In recent years, representatives of more than 40 families of reptiles have been studied to understand how environmental parameters affect sex determination. In this review, we summarise the distribution and taxonomic pattern of sex determining mechanisms, outline the main hypotheses of the adaptive significance of temperature sex determination (TSD), and of skewed population sex ratios. We also...

The genus Astragalus L. (Fabaceae) is reviewed from both phyloenetic and taxonomic points of view. As the largest genus of flowering plants it has attracted many researchers, but much work remains to be done. A short taxonomic history with special focus on infrageneric classification of the genus, a list of phylogenetic studies including the applied markers and sampling strategies as well a...

Ten bacteriophages for Xanthomonas phaseoli were characterized. On the basis of adsorption rates, latent period and burst size, plaque morphology, host range, efficiency of plating, ultrastructure, sensitivity to osmotic shock, streptomycin sensitivity, temperature effects on plating efficiency, and serology, the phages were separated into at least three groups. Some of the phages were infectio...

The paper is focused on classes of lexical units which arise as a result of derivational processes – word formation and semantic transfers, acting either in isolation or together, on the basis of common semantic foundations that bind targets and sources of derivation. The lexical items which constitute the classes under study vary in their denotative characteristics and due to their categ...

Repetitive DNA elements are major organizational components of the genome inolved in replication, in transmission to daughter cells, and controlling expression of genomic coding sequences. Repetitive elements format the genome system architecture characteristic of each taxonomic group. Appreciating the functional significance of repetitive DNA provides new concepts of genome organization and ge...

Lake Sayram is an ancient cold water lake locating at a mountain basin in Xinjiang, China. The lake water is brackish, alkaline, unpolluted, and abundant in SO4(2-) and Mg(2+). The lacustrine ecosystem of Lake Sayram has been intensely investigated. However, profiles of the microbial communities in the lake remain largely unknown. In this study, taxonomic compositions of the planktonic and sedi...

A chemotaxonomic survey of 380 species of Aloe indicated the presence of the anthrone isomers aloin A and B together with the aloinoside isomers and microdontin A and B in 36 (10%) species of Aloe. This group, referred to as the microdontin chemotype, is thus characterised by a combination of exudate compounds and not merely a single phytochemical marker, implying taxonomic significance of leaf...

Phages infecting lactic acid bacteria have been the focus of significant research attention over the past three decades. Through the isolation and characterization of hundreds of phage isolates, it has been possible to classify phages of the dairy starter and adjunct bacteria Lactococus lactis, Streptococcus thermophilus, Leuconostoc spp., and Lactobacillus spp. Among these, phages of L. lactis...

during a survey of sindh and punjab provinces of pakistan, two dragonfly genera were collected and identified for the first time from the country. anaciaeshna(family aeshnidae) is a genus of large dragonflies. representatives were collectedfrom gujjo, district thatta (sindh) in august 2008 and were identified as anaciaeshna jaspidea (burmeister). the second genus was epophthalmia (family cordul...

BACKGROUND Large-scale patterns or trends in species diversity have long interested ecologists. The classic pattern is for diversity (e.g., species richness) to decrease with increasing latitude. Taxonomic distinctness is a diversity measure based on the relatedness of the species within a sample. Here we examined patterns of taxonomic distinctness in relation to latitude (ca. 32-48 degrees N) ...