CEP2 Attenuates Myoblast Differentiation But Does Not Affect Proliferation

CEP2 (CDC42EP2) is a member of the CDC42 subfamily that belongs to the Rho family. The Rho family plays an important role in a variety of cellular processes including skeletal myogenesis. Here, we find the expression of CEP2 increased significantly during C2C12 myogenesis. Overexpression of CEP2 could attenuate myoblast differentiation, while knockdown of CEP2 by siRNA results in enhancing myogenesis. Furthermore, we demonstrate for the first time that CEP2 attenuates myoblast differentiation via suppression of muscle regulatory factors (MRFs) rather than influencing myoblast proliferation. These results indicate that CEP2 acts as a repressor during myogenesis, which provides new insights into the role of CEP2 in muscle development.     

Phylogeography of the Northern Atlantic species Chondrus crispus (Gigartinales, Rhodophyta) inferred from nuclear rDNA internal transcribed spacer sequences

Eighteen isolates of the red algae Chondrus crispus were collected from Northern Atlantic sites, together with C. ocellatus, C. yendoi and C. pinnulatus from the North Pacific. The nuclear rDNA internal transcribed spacer (ITS) was sequenced and compared, spanning both the ITS regions and the 5.8S rRNA gene. Percentage of nucleotide variation for C. crispus ranged from 0.3% to 4.0%. Phylogenetic analyses were performed using maximum parsimony (MP), neighbor-joining (NJ) and minimum evolution methods. They showed that two main clades existed within the C. crispus samples examined and that suggested C. crispus had a single Atlantic origin. The clustering however did not follow the geographic origin. We hypothesized that the current distribution of C. crispus populations might be a result of three main factors: temperature boundaries, paleoclimate and paleoceanography. ITS data exhibited abundant molecular information not only for phylogeographical investigation but also for systematics studies. Handling editor: C. Sturmbauer     

青海湖不同支流中青海湖裸鲤的AFLP遗传多样性分析

为研究青海湖不同支流中青海湖裸鲤(Gymnocypris przewalskii)群体间的遗传差异,我们对采自于不同支流中的群体进行了扩增片段长度多态性分析(AFLP)。应用10对多态性引物在6个青海湖裸鲤群体中共扩增位点348个,其中多态性位点184个,多态性条带占总扩增条带的比例为52.9%;筛选得到79个特异位点,构建了AFLP指纹图谱,根据谱带特征可以将不同支流中的青海湖裸鲤准确区分。遗传聚类分析对比结果表明:当遗传相似系数为0.87时,将六条河流的裸鲤归为为四支,沙柳河、甘子河、黑马河各归一支,哈尔盖河、泉吉河、布哈河为同一支。研究结果为青海湖裸鲤遗传多样性检测和亲本选育提供了技术参数,对青海湖裸鲤资源保护和人工增殖放流工作中野生亲鱼的选择策略具有指导意义。     

Fine Mapping and Candidate Gene Analysis of qSTL3, a Stigma Length-Conditioning Locus in Rice (Oryza sativa L.)

The efficiency of hybrid seed production can be improved by increasing the percentage of exserted stigma, which is closely related to the stigma length in rice. In the chromosome segment substitute line (CSSL) population derived from Nipponbare (recipient) and Kasalath (donor), a single CSSL (SSSL14) was found to show a longer stigma length than that of Nipponbare. The difference in stigma length between Nipponbare and SSSL14 was controlled by one locus (qSTL3). Using 7,917 individuals from the SSSL14/Nipponbare F₂ population, the qSTL3 locus was delimited to a 19.8-kb region in the middle of the short arm of chromosome 3. Within the 19.8-kb chromosome region, three annotated genes (LOC_Os03g14850, LOC_Os03g14860 and LOC_Os03g14880) were found in the rice genome annotation database. According to gene sequence alignments in LOC_Os03g14850, a transition of G (Nipponbare) to A (Kasalath) was detected at the 474-bp site in CDS. The transition created a stop codon, leading to a deletion of 28 amino acids in the deduced peptide sequence in Kasalath. A T-DNA insertion mutant (05Z11CN28) of LOC_Os03g14850 showed a longer stigma length than that of wild type (Zhonghua 11), validating that LOC_Os03g14850 is the gene controlling stigma length. However, the Kasalath allele of LOC_Os03g14850 is unique because all of the alleles were the same as that of Nipponbare at the 474-bp site in the CDS of LOC_Os03g14850 among the investigated accessions with different stigma lengths. A gene-specific InDel marker LQ30 was developed for improving stigma length during rice hybrid breeding by marker-assisted selection.     

Population genetic structure of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Sargassum thunbergii</Emphasis> (Fucales,Phaeophyta) detected by RAPD and ISSR markers

Genetic variation of four populations of Sargassum thunbergii (Mert.) O. Kuntze and one outgroup of S. fusiforme (Harv.) Setchell from Shandong peninsula of China was studied with random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) and inter-simple sequence repeat (ISSR) markers. A total of 28 RAPD primers and 19 ISSR primers were amplified, showing 174 loci and 125 loci, respectively. Calculation of genetic diversity with different indicators (P%, percentage of polymorphic loci; H, the expected heterozygosity; I, Shannon’s information index) revealed low or moderate levels of genetic variations within each S. thunbergii population. High genetic differentiations were determined with pairwise Nei’s unbiased genetic distance (D) and fixation index (F _ST ) between the populations. The Mantel test showed that two types of matrices of D and F _ST were highly correlated, whether from RAPD or ISSR data, r = 0.9310 (P  = 0.008) and 0.9313 (P = 0.009) respectively. Analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA) was used to apportion the variations between and within the S. thunbergii populations. It indicated that the variations among populations were higher than those within populations, being 57.57% versus 42.43% by RAPD and 59.52% versus 40.08% by ISSR, respectively. Furthermore, the Mantel test suggested that the genetic differentiations between the four populations were related to the geographical distances (r > 0.5), i.e., they conformed to the IBD (isolation by distance) model, as expected from UPGMA (unweighted pair group method with arithmetic averages) cluster analysis. As a whole, the high genetic structuring between the four S. thunbergii populations along distant locations was clearly indicated in the RAPD and ISSR analyses (r > 0.8) in our study.     

中华姬鼠体组织化学成分的分析

在研究生态系统中的元素循环问题时,对每个生物组分的分析,通常是依据其生物量与元素含量的乘积。但是,许多因子又影响到个体和种群元素的含量,这些因子包括体尺大小、性别、繁殖状况、时间、空间和遗传变异等等。因此,元素含量及其变化的研究均有一定意义。中华姬鼠(Apodemus draco)是亚热带山地常绿阔叶林鼠形啮齿类的绝对优势种。既然生态系统内一定营养层中优势种的能学研究在相当程度上可以代表该营养层的能学状况,那么中华姬鼠身体中的元素研究无疑对研究鼠形啮齿类在该生态系统元素循环过程中的地位有所助益。