immunity in the case of most pathogens.
RNA interference or RNAI is conserved a gene regulatory mechanism that is guided by small RNAS for silencing
(or suppressing) genes. Next Jin and colleagues plan to continue investigating if the novel mechanism they discovered also exists in other aggressive pathogens.
and Circassia a U k. based biotechnology company and was supported by St joseph's Healthcare Hamilton. It is estimated that together these allergens are responsible for more than 50%of allergic respiratory disease.
The newly published study--led by professor Haja Kadarmideen--is the first in the world looking at pig to human comparative genetic mapping to reveal key genes on the human genome that are known to be involved in obesity.
With 30 million pigs produced in Denmark each year genomics scientist at University of Copenhagen Haja Kadarmideen decided to turn this to his advantage with his latest research on people's eating habits surrounding obesity and diabetes.
First kind of study in the worldas pigs are a well-known animal model for studying human obesity because of similar genomes
Each of the 1200 pig's DNA was assessed using a genomic chip technology that simultaneously created a genetic profile at 60000 locations across the entire DNA of each pig.
and eating behaviour observations on all pigs via genome wide association studies to detect eating behaviour genes--a big task equivalent to finding polar bears in a snowstorm says Kadarmideen.
The research was clearly able to show that for some (pigs with certain genetic variants) overeating was normal behaviour.
This is the first study in the world looking at pig to human comparative genetic mapping to reveal key genes on the human genome (e g. on chromosomes 6 and 17) that are known to be involved in human obesity and some new genes;
Thus addressing the question some humans may have a genetic disposition to overeat. Our pig model research indicates that eating behaviours runs in families.
and this is because they may have received different variants of eating behaviour genes which could lead to obesity.
and behavioural changes to offset the actions of these potential obesity genes concludes Kadarmideen. Story Source:
Appearing in the journal Global Change Biology the study showed that tree growth slows down as forests age as expected.
Older forests contain surprises for climate science and ecosystem biology. We need to distinguish past disturbances from today's conditions.
while the colony judiciously decides how to best allocate its foraging says James Nieh a professor of biology at UC San diego. Nieh worked with scientists at Yunnan Agricultural University in China to study the impact on foraging Asian honey bees of the monstrous
and could one day be used to prevent the transmission of deadly vector-borne diseases such as malaria dengue West Nile virus and yellow fever.
In their experiments the researchers used the genetic model system Drosophila melanogaster (fruit fly) that was engineered genetically in such a way that neurons activated by DEET glowed fluorescent green.
asks James Clark the Blomquist Professor of environment and biology at Duke university. With colleagues from the Marine Biological Lab at Woods Hole and the University of Georgia Clark is working on building a statistical model of how trees make this decision.
The first takeaway from that work now appearing online in the journal Global Change Biology is that there is a certain time of the year
when warming has the most impact Clark said. And that time would appear to be from Mid-february to Mid-march a few weeks before the buds would be expected to open.
After identifying hotspots of CWR diversity globally and comparing these against the CWR species already preserved in gene banks the scientists have generated now a list of taxa in critical need of future protection.
Colin Khoury of CIAT and Wageningen University in The netherlands will discuss a recently completed inventory of CWR in the United states as well as plans for protecting these plants both in gene banks and in the wild.
Results of their experiments to study this question were published recently in the journal Biogeochemistry. The big question I had started
In fact astonishingly humans have doubled the amount of available nitrogen in the biosphere. According to Gillespie 40 per cent of people alive today derive their nitrogen nutrition from synthetically-fixed fertilizer.
Eric Post a Penn State university professor of biology and Jeffrey Kerby a Penn State graduate student have linked the melting of Arctic sea ice with changes in the timing of plant growth on land
In addition to analyzing their own data Post and Kerby also used information from a 1970s study of caribou calving and calf survival at the same site by Danish biologists Henning Thing and Bjarne Clausen.
Magda Carvajal Moreno from the Biology Institute at UNAM (National Autonomous University of Mexico) and head of the research explained that this is the first time both conditions are related with the presence of aflatoxins the most frequent carcinogenic we ate daily she said.
The specialist clarified that Human Papillomavirus is more carcinogenic and prone to trigger cervical cancer than aflatoxins.
#Biochar quiets microbes, including some plant pathogensin the first study of its kind Rice university scientists have used synthetic biology to study how a popular soil amendment called biochar can interfere with the chemical signals that some microbes
but there are actually a lot of conversations going on in that pot said study co-author Joff Silberg associate professor of biochemistry and cell biology and of bioengineering at Rice.
So Silberg and colleagues used the tools of synthetic biology --and a refined experimental setup that Silberg initially drafted with his son's spare Lego bricks--to establish a situation where just one microbial conversation was taking place
since support from the National Science Foundation the Department of energy Rice's Faculty Initiative Fund Rice's Shell Center for Sustainability and Rice's Institute of Bioscience and Bioengineering.
Masiello and another member of the group Rice biologist Jennifer Rudgers (now at the University of New mexico) were investigating the combined effects of adding biochar and nutrients to soils.
His lab began by working with Matt Bennett assistant professor of biochemistry and cell biology at Rice to make use of two tailored forms of E coli bacteria created by Rice graduate student Chen Ye.
One strain spoke with a type of chemical communication commonly used by soil microbes and the other listened.
The team next inserted florescence genes into each organism which caused them to glow different colors--red for speaking and green for listening.
The group then ran dozens of microscopy tests with Dan Wagner Rice associate professor of biochemistry
and cell biology to see how different formulations and amounts of biochar affected cell signaling. In every case we observed significantly less green light from the opposite side of the biochar
Moreover they are involved also in gene regulation helping to down regulate the activity of certain genes.
According to the study however the life-prolonging effect is not down to gene regulation as has often been supposed in the past.
A method to detect different trypanosomeskatja Silbermayr from the Institute of Parasitology of the University of Veterinary medicine Vienna (Vetmeduni) together with an international research team collected blood samples from three cattle types.
It seems that the Baoul's immune system can tolerate higher levels of the blood parasite The Baoul gene pool should be preserveda number of international research projects are attempting to breed trypanosome-tolerant cattle
The genetic background of the Baoul is very valuable for African agriculture. Crossing large breeds of cattle that produce a lot of meat and milk such as the Zebu with the smaller but immunologically stronger Baoul could be very beneficial for farming in Africa.
The fate of much of the world's biodiversity is going to depend on it. The study was motivated by a desire to understand how long species can live in forest fragments.
That's the only way we can ensure biodiversity will survive. Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by National University of Singapore.
spread of invasive plant species by changing soil chemistryinvasive species are among the world's greatest threats to native species and biodiversity.
could the changes in soil biogeochemistry be due to an advantage that invasive plants get from interacting with their microbiome?
and phosphorus in the soil and has increased rhizome production and aboveground biomass which in turn facilitates its spread and establishment.
she is currently exploring them from a genetic perspective to better understand the complex communication between the microbiome and the plant.
Smooth surfaces that are resistant to corrosion are crucial for many of the present-day uses of cast metals ranging from bio-implants to automotive parts.
when processing metals destined for exposure to fluids such as those that will be used in bio-implants.
and many experts believe it is just a matter of time before the disease appears full force in California said plant molecular biologist Abhaya Dandekar lead author on the study.
Earlier sequencing of the Calas bacteria genome showed that there were no toxins or enzymes that would destroy plant cell walls
The researchers used gene sequencing technology to study the transcriptome which is the collection of RNA found in the tree leaves and fruit.
Additionally it will be useful in a number of other disciplines including geology archaeology biodiversity glaciology and rangeland ecosystem research.
To study immune responses in H. pylori-mediated disease researchers at the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute s Nutritional Immunology
When pigs were infected with H. pylori the researchers observed an increase in another type of immune cells called pro-inflammatory CD4+T helper cells followed by an increase in CD8+cytotoxic T cells according to the study.
#oepigs have greater anatomic physiologic and immunologic similarities to humans than mice the main animal model used in biomedical research said Raquel Hontecillas co-director of the Nutritional Immunology and Molecular Medicine
The genus Progradungula to which the species studied here belongs is among the few cribellate ones in the family.
which was described already in detail by now retired arachnologist Mike gray (Australian Museum) for the only known other species of this genus P. carraensis.
which result in a dramatic decrease in biodiversity. Additionally there is also contamination of soil and waterways by agricultural chemicals as well as carbon costs because of vehicles and artificial fertiliser necessary to maintain the pasture.
and encourages biodiversity using native shrubs and trees. Additionally shrubs and trees with edible leaves and shoots along with pasture plants produce more food for animals per unit area of land than pasture plants alone.
One of the additional benefits of using the silvopastoral system is that it increases biodiversity.
Biodiversity is declining across the globe and the main culprit is farming--33%of the total land surface of the world is used for livestock production.
If farmers were to switch to sustainable livestock production methods such as the silvopastoral system the result would be much greater biodiversity with no increase in land use.
It is clear that silvopastoral systems increase biodiversity improve animal welfare and provide good working conditions
The paper'Sustainable efficient livestock production with high biodiversity and good welfare for animals'will be published in the 25 september edition of Proceedings of the Royal Society B. Story Source:
Less biodiversitythis development gives rise to concern about the biodiversity of the forests of the future according to Brody Sandel who is one of the researchers responsible for the study.
#Time to rethink misguided policies that promote biofuels to protect climate, experts saypolicymakers need to rethink the idea of promoting biofuels to protect the climate
because the methods used to justify such policies are flawed inherently according to a University of Michigan energy researcher.
but scientifically simplistic perception that biofuels such as ethanol are inherently carbon neutral meaning that the heat-trapping carbon dioxide gas emitted
because the plants used to make biofuels--including corn soybeans and sugarcane--are already pulling carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere through photosynthesis said Decicco a research professor at the U-M Energy Institute and a professor of practice at the School of Natural resources and Environment.
because it methodically deconstructs the life-cycle-analysis approach that forms a basis for current environmental policies promoting biofuels.
Instead he presents a rigorous carbon cycle analysis based on biogeochemical fundamentals to identify conditions under which biofuels might have a climatic benefit.
Plants used to make biofuels do not remove any additional carbon dioxide just because they are used to make fuel as opposed to say corn flakes Decicco said.
R&d is needed especially for bio-based or other technologies able to efficiently capture and use more carbon dioxide than is already being captured
and into subsidies mandates and other programs to prop up biofuels is unwarranted he said. Decicco's direct carbon accounting examines carbon sources
Biofuels have no benefit at the tailpipe Decicco said. Per unit energy the carbon dioxide emissions from burning ethanol are just 2 percent lower than those from gasoline.
Biodiesel yields carbon dioxide emissions about 1 percent greater than those from petroleum diesel. If there is any climate benefit to biofuels it occurs
only if harvesting the source crops causes a greater net removal of carbon dioxide from the air than would otherwise have occurred Decicco said.
and promoting biofuels. Corn ethanol production of 14 billion gallons supplied 4. 4 percent of total U s. transportation liquid fuel use in 2011.
Biofuels are presumed the replacement for the petroleum-based transportation fuels gasoline and diesel that dominate liquid fuel use.
In the United states the federal Renewable Fuel Standard mandates a large increase in biofuels use which has reached now 16 billion gallons a year mainly ethanol.
#Modifying rice crops to resist herbicide prompts weedy neighbors growth spurtrice containing an overactive gene that makes it resistant to a common herbicide can pass that genetic trait to weedy rice prompting powerful growth even
This new study is a surprising example of gene flow from crops to weeds that makes weeds more vigorous even without an environmental trigger researchers say.
and organismal biology at The Ohio State university and a lead author of the paper.##oeit s unusual for any transgene to have such a positive effect on a wild relative
and even more so for herbicide resistance#she said.##oebut we think we know why: It s probably because the pathway regulated by this gene is so important to the plant.#
#The work is the result of Snow s longtime collaboration with senior author Bao-Rong Lu a professor at Fudan University in Shanghai.
The weed-killer glyphosate sold under the brand name Roundup kills plants by inhibiting a growth-related pathway activated by the epsps gene.
Biotech companies have inserted mutated forms of a similar gene from microbes into crop plants producing#oeroundup Ready#corn
But in this study the researchers used a different method boosting activation of the native epsps gene in rice plants#a process called overexpressing#to give the plants enough strength to survive an application of herbicide.
taking the plant s own gene and ramping it up#Snow said.##oewe don t know yet
#To overexpress the native gene in rice the scientists attached a promoter to it giving the plant an extra copy of its own gene
and ensuring that the gene is activated at all times. The researchers conducted tests in rice and four strains of a relative of the same species weedy rice a noxious plant that infests rice fields around the world.
In regulated field experiments the hybrids containing the overexpressed gene produced 48 percent to 125 percent more seeds per plant than did hybrid plants with no modified genes.
if a gene gives you a lot more seeds per plant compared to controls it s likely to increase the plants fitness
because those genes would be represented at a higher percentage in future generations#Snow said. When Snow and Lu set out to study this new genetic engineering method they didn t know what to expect.#
#oeour colleagues developed this novel transgenic trait in rice and we didn t know if it would have a fitness benefit
or a cost or be said neutral#Snow.##oewith most types of herbicide resistant genes there s no benefit to a wild plant
unless the herbicide is sprayed. A lot of transgenes in crop plants are either selectively neutral in wild plants or if they have a benefit it depends on environmental factors like insects diseases
or herbicides being present.##Snow has a history in this area of research. She has found that genes from crop plants can persist in related weeds over many generations.
In 2002 she led a study that was the first to show that a gene artificially inserted into crop plants to fend off pests could migrate to weeds in a natural environment
and make the weeds stronger. She also has served on national panels that monitor and make recommendations about the release of genetically engineered species into the environment.
She is interested in identifying new possible outcomes of the growth of crop-weed hybrids that contain genetic modifications
but she doesn t take sides about possible risks and benefits of genetically modified crops.##oeit s not always the end of the world if a weed starts to become a lot more common after acquiring a new trait#there may be effective ways to manage that weed#Snow said.#
#oeyou just can t make sweeping generalizations about genetic engineering and knowledge from ecological studies like ours can help inform risk assessment and biosafety oversight.#
#Story Source: The above story is provided based on materials by Ohio State university. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.
#First look at complete sorghum genome may usher in new uses for food and fuelalthough sorghum lines underwent adaptation to be grown in temperate climates decades ago a University of Illinois researcher said he
Patrick Brown an assistant professor in plant breeding and genetics said having a complete characterization of the locations (loci) affecting specific traits will speed up the adaptation of sorghum and other related grasses to new production
Brown is working on the project through the Energy Biosciences Institute at the U of I hoping to use the sorghum findings as a launching pad for working with complex genomes of other feedstocks.
The EBI provided the startup funding for the study. To adapt the drought-resistant tropical sorghum to temperate climates Brown explained that sorghum lines were converted over the years by selecting
Now that genotyping is cheap you can get a lot of data for a modest investment. Previous studies had looked at a specific genomic region or a smaller subset of these lines.
This is the first study to look at all of them A previous paper had come out looking at a specific region of chromosome 6
The researchers used a new technique called genotyping-by-sequencing (GBS) to map genetic differences in 1160 sorghum lines.
Using GBS we're now able to cover the whole genome with some gaps in individual lines he said.
While much improvement has been done for grain sorghum Brown said little improvement has been done for sweet or bioenergy types.
But now there is a lot of interest in using sorghum for other things such as growing sweet sorghum in areas where they grow sugarcane and growing biomass sorghum for bioenergy through combustion or cellulosic technology.
and use the genes that we bred for in grain sorghum over the last hundred years and move them into sweet sorghum and biomass sorghum.
We think that finding those genes is going to be said critical he. Even with this complete genetic map Brown said the research is still not at the end point.
The case I always make is that over here we have grain sorghum where we've done almost all the plant breeding
and where we've stacked the good genes. Over here we've got exotic sorghum which hasn't been improved at all yet it's where most of the genetic diversity is.
For that genetic diversity to be useful to grain sorghum we need to know where the genes are for height
and maturity so we can bring in good diversity while keeping our grain sorghum short and early like we need it he said.
or biomass sorghum researchers will need to bring in some of the genes from grain sorghum for traits like seed quality or early-season vigor.
This is the general agronomic stuff we've been breeding for not the genes for dwarfing and earliness.
But the bigger problem with biomass sorghum right now is the moisture content of the biomass.
Because biomass sorghum is grown annually growing until frost comes when it is harvested it has a high moisture content.
When we cut it down there's tons of biomass. I don't know that there's anything else that can match it in the area
but the biomass is really high moisture. For the existing cellulosic idea as it stands now that is not very useful he said That's one of the roadblocks to biomass sorghum right now he said.
Sweet sorghum where you squeeze the sugary juice out like sugarcane may be closer on the horizon.
Right now we're using sorghum as a model--maybe we can find sorghum genes that we can also tinker with in miscanthus
Brown added that with genetic studies and improvements there are other value-added opportunities for sorghum grain.
Another gene found shows that sorghum produces a huge amount of antioxidant in the outer layer of the grain.
The research was done at the Energy Biosciences Institute a collaboration in which bioscience and biological techniques are being applied to help solve the global energy challenge.
The partnership funded from the energy company BP includes researchers from the University of California Berkeley;
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