Effects of entrance design on catch efficiency of arabesque greenling traps: a field experiment in Matsumae, Hokkaido

ABSTRACT:   A field experiment was conducted in the Matsumae area of Hokkaido, Japan, during June and July 2002, to investigate the effects of different entrance designs on the catch efficiency of fish traps by fishing with commercial traps (entrance inclination angle [α] = 37°; funnel length of entrance [ L _f ] = 22 cm) and experimental traps. The experimental traps were of the same size and similar design as commercial traps, with different entrance inclination angles (trap E1: α = 46°; E2: α = 27°; E3: α = 0°; all L _f  = 22 cm) or funnel lengths (E4: α = 37°, L _f  = 8 cm). In total, 2200 fish during 200 trap hauls were captured. The catch was significantly higher using both traps E2 and the commercial trap than with trap E3 ( P  < 0.05), and the catch of trap E2 was higher than that of the commercial trap. There were no significant differences in mean fish body length or the frequency distributions of body length among trap types (E1, E2, E3 and commercial). The funnel length of the entrance also affected the catch of traps. Trap E4 had significantly higher catches than the commercial trap ( P  = 0.04) when traps were deployed for a 1-day soak time. Fish body length frequency distributions did not differ between trap E4 and the commercial trap. The results showed that catch can be greatly affected by trap entrance designs.     

Phenotypic and functional analysis of bovine peripheral blood dendritic cells before parturition by a novel purification method

Dendritic cells (DCs) are specialized antigen presenting cells specializing in antigen uptake and processing, and play an important role in the innate and adaptive immune response. A subset of bovine peripheral blood DCs was identified as CD172a⁺/CD11c⁺/MHC (major histocompatibility complex) class II⁺ cells. Although DCs are identified at 0.1%–0.7% of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC), the phenotype and function of DCs remain poorly understood with regard to maintaining tolerance during the pregnancy. All cattle used in this study were 1 month before parturition. We have established a novel method for the purification of DCs from PBMC using magnetic‐activated cell sorting, and purified the CD172a⁺/CD11c⁺ DCs, with high expression of MHC class II and CD40, at 84.8% purity. There were individual differences in the expressions of CD205 and co‐stimulatory molecules CD80 and CD86 on DCs. There were positive correlations between expression of cytokine and co‐stimulatory molecules in DCs, and the DCs maintained their immune tolerance, evidenced by their low expressions of the co‐stimulatory molecules and cytokine production. These results suggest that before parturition a half of DCs may be immature and tend to maintain tolerance based on the low cytokine production, and the other DCs with high co‐stimulatory molecules may already have the ability of modulating the T‐cell linage.     

N-terminal domain including conserved flg22 is required for flagellin-induced hypersensitive cell death in <Emphasis Type="Italic">Arabidopsis thaliana</Emphasis>

Flagellin in Pseudomonas syringae is a potent elicitor of defense responses including hypersensitive cell death in dicot plants. The oligopeptides flg22 consisting of 22 conserved amino acids near the N-terminus of flagellins is reported to induce plant defense responses. Because glycosylation of the central domain of flagellin affects its elicitor activity, we investigated whether any peptide sequence in addition to flg22 is required for flagellin-induced hypersensitive reaction. A study of recombinant flagellin polypeptides indicated that the N-terminal domain including the conserved flg22 is required for flagellin-induced hypersensitive cell death in Arabidopsis thaliana.     

Pea extracellular Cu/Zn-superoxide dismutase responsive to signal molecules from a fungal pathogen

We previously reported that the release of O₂ ⁻ from isolated pea cell walls was enhanced by a 70-kDa glycoprotein elicitor but was suppressed by mucin-type glycopeptide suppressors (supprescins A and B) prepared from pycnospore germination fluid of Mycosphaerella pinodes, causal agent of Mycosphaerella blight of pea. Here, we show that superoxide dismutase (SOD) in the apoplast fluid/cell wall of pea seedlings responds to the fungal elicitor and suppressor molecules. In a pharmacological study and with internal amino acid sequencing, the apoplastic SOD in a pea cultivar Midoriusui was found to be a Cu/Zn type SOD. We cloned a full-length cDNA of the Cu/Zn-SOD and designated it as PsCu/Zn-SOD1. An increase in PsCu/Zn-SOD1 mRNA and the PsCu/Zn-SOD1 protein was induced by treatment with the elicitor more intensively than by wounding. Such induction by the elicitor or wounding, however, was inhibited by the concomitant presence of supprescins. The SOD activity of recombinant PsCu/Zn-SOD1 was regulated directly by these signal molecules in a manner similar to their effect on the SOD activity in the apoplastic fluid and in the cell wall-bound proteins. Based on these findings, we discuss a role for PsCu/Zn-SOD1 in the pea defense response. The nucleotide sequence data of PsCu/Zn-SOD1 reported are available in the DDBJ/EMBL/GenBank databases under accession number AB189165.     

Need for flagella for complete virulence of Pseudomonas syringae pv. tabaci: genetic analysis with flagella-defective mutants ?fliC and ?fliD in host tobacco plants

The flagellins purified from Pseudomonas syringae pv. tabaci induce a hypersensitive reaction in nonhost tomato cells. To investigate the role of flagella and flagellin in the compatible interaction, we generated two types of flagella-defective mutant. The fliC mutant lost the fliC gene that encodes flagellin protein, whereas the fliD mutant lost the fliD gene that encodes HAP2-capping protein. The two mutants had markedly reduced ability to cause disease symptoms in tobacco leaves. Furthermore, propagation of the mutants in tobacco leaves was less than that in wild-type pv. tabaci. Compared to the inoculation with wild-type pv. tabaci, inoculation with the two mutants did not markedly induce the expression of typical defense response-related genes such as PAL and hsr203J. Complementation of each fliC and fliD gene to the corresponding deficient mutant restored motility and virulence. These results indicate that flagella of P. syringae pv. tabaci are indispensable organelles for complete virulence on host tobacco plants.