Omega-3 is an essential polyunsaturated fatty acid (PUFA) that most animals need to acquire in their diet. Mammalian brains are rich in docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), a long-chain form of omega-3, whose deficiency, coupled with a high omega-6:3 ratio, leads to numerous cognitive disorders and mental diseases. Insects have only trace amounts of long-chain PUFAs, and the effect of omega-3 deficiency on cognition has not been studied. We found that omega-3 deficiency greatly impaired honey bee learning, extending the finding of the importance of omega-3 to a nonmammal, despite lack of DHA in its brain

Decadal-scale metabolic responses of plants to environmental changes, including the magnitude of the “CO₂ fertilization” effect, are a major knowledge gap in Earth system models, in agricultural models, and for societal adaptation. We introduce intramolecular isotope distributions (isotopomers) as a methodology for detecting shifts in plant carbon metabolism over long times. Trends in a deuterium isotopomer ratio allow quantification of a biogeochemically relevant shift in the metabolism of C₃ plants toward photosynthesis

Rice suffers dramatic yield losses due to blast pathogen Magnaporthe oryzae. Pseudomonas chlororaphis EA105, a bacterium that was isolated from the rice rhizosphere, inhibits M. oryzae. It was shown previously that pre-treatment of rice with EA105 reduced the size of blast lesions through jasmonic acid (JA)- and ethylene (ETH)-mediated ISR. Abscisic acid (ABA) acts antagonistically toward salicylic acid (SA), JA, and ETH signaling, to impede plant defense responses.

PLATZ (plant AT-rich sequence and zinc-binding protein) is a novel class of DNA-binding proteins; however, the function of the PLATZ gene has not yet been identified in plants. This study aims to isolate, sequence, and analyse the PLATZ gene responsive to abiotic stress in soybean. We isolated a stress-inducible gene encoding the PLATZ from soybean (Glycine max L.). This gene, designated as GmPLATZ1, was specifically induced by drought, high salinity, or abscisic acid (ABA) in soybean.

The human genome contains many segments of short repetitive DNA, known as microhomologies, which are potential sites for the types of rearrangements found in many different types of cancer. Therefore, understanding how microhomologies within DNA can initiate chromosome rearrangements and the genes involved in promoting this process is critical in understanding cancer development.

Due to the importance of chitinolytic enzymes for insect, nematode and fungal growth, they are receiving attention concerning their development as biopesticides or chemical defense proteins in transgenic plants and as microbial biocontrol agents. Targeting chitin associated with the extracellular matrices or cell wall by insect chitinases may be an effective approach for controlling pest insects and pathogenic fungi.

The use of transgenic plants in agriculture provides many economic benefits, but it also raises concerns over the potential impact of transgenic plants on the environment. We here examined the impact of transgenic high-methionine soybean ZD91 on the arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungal community structure in rhizosphere soil. Our investigations based on clone libraries were conducted in field trials at four growth stages of the crops each year from 2012 to 2013

We integrated single-molecule superresolution imaging with biochemical and genomic approaches to understand how the mismatch repair protein MutS efficiently identifies DNA mismatches during real time in living cells. We show that MutS molecules move fast, exploring the entire nucleoid, but can transition to a slow-moving population that is localized at the replisome even before a mismatch is produced.

The patterns of lateral branching, including tillers and inflorescence branches, determine grain yields of many cereals. In this study, we characterized a regulatory network composed of microRNAs and transcription factor that coordinately regulate vegetative (tiller) and reproductive (panicle) branching in rice. The findings hold tremendous promise for application in rice genetic improvement and may also have general implications for understanding branching regulation of grasses.

Whole genome duplication (WGD) has long been recognized as a major force in angiosperm evolution. DNA methylation variation is known to be involved in polyploidization events. We synthesized autotetraploid rice that may rule out disturbances from hybridization and investigated the scope and scale of DNA methylation variation in response to WGD in neopolyploid rice.