Whole-genome duplication events (polyploidy events) and gene loss events have played important roles in the evolution of legumes. Here we show that the vast majority of Hsf gene duplications resulted from whole genome duplication events rather than tandem duplication, and significant differences in gene retention exist between species. By searching for intraspecies gene colinearity (microsynten...

The relationship between climatic factors and crop yields for maize and soybeans in 3 major producing countries (the United States, Brazil, and China) was analyzed statistically. Temporal changes in the climate−yield relationship were considered, and the temporal and spatial variations were evaluated. County-level data from 1980 to 2006 were collected for each country and allocated to 1.125° × ...

Improving water use efficiency (WUE) may prove a useful way to adapt crop species to drought. Since the recognition of the importance of mesophyll conductance to CO₂ movement from inside stomatal pores to the sites of photosynthetic carboxylation, there has been interest in how much intraspecific variation in mesophyll conductance (gm) exists, and how such variation may impact leaf WUE within C...

Leaf caloric value (LCV) is a useful index to represent the conversion efficiency of leaves for solar energy. We investigated the spatial pattern of LCV and explored the factors (phylogeny, climate, and soil) that influence them at a large scale by determining LCV standardized by leaf area in 920 plant species from nine forest communities along the 3700 km North-South Transect of Eastern China....

Leaf movement in Biloxi soybean has been investigated in some detail by Bunning (1) and Holdsworth (2). The results and the interpretations presented by these investigators differ with regard to the nature of the leaf movement response. Bunning considers the leaf movement to be a circadian manifestation of the physiological clock, while Holdsworth considers it to be essentially a photonastic re...

A successful cancer vaccine needs to overcome the effects of immune-suppressor cells such as Treg lymphocytes, suppressive cytokine-secreting Tr1 cells, and myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs), while enhancing tumor-specific immune responses. Given the relative poor efficacy associated with current cancer vaccines, a novel vaccine platform called DepoVax(TM) (DPX) was developed. C3 tumor-c...

UNLABELLED Legionella pneumophila is an intracellular pathogen that resides within a membrane-bound compartment that is derived from vesicles exiting the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). To create this compartment, these bacteria use a type IV secretion system to deliver effector proteins that subvert host cell functions. Several Legionella effector proteins modulate the function of the host protein...