Using metagenomic 'parts lists' to infer global patterns on microbial ecology remains a significant challenge. To deduce important ecological indicators such as environmental adaptation, molecular trait dispersal, diversity variation and primary production from the gene pool of an ecosystem, we integrated 25 ocean metagenomes with geographical, meteorological and geophysicochemical data. We fin...

Whole blood samples of patients with various forms of alpha thalassemia including hemoglobin H disease, alpha thalassemia trait, and the "silent carrier" state were incubated with leucine-(14)C for definition of relative rates of production of alpha and beta chains in these disorders. The chains were separated by carboxymethyl cellulose chromatography in the presence of 8 M urea and dithiothrei...

Several personality/temperament traits have been linked to health outcomes in humans and animals but underlying physiological mechanisms for these differential outcomes are minimally understood. In this paper, we compared the strength of a behavioral trait (behavioral inhibition) and an associated physiological trait (glucocorticoid production) in predicting life span. In addition, we examined ...

Male sterility is defined as the deviant condition in normally bisexual plants when no viable pollen is formed (Frankel and Galun, 1977). Male sterility has been exploited as an effective tool to aid hybrid seed production in many crops. Using this trait, seed producers can transform one inbred from a planned hybridization into a “female” line, thereby ensuring seed of hybrid origin on the male...

the genetic parameters for milk production and milk fat traits for first to third parities were estimated using single, multi trait and repeatability models. the genetic parameters for test day milk records were also estimated using random regression model. the test day records and 305 day milk records of 17055 cows from 10 herds collected between years 1996-2007 in khorasan razavi province wer...

the fixed regression test-day model (frm) and random regression test-day model (rrm) for genetic evaluation of milk yield trait of dairy cattle in khorasan razavi province were studied. breeding values and genetic parameters of milk yield trait from two models were compared. a total of 164391 monthly test day milk records (three times milking per day) obtained from 19217 holstein cows distribut...

Waterlogging and salinity are two major abiotic stresses that hamper crop production world-wide resulting in multibillion losses. Plant abiotic stress tolerance is conferred by many interrelated mechanisms. Amongst these, the cell's ability to maintain membrane potential (MP) is considered to be amongst the most crucial traits, a positive relationship between the ability of plants to maintain h...

Mixed model techniques were used to evaluate the importance of cytoplasmic genetic effects on beef cattle performance. Birth weight (BWT), preweaning average daily gain (ADG), weaning weight (WT205), postweaning gain (PG), ultrasonic backfat thickness (FAT) and predicted milk yield (MILK) data were collected in two herds of Hereford cattle located at Plymouth and Raleigh, North Carolina. Cytopl...

While many studies have demonstrated the sensitivities of plants and of crop yield to a changing climate, a major challenge for the agricultural research community is to relate these findings to the broader societal concern with food security. This paper reviews the direct effects of climate on both crop growth and yield and on plant pests and pathogens and the interactions that may occur betwe...