Impact of soil water content on maize responses to the plant growth-promoting rhizobacterium Azospirillum lipoferum CRT1

Members of the bacterial genus Azospirillum are root-associated bacteria that increase yield in cereals by promoting growth and alleviating drought stress. How plants integrate the many bacterium-derived growth-promoting stimuli with other environmental factors to generate a coordinated response remains unresolved. Using a commercial Azospirillum strain, A. lipoferum CRT1 and two host maize cultivars, it was observed that bacterization reduced the drought-induced increase in lateral root growth and enhanced the flood-induced increase in lateral root growth in the more drought- and flood-sensitive cultivar. In the other one, A. lipoferum CRT1 only elicited a moderate root growth response under low soil water potential. The photosynthetic potential and activity were increased in the earlier cultivar and decreased in the later one, irrespective of the soil water content. No impact of the bacterium was seen on the growth of the leaves of both cultivars under both stresses until the third leaf stage, therefore suggesting that it is a consequence of multiple primary adaptations to biotic and abiotic stresses. It is suggested that host–bacteria recognition leads to a stress-specific modulation of the root response and a differential stress-independent effect on photosynthesis. This is the first report of the impact of Azospirillum under flood conditions.     

Evaluation of the visual stress grading standard on French Spruce (Picea excelsa) and Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) sawn timber

? In this paper an evaluation of the visual grading standard for softwood sawn timber was made.

? In order to do so, visual grading according to EN 518 and theoretical grading according to EN 338 and EN 384 (measurements of MOE, MOR and density) were applied to lumber. Two batches of 111 and 102 French boards were graded, respectively, of Spruce (Picea excelsa) and Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii). For the visual grading the most discriminant criterion was noted: knots, cracks, wane, etc.

? Finally, the results of the two grading methods were compared, and it was shown that the visual stress grading gave quite low results for our two French species.

     

Mining the genetic diversity of Ehrlichia ruminantium using map genes family

Understanding bacterial genetic diversity is crucial to comprehend pathogenesis. Ehrlichia ruminantium (E. ruminantium), a tick-transmitted intracellular bacterial pathogen, causes heartwater disease in ruminants. This model rickettsia, whose genome has been recently sequenced, is restricted to neutrophils and reticulo-endothelial cells of its mammalian host and to the midgut and salivary glands of its vector tick. E. ruminantium harbors a multigene family encoding for 16 outer membrane proteins including MAP1, a major antigenic protein. All the 16 map paralogs are expressed in bovine endothelial cells and some are specifically translated in the tick or in the mammalian host.In this study, we carried out phylogenetic analyses of E. ruminantium using sequences of 6 MAP proteins, MAP1, MAP1-2, MAP1-6, MAP1-5, MAP1+1 and MAP1-14, localized either in the center or at the borders of the map genes cluster.We show that (i) map1 gene is a good tool to characterize the genetic diversity among Africa, Caribbean islands and Madagascar strains including new emerging isolates of E. ruminantium; (ii) the different map paralogs define different genotypes showing divergent evolution; (iii) there is no correlation between all MAP genotypes and the geographic origins of the strains; (iv) The genetic diversity revealed by MAP proteins is conserved whatever is the scale of strains sampling (village, region, continent) and thus was not related to the different timing of strains introduction, i.e. continuous introduction of strains versus punctual introduction (Africa versus Caribbean islands).These results provide therefore a significant advance towards the management of E. ruminantium diversity. The differential evolution of these paralogs suggests specific roles of these proteins in host–vector–pathogen interactions that could be crucial for developing broad-spectrum vaccines.     

ELISA to detect proteolysis of ultrahigh-temperature milk upon storage

Casein proteolysis can occur in milk during storage leading to its gelation. The two main proteolytic systems suspected to be involved are the plasmin and the proteases produced by psychrotrophic bacteria. The latter have been shown to cleave kappa-casein at the Phe105-Met106 bond. Although several techniques allow the determination of plasmin in milk, few rapid and easy-to-perform analytical techniques are available to check for bacterial proteolytic activity. This study presents the development of an inhibition ELISA allowing for the quantification of the kappa-casein intact at the Phe105-Met106 bond. It uses a monoclonal antibody specifically directed against this peptide bond that binds to the protein as long as the molecule's cleavage site is intact but not when it is cleaved. This simple technique allows for the rapid analysis of more than 20 samples within 3 h. Applied to commercial milks, this assay allowed for the detection of unstable milk.     

Development of structure-taste relationships for monosubstituted phenylsulfamate sweeteners using classification and regression tree (CART) analysis

Twenty monosubstituted phenylsulfamates (cyclamates) have been synthesized and have had their taste portfolios determined. These have been combined with 63 compounds already in the literature to give a database of 83 ortho, meta, and para compounds. A training set of 75 compounds was randomly selected leaving eight compounds as a test set. A series of nine predictors determined with Corey-Pauling-Koltun models, calculated from the PC SPARTAN PRO program and Hammett sigma values taken mainly from the literature, have been used to establish structure-taste relationships for these types of sweeteners. The taste panel data for all compounds were categorized into three classes, namely, sweet (S), nonsweet (N), and sweet/nonsweet (N/S), and a novel "sweetness value" or weighting was also calculated for each compound. Linear and quadratic discriminant analysis were first used with the S, N, and N/S data, but the results were somewhat disappointing. Classification and regression tree analysis using the sweetness values for all 75 compounds was more successful, and only 14 were misclassified and six of the eight test set compounds were correctly classified. For the 29 meta compounds, one subset using just two parameters classified 83% of these compounds. Finally, using various methods, predictions were made on the likely tastes of a number of meta compounds and a striking agreement was found between the tree prediction and those given by earlier models. This appears to offer a strong vindication of the tree approach.     

Estimating nocturnal ecosystem respiration from the vertical turbulent flux and change in storage of CO2

Micrometeorological measurements of nighttime ecosystem respiration can be systematically biased when stable atmospheric conditions lead to drainage flows associated with decoupling of air flow above and within plant canopies. The associated horizontal and vertical advective fluxes cannot be measured using instrumentation on the single towers typically used at micrometeorological sites. A common approach to minimize bias is to use a threshold in friction velocity, u_*, to exclude periods when advection is assumed to be important, but this is problematic in situations when in-canopy flows are decoupled from the flow above. Using data from 25 flux stations in a wide variety of forest ecosystems globally, we examine the generality of a novel approach to estimating nocturnal respiration developed by van Gorsel et al. (van Gorsel, E., Leuning, R., Cleugh, H.A., Keith, H., Suni, T., 2007. Nocturnal carbon efflux: reconciliation of eddy covariance and chamber measurements using an alternative to the u_*-threshold filtering technique. Tellus 59B, 397–403, Tellus, 59B, 307-403). The approach is based on the assumption that advection is small relative to the vertical turbulent flux (F_C) and change in storage (F_S) of CO₂ in the few hours after sundown. The sum of F_C and F_S reach a maximum during this period which is used to derive a temperature response function for ecosystem respiration. Measured hourly soil temperatures are then used with this function to estimate respiration R_Rmax. The new approach yielded excellent agreement with (1) independent measurements using respiration chambers, (2) with estimates using ecosystem light-response curves of F_c + F_s extrapolated to zero light, R_LRC, and (3) with a detailed process-based forest ecosystem model, R_cast. At most sites respiration rates estimated using the u_*-filter, R_ust, were smaller than R_Rmax and R_LRC. Agreement of our approach with independent measurements indicates that R_Rmax provides an excellent estimate of nighttime ecosystem respiration.     

Reliability of an expert-based runoff and erosion model: Application of STREAM to different environments

During the last decades, the European loess belt has been confronted with a significant increase in environmental problems due to erosion on agricultural land. Spatially distributed runoff and erosion models operating at the catchment scale are therefore needed to evaluate the impact of potential mitigation measures. Expert-based models offer an alternative solution to process-based and empirical models, but their decision rules are only valid for the local conditions for which they have been derived. The STREAM model, which was developed in Normandy (France), has been applied in two Belgian catchments having a similar soil texture, as well as in a catchment of southern France differing by soil, land use and climate characteristics. The performance of hydrological models can be assessed for instance by calculating the Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency criterion (E_NS). When applied to Belgium, the model results are satisfactory to good after an adaptation of the decision rules (0.90 < E_NS < 0.93 for runoff predictions and 0.85 < E_NS < 0.89 for erosion predictions). Given the important environmental differences between Normandy and southern France, the model rules were also adapted for application in the latter environment. Unfortunately, the quality of runoff predictions was insufficient to simulate erosion in southern France. In conclusion, STREAM is a reliable model providing satisfactory runoff and erosion predictions in the regions where hortonian overland flow dominates. Nevertheless, an adaptation of decision rules based on local multi-scale (plot, field, catchment) data is needed, before running the model. STREAM can then serve as a decision support tool to design for instance flood control measures.     

Prevalence of pathogens causing subclinical mastitis in 15 dairy herds in the Republic of Ireland

: Milk samples from 285 cows in 15 dairy herds were collected for bacteriological analysis. Cows were selected on the basis of a somatic cell count (SCC) exceeding 200,000 cells per ml at the three most recent milk recordings prior to sampling. Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus uberis were the predominant isolates accounting for 21% (n = 61) and 19% (n = 53) of isolates, respectively. Streptococcus uberis was more frequently isolated from split-calving herds than from spring-calving herds and this difference was statistically significant (P < 0.005). Herds with suboptimal housing had a significantly greater prevalence of S. uberis than did herds where housing was adequate (P < 0.005). The isolation rates for S. aureus was significantly greater in herds where parlour hygiene was suboptimal (P < 0.05).