Asian citrus psyllid, Diaphorina citri Kuwayama (Hemiptera: Psyllidae), and huanglongbing disease do not exist in the Stapleton Station area of the Northern Territory of Australia

Abstract  A series of specimens of the Asian citrus psyllid, Diaphorina citri , collected from the Northern Territory (NT) in 1915 was recently rediscovered in the Natural History Museum, London. Surveys were conducted in 2002 on suitable hosts in the locality of the 1915 collections to see if the infestation had persisted. These failed to detect either D. citri or the bacterium that it transmits and that causes huanglongbing disease in citrus. It is presumed that D. citri was eradicated fortuitously by the removal of all citrus plants above latitude 19°S during an eradication program for citrus canker in the NT from 1916 until 1922.     

Mating speed differences between Australian populations ofDrosophila melanogaster

Mating speeds have been studied for two natural populations ofDrosophila melanogaster collected in Victoria, Australia, about 100 miles apart. Significant differences in mating speed were found and hybrids between the populations gave intermediate mating speeds. A small difference between strains in duration of copulation was found.The differences in mating speeds were controlled by the strain of the male, the strain of the female having little effect. No appreciable behavioural interactions were found between strains.     

Nucleotide excision repair endonuclease genes in Drosophila melanogaster

Nucleotide excision repair (NER) is the primary pathway for the removal of ultraviolet light-induced damage and bulky adducts from DNA in eukaryotes. During NER, the helix is unwound around the damaged site, and incisions are made on the 5' and 3' sides, to release an oligonucleotide carrying the lesion. Repair synthesis can then proceed, using the intact strand as a template. The incisions flanking the lesion are catalyzed by different structure-specific endonucleases. The 5' incision is made by a heterodimer of XPF and ERCC1 (Rad1p-Rad10p in Saccharomyces cerevisiae), and the 3' incision is made by XPG (Rad2p in S. cerevisiae). We previously showed that the Drosophila XPF homologue is encoded by the meiotic recombination gene mei-9. We report here the identification of the genes encoding the XPG and ERCC1 homologues (XPG(Dm) and ERCC1(Dm)). XPG(Dm) is encoded by the mus201 gene; we found frameshift mutations predicted to produce truncated XPG(Dm) proteins in each of two mus201 alleles. These mutations cause defects in nucleotide excision repair and hypersensitivity to alkylating agents and ultraviolet light, but do not cause hypersensitivity to ionizing radiation and do not impair viability or fertility. ERCC1(Dm) interacts strongly in a yeast two-hybrid assay with MEI-9, indicative of the presumed requirement for these polypeptides to dimerize to form the functional endonuclease. The Drosophila Ercc1 gene maps to polytene region 51D1-2. The nucleotide excision repair gene mus210 maps nearby (51E-F) but is distinct from Ercc1.     

Association of PADI4 and rheumatoid arthritis: a successful multidisciplinary approach

The identification of functionally relevant polymorphisms of peptidylarginine deiminase 4, an enzyme that catalyzes the post-translational citrullination of proteins, as a rheumatoid arthritis gene is one of the most convincing success stories of complex disease gene mapping to date. In addition to an extensive single nucleotide polymorphism-based association study in a Japanese cohort, a range of techniques have been used to validate this finding.     

Human proximity and habitat fragmentation are key drivers of the rangewide bonobo distribution

Habitat loss and hunting threaten bonobos (Pan paniscus), Endangered (IUCN) great apes endemic to lowland rainforests of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Conservation planning requires a current, data-driven, rangewide map of probable bonobo distribution and an understanding of key attributes of areas used by bonobos. We present a rangewide suitability model for bonobos based on a maximum entropy algorithm in which data associated with locations of bonobo nests helped predict suitable conditions across the species’ entire range. We systematically evaluated available biotic and abiotic factors, including a bonobo-specific forest fragmentation layer (forest edge density), and produced a final model revealing the importance of simple threat-based factors in a data poor environment. We confronted the issue of survey bias in presence-only models and devised a novel evaluation approach applicable to other taxa by comparing models built with data from geographically distinct sub-regions that had higher survey effort. The model’s classification accuracy was high (AUC = 0.82). Distance from agriculture and forest edge density best predicted bonobo occurrence with bonobo nests more likely to occur farther from agriculture and in areas of lower edge density. These results suggest that bonobos either avoid areas of higher human activity, fragmented forests, or both, and that humans reduce the effective habitat of bonobos. The model results contribute to an increased understanding of threats to bonobo populations, as well as help identify priority areas for future surveys and determine core bonobo protection areas.     

Role of metal ions in Escherichia coli alkaline phosphatase. A study of the metal-water interaction by nuclear relaxation rate measurements on water protons.

The binding of metal to alkaline phosphatase from Escherichia coli and the binding of water and orthophosphate to the Me-2+-enzyme binary complex have been examined by water proton relaxation rate (PRR) measurements. Titration of the three paramagnetic metals, Mn2+, Cu2+, and Co2+, into apoalkaline phosphatase and the titrations of apoenzyme into metal have been carried out. Analysis of the spin-lattice relaxation rates for these titrations and of Scatchard binding curves derived from these results, as well as EPR data, show four tight manganese sites, between two and three tight copper sites, or four cobalt sites per enzyme dimer of molecular weight 80,000. The multiple sites for each metal are indistinguishable by these magnetic resonance techniques. Both the spin-lattice- and spin-spin-relaxation rates exhibit a negative temperature coefficient, showing that these processes are not exchange-limited. From a frequency dependence study of T-1 and from the T-1:T-2 ratio measured at 220 MHz, correlation times from the water-enzyme complexes have been estimated. For H20-Mn-2+-alkaline phosphatase, gamma c equals 1.55 times 10-9 s; for H20-Cu-2+ -alkaline phosphatase, gamma c equals 1.82 times 10-s; and for the cobalt complex, gamma c equals 1.0 times 10-12 s at 4 degrees. Assuming 1 water molecule bound per metal site, these correlation times correspond to the following water-metal distances: gamma (A) is 4.0 A for Mn-2+-H20, 3.4 A for Cu-2+-H20, and 2.8 A for Co-2+-H20. Thus, water is shown to bind directly to the metal atoms of alkaline phosphatase. The correlation between the length of the water-metal bond and the relative activity of the various metalloenzymes support the importance of this binding in the monophosphoesterase reaction catalyzed by alkaline phosphatase. Addition of excess orthophosphate to any of the water-metalloenzyme complexes does not displace an exchangeable water molecule from the metal site. The Mn-PO-4 distance which we have reported earlier (Zukin, R.S., Hollis, D.P., and Gray, G.A. (1973) Biochem. Biophys. Res. Commun. 53, 238) to be 7.3 A is consistent with this finding and suggests a model in which Pi binds to Mn-2+-alkaline phosphatase through a water bridge.