Scatter-hoarding rodents are effective dispersal agents for many plant species. Several studies have shown that rodents repeatedly re-cache seeds. The re-caching process often has a significant impact on final seedling establishment, but the factors determining its occurrence are poorly understood. In this study, we followed the fate of 3564 artificial seeds that varied in size, nutrient conten...

Transition seeds exhibit a good tradeoff between sensitivity and specificity for homology search in both coding and non-coding regions. However, identifying good transition seeds is intractable. This work studies the hit probability of high-order seed patterns. Based on our theoretical results, we propose an efficient method for ranking transition seeds for seed design and list good seeds in di...

†Background and Aims Mimetic seeds simulate the appearance of fleshy fruits and arilled seeds without producing nutritive tissues as a reward for seed dispersers. In this strategy of seed dispersal, seeds may remain attached to the mother plant for long periods after maturity, increasing their availability to naı̈ve seed dispersers. The hypothesis that seed coat impermeability in many tropical F...

Our research indicates that in Kerman and Fars provinces the phenomenal growth of seeds dietary supplements have received considerable interest, because of their presumed safety and potential, nutritional and functional effects. This interest can be attributed to several social and economic factors, including consumer beliefs. The amount of 7 minerals Zn, Cu, Fe, Mg, Mn, K and Na, were determin...

OBJECTIVE For the past 2 decades there has been vigorous disagreement over the purported toxicity of Hedysarum alpinum seeds, and whether the consumption of such seeds was a factor in the 1992 death of Chris McCandless, the subject of the book Into the Wild. Our objective was to confirm or disprove the presence of L-canavanine (a nonprotein amino acid known to induce systemic lupuslike symptoms...

Seed analysts need to identify seeds, and seed catalogs are used as a reference to accomplish this task. Conventional seed catalogs supply two-dimensional photographs and handdrawn diagrams. In this study, a new, three-dimensional representation of seeds is developed to supplement these traditional photographs and drawings. QuickTime VR is a promising method for viewing three-dimensional object...

Selenium (Se) hyperaccumulator plants can concentrate the toxic element Se up to 1% of shoot (DW) which is known to protect hyperaccumulator plants from generalist herbivores. There is evidence for Se-resistant insect herbivores capable of feeding upon hyperaccumulators. In this study, resistance to Se was investigated in seed chalcids and seed beetles found consuming seeds inside pods of Se-hy...

Neither the P32-phosphate nor the S35-sulfate were metabolized by intact seeds until after radicle protrusion (15 to 18 hours after beginning of imbibition). Punctured seeds, however, metabolized the radioactive phosphate or sulfate within 3 hours after the beginning of imbibition. We concluded that the coats surrounding the embryo are impermeable to phosphate and sulfate ions. Most of the orga...

The effect of W92/72 transgenic flax seeds taken from a variety of Linola on the production of SCFA, ammonia and methane by bacteria inhabiting rabbit caecum was studied. The in vitro method was used where caecal contents from rabbits was incubated with W92/72 transgenic or Linola flax seeds, or without any additives (control samples). The total concentration of SCFA was higher in samples with ...

Raffinose family oligosaccharides (RFOs) have been implicated in mitigating the effects of environmental stresses on plants. In seeds, proposed roles for RFOs include protecting cellular integrity during desiccation and/or imbibition, extending longevity in the dehydrated state, and providing substrates for energy generation during germination. A gene encoding galactinol synthase (GOLS), the fi...