Mazus japonicus is an important plant of Scrophulariaceae family. In the present research work, the dichloromethane and methanol crude extracts of the plant Mazus japonicus were evaluated for phytotoxic, cytotoxic, antifungal and antibacterial activities. Both dichloromethane and methanol extracts of Mazus japonicus inhibited the growth of Lemna minor L. and showed significant phytotoxic activi...

Humulus japonicus Siebold et Zucc (Japanese hop) is a dioecious species of the family Cannabaceae. The chromosome number is 2n = 16 = 14 + XX for females and 2n = 17 = 14 + XY1Y2 for male. To date, no fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) markers have been established for the identification of Humulus japonicus sex chromosomes. In this paper, we report a method for the mitotic and meiotic s...

We conducted a double-blind randomized controlled study of elderly individuals in a nursing home to investigate the effect of the consumption of jelly containing sea cucumber on their oral Candida load. The jelly contained a hydrolysate of the sea cucumber Stichopus japonicus, which contained triterpene glycosides called holotoxins. The holotoxins worked as a fungicide, and their minimum inhibi...

Nesodiprion flavipes sp. nov. associated with Tsuga diversifolia (Maxim.) Mast. and N. kojimai sp. nov. associated with Abies veitchii Lindl. are described from Honshu, Japan. Additional taxonomic and biological information is given for other Japanese congeners, N. japonicus (Marlatt, 1898), N. albiventris Togashi, 1998, N. shinoharai Togashi, 1998, N. nigerrimus Togashi, 1998, N. kagaensis Tog...

In order to study gene expression in a reproductive organ, we constructed a cDNA library of mature flower buds in Lotus japonicus, and characterized expressed sequence tags (ESTs) of 842 clones randomly selected. The EST sequences were clustered into 718 non-redundant groups. From BLAST and FASTA search analyses of both protein and DNA databases, 58.5% of the EST groups showed significant seque...

A collection of 94 F(6) individuals derived from crosses between Lotus japonicus, Gifu B-129 (G) and Miyakojima MG-20 (M) were used for mapping. By using the HEGS running system, 427 EcoRI/MseI primer pairs were selected to generate a total of 2053 markers, consisting of 739 G-associated dominant markers, 674 M-associated dominant markers, 640 co-dominant markers, 95 SSR markers and 2 dCAPS mar...

Tires and other water-holding containers throughout New York State were sampled during 2000 for the presence of immature or adult Ochlerotatus japonicus to determine the geographic distribution of this species. Waste tire stockpiles were one of the primary sites surveyed. Immature or adult Oc. japonicus were confirmed in 18 counties in New York State, including the northernmost recorded occurre...

The legume Lotus japonicus has been widely used as a model system to investigate the genetic background of legume-specific phenomena such as symbiotic nitrogen fixation. Here, we report structural features of the L. japonicus genome. The 315.1-Mb sequences determined in this and previous studies correspond to 67% of the genome (472 Mb), and are likely to cover 91.3% of the gene space. Linkage m...

Lotus japonicus is a model plant for the legume family. To facilitate map-based cloning approaches and genome analysis, we performed an extensive characterization of the chromosome complement of the species. A detailed karyotype of L. japonicus Gifu was built and plasmid and BAC clones, corresponding to genetically mapped markers (see the accompanying article by Sandal et al. 2002, this issue),...

The exogenous addition of salicylic acid (SA) was previously shown to inhibit indeterminate but not determinate-type nodulation. We sought to extend these results by modulating endogenous levels of SA through the transgenic expression of salicylate hydroxylase (NahG) in both stably transformed Lotus japonicus and composite Medicago truncatula plants. NahG expression in L. japonicus resulted in ...