Non-African origin of a local beneficial mutation in D. melanogaster

It is well understood that the out-of-Africa habitat expansion of D. melanogaster was associated with the fixation of many beneficial mutations. Nevertheless, it is not clear yet whether these beneficial mutations segregated already in Africa or originated outside of Africa. In this article, we describe an ongoing selective sweep specific to one European population. One microsatellite allele has increased in a population from The Netherlands to a frequency of 18%, whereas it is virtually absent in 12 other European populations. The selective sweep resulted in a genomic region of more than 600 kb that is identical by descent. This is probably the first evidence of a beneficial mutation that has arisen outside of Africa and has resulted in a selective sweep localized in a population from The Netherlands.     

Effect of prolonged refractoriness on the forward masking of tone bursts in single units of the mouse inferior colliculus

The estimation of conditional probability was used to demonstrate the effect of the postspike changes in neuron excitability on its response to the second burst in a pair with an interval between bursts ranging from 50 to 200 ms. The responses of the neurons of the inferior colliculus to pairs of low-intensity tone bursts were recorded extracellularly in anesthetized albino mice. The probability of the response to the second burst in a pair was estimated under two conditions: the presence and the absence of a spike in the response to the first burst. If the interval between burst was 50 ms, the probability of response was decreased in most neurons where there was a spike in the response to the first burst. The opposite trend was observed in a small proportion of neurons. If the interval was increased, it weakened the dependence of the response to the second burst on the character of the response to the first one. The suppression of inhibitory inputs by bicuculline emphasized the postspike refractoriness rather than canceled it. The possible mechanisms of the interdependence between the responses to two consecutive signals are discussed.     

Genetic Analysis for F1 Yield Traits with Conditional Approach in Island Cotton (Gossypium barbadense L.)

A genetic model with additive, dominance and genotype × environment interaction effect was employed to analyze the 3-year data of F₁ hybrids from 5 × 4 diallel cross, whose parents were Island cotton and had different fruit branch types. Unconditional and conditional genetic variances were conducted for analyze genetic impacts of yield components on yield. Results of unconditional genetic variances showed that there were no additive variance of total lint yield. But conditional additive effects of total lint yield, when excluding the phenotype of boll weight, boll number at prefrost, boll number at postfrost, and lint yield at prefrost, indicated that improving the additive effects of the total lint yield was still possible. Crossing and selecting component traits with high contributive additive effects could obtain good offsprings. Yield components contributed large dominance effects to the heterosis of lint yield at prefrost and total lint yield in crosses. Yield component traits were controlled with each other. The traits having positive contributive effects could be applied to further improve target traits.     

Enhancing the stability and ecological safety of mass‐reared transgenic strains for field release by redundant conditional lethality systems

The genetic manipulation of agriculturally important insects now allows the development of genetic sexing and male sterility systems for more highly efficient biologically‐based population control programs, most notably the Sterile Insect Technique (SIT), for both plant and animal insect pests. Tetracycline‐suppressible (Tet‐off) conditional lethal systems may function together so that transgenic strains will be viable and fertile on a tetracycline‐containing diet, but female‐lethal and male sterile in tetracycline‐free conditions. This would allow their most efficacious use in a unified system for sterile male‐only production for SIT. A critical consideration for the field release of such transgenic insect strains, however, is a determination of the frequency and genetic basis of lethality revertant survival. This will provide knowledge essential to evaluating the genetic stability of the lethality system, its environmental safety, and provide the basis for modifications ensuring optimal efficacy. For Tet‐off lethal survival determinations, development of large‐scale screening protocols should also allow the testing of these modifications, and test the ability of other conditional lethal systems to fully suppress propagation of rare Tet‐off survivors. If a dominant temperature sensitive (DTS) pupal lethality system proves efficient for secondary lethality in Drosophila, it may provide the safeguard needed to support the release of sexing/sterility strains, and potentially, the release of unisex lethality strains as a form of genetic male sterility. Should the DTS Prosβ2¹ mutation prove effective for redundant lethality, its high level of structural and functional conservation should allow host‐specific cognates to be created for a wide range of insect species.     

A high efficient method of constructing recombinant Bombyx mori (silkworm) multiple nucleopolyhedrovirus based on zero‐background Tn7‐mediated transposition in Escherichia coli

A high efficient way for generation of recombinant Bombyx mori (silkworm) multiple nucleopolyhedrovirus by Tn7‐mediated transposition in Escherichia coli was performed. The new system consists of a conditional replication donor vector pRCDM and an attTn7 site blocked E. coli containing BmNPV‐Bacmid. The donor vector contains a replication origin derived from R6Kγ, which propagated only in host cells with pir gene expression decreased in the transposition background greatly. Compared with original vector derived from pUC, the transposition efficiency increased from 5.7 to 66% (≈10 fold) when using conditional replication vector pRCDM transposition into original BmDH10Bac. A further effort to decrease the transposition background was made by blocking the attTn7 site in host E. coli genome. The resulting attTn7 occupied BmDH10BacΔTn7 resulted in a significant increase from 5.7 to 23% (≈4 fold) in the efficacy of generate recombinant BmNPV Bacmid by transposition. Furthermore, the transposition of BmDH10BacΔTn7 with pRCDM resulted typically in 100% white colonies, and it indicated that a zero transposition background was accomplished. This high efficient and zero background transposition system provides a new simple and rapid method for construction of recombinant BmNPV used to express target genes or produce gene‐delivery virus particles in silkworm. © 2009 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Biotechnol. Prog., 2009     

Fate of HERS during tooth root development

Tooth root development begins after the completion of crown formation in mammals. Previous studies have shown that Hertwig's epithelial root sheath (HERS) plays an important role in root development, but the fate of HERS has remained unknown. In order to investigate the morphological fate and analyze the dynamic movement of HERS cells in vivo, we generated K14-Cre;R26R mice. HERS cells are detectable on the surface of the root throughout root formation and do not disappear. Most of the HERS cells are attached to the surface of the cementum, and others separate to become the epithelial rest of Malassez. HERS cells secrete extracellular matrix components onto the surface of the dentin before dental follicle cells penetrate the HERS network to contact dentin. HERS cells also participate in the cementum development and may differentiate into cementocytes. During root development, the HERS is not interrupted, and instead the HERS cells continue to communicate with each other through the network structure. Furthermore, HERS cells interact with cranial neural crest derived mesenchyme to guide root development. Taken together, the network of HERS cells is crucial for tooth root development.     

Genetic variation underlying the expression of a polyphenism

Polyphenic traits are widespread and represent a conditional strategy sensitive to environmental cues. The environmentally cued threshold (ET) model considers the switchpoint between alternative phenotypes as a polygenic quantitative trait with normally distributed variation. However, the genetic variation for switchpoints has rarely been explored empirically. Here, we used inbred lines to investigate the genetic variation for the switchpoint in the mite Rhizoglyphus echinopus, in which males are either fighters or scramblers. The conditionality of male dimorphism varied among inbred lines, indicating that there was genetic variation for switchpoints in the base population, as predicted by the ET model. Our results also suggest a mixture between canalized and conditional strategists in R. echinopus. We propose that major genes that canalize morph expression and affect the extent to which a trait can be conditionally expressed could be a feature of the genetic architecture of threshold traits in other taxa.     

Generation of an OMgp allelic series in mice

The very limited ability to regenerate axons after injury in the mature mammalian central nervous system (CNS) has been partly attributed to the growth restrictive nature of CNS myelin. Oligodendrocyte myelin glycoprotein (OMgp) was identified as a major myelin‐derived inhibitor of axon growth. However, its role in axon regeneration in vivo is poorly understood. Here we describe the generation and molecular characterization of an OMgp allelic series. With a single gene targeting event and Cre/FLP mediated recombination, we generated an OMgp null allele with a LacZ reporter, one without a reporter gene, and an OMgp conditional allele. This allelic series will aid in the study of OMgp in adult CNS axon regeneration using mouse models of spinal cord injury. The conditional allele will overcome developmental compensation when employed with an inducible Cre, and allows for the study of temporal and tissue/cell type‐specific roles of OMgp in CNS injury‐induced axonal plasticity. genesis 47:751–756, 2009. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Deep homology: A view from systematics

Over the past decade, it has been discovered that disparate aspects of morphology – often of distantly related groups of organisms – are regulated by the same genetic regulatory mechanisms. Those discoveries provide a new perspective on morphological evolutionary change. A conceptual framework for exploring these research findings is termed ‘deep homology’. A comparative framework for morphological relations of homology is provided that distinguishes analogy, homoplasy, plesiomorphy and synapomorphy. Four examples – three from plants and one from animals – demonstrate that homologous developmental mechanisms can regulate a range of morphological relations including analogy, homoplasy and examples of uncertain homology. Deep homology is part of a much wider range of phenomena in which biological (genes, regulatory mechanisms, morphological traits) and phylogenetic levels of homology can both be disassociated. Therefore, to understand homology, precise, comparative, independent statements of both biological and phylogenetic levels of homology are necessary.