生态饲料的曙光

在现今的地球上,随时可以听到生态的呼声.臭氧层变薄,空气污染,植被减少……引起了人类的警觉.     

Characteristics of the genomes of equine rotaviruses

The electrophoretic migration patterns of the double-stranded RNA genome segments of equine rotaviruses closely resembled the usual pattern described for other mammalian rotaviruses. However, in a direct comparison of one equine isolate with the genome of the simian rotavirus SA 11, variations in the mobility of seven “corresponding” segments were observed. Similarly, comparisons made between various different equine rotavirus isolates showed minor but consistent variations in the electrophoretic mobility of some segments. The application of RNA electrophoresis to epidemiological studies of rotavirus strains is discussed.     

Genotype disclosure in the genomics era: roles and responsibilities

Disclosure of affected breed without disclosure of major progenitors has been the usual practice in scientific papers reporting recessive heritable disorders of cattle. Before molecular genetics, carrier identity could not be used by breeders to control causal mutations because phenotypically normal heterozygotes among genetically related animals could not be detected other than by test mating. Accurate, low‐cost DNA tests fundamentally changed this situation. Genomics can provide relief from the old problem of emerging recessive disorders in cattle breeding, but greater transparency of genotype data between breeders is necessary to fully exploit the opportunities for cost‐efficient genetic disease control. Effective control of several recessive disorders has been demonstrated in Angus cattle, based entirely on voluntary DNA testing by breeders but mandatory public disclosure of test results and genotype probabilities for all registered animals. When a DNA test is available, major progenitors (particularly bulls from which semen has been distributed) should be identified and disclosed concurrently with the affected breed. As a minimum, whenever possible the closest common ancestors in the pedigrees of the parents of homozygous mutants should be disclosed after confirmation of carrier status. Progenitor disclosure in scientific publications should occur in cooperation with breed societies, which should have the opportunity to advise breeders and initiate management programs before scientific publication. Unless properly managed, genomic enhancement of animal selection using SNP markers may increase inbreeding, co‐ancestry and emergence of recessive disorders. The information systems and genotype disclosure policies of some breed societies will be increasingly challenged, particularly with accelerating mutation discovery using next‐generation sequencing.     

Poultry breeding in the post-genomics era

1. I introduce the problems facing poultry breeding in the future and the role biotechnology may have to play. 2. I then review recent research in the genomics and bioinformatics of poultry and where this may lead in the near future. 3. Finally, I discuss the scientific and commercial opportunities of this research and strategies for implementation into poultry breeding practices.     

Plasticity of bacterial genomes: pathogenicity islands and the locus of enterocyte effacement (LEE)

Many bacterial virulence attributes, like toxins, adhesins, invasins, iron uptake systems, are encoded within specific regions of the bacterial genome. These in size varying regions are termed pathogenicity islands (PAIs) since they confer pathogenic properties to the respective micro-organism. Per definition PAIs are exclusively found in pathogenic strains and are often inserted near transfer-RNA genes. Nevertheless, non-pathogenic bacteria also possess foreign DNA elements that confer advantageous features, leading to improved fitness. These additional DNA elements as well as PAIs are termed genomic islands and were acquired during bacterial evolution. Significant G+C content deviation in pathogenicity islands with respect to the rest of the genome, the presence of direct repeat sequences at the flanking regions, the presence of integrase gene determinants as other mobility features,the particular insertion site (tRNA gene) as well as the observed genetic instability suggests that pathogenicity islands were acquired by horizontal gene transfer. PAIs are the fascinating proof of the plasticity of bacterial genomes. PAIs were originally described in human pathogenic Escherichia (E.) coli strains. In the meantime PAIs have been found in various pathogenic bacteria of humans, animals and even plants. The Locus of Enterocyte Effacement (LEE) is one particular widely distributed PAI of E coli. In addition, it also confers pathogenicity to the related species Citrobacter (C.) rodentium and Escherichia (E.) alvei. The LEE is an important virulence feature of several animal pathogens. It is an obligate PAI of all animal and human enteropathogenic E. coli (EPEC), and most enterohaemorrhegic E. coli (EHEC) also harbor the LEE. The LEE encodes a type III secretion system, an adhesion (intimin) that mediates the intimate contact between the bacterium and the epithelial cell, as well as various proteins which are secreted via the type III secretion system. The LEE encoded virulence features are responsible for the formation of so called attaching and effacing (AE) lesions in the intestinal epithelium. Due to its wide distribution in animal pathogens, LEE encoded antigens are suitable vaccine antigens. Acquisition and structure of the LEE pathogenicity island is the crucial point of numerous investigations. However, the evolution of the LEE, its origin and further spread in E. coli, are far from being resolved.     

We and they: Animal welfare in the era of advanced agricultural biotechnology

The paper discusses central moral issues raised by the applications of advanced biotechnology to animal agriculture and introduces the major ethical concepts and principles of animal bioethics. It is argued that biotechnology enables human beings to transform animals according to human needs, which blurs the boundary between humans and non-human animals in moral and biological sense. The more humans change animals, the more responsible humans are for the welfare of the animals and the greater their moral obligations. The paper introduces the main ethical approaches to animal welfare, traces the philosophical roots of animal ethics in the Judeo-Christian tradition and discusses the views of classical and contemporary ethicists such as Kant, Bentham, Mill, Peter Singer and Tom Regan. The paper explores the concept of animal welfare, suffering and rights, and the values behind Animal Liberation. Special attention is given to the animal welfare issues posed by cloning, genetic engineering and patenting of living organism. For each technology, actual or potential risks to animal welfare are identified and their moral implications are outlined. It is noted that the traditional moral principles of animal welfare, animal interests and animal rights are inadequate as means for evaluating the morality of certain advanced technologies because the technologies can change the animals in profound ways that make animal awareness too limited to give rise to claims about welfare, interests or rights. The principle of animal integrity is endorsed as an alternative better suited for evaluating the morality of advanced biotechnology.     

Schofield memorial lecture. Bull semen and muscle ATP: some evidence of the dawn of medical science in ancient Egypt.

The importance of animal experimentation to human and animal health is not well understood by an increasingly articulate segment of the public. This could have very unfortunate consequences for man and his domestic animals. Even veterinarians and physicians are not as conversant as they need be about the great extent to which advances in human health have depended upon animal observations and experiments. Some believe that resort to "animal models" of biomedical phenomena, including diseases--a comparative or analogical approach to medical studies--is a relatively recent event. Even medical historians often treat these subjects as occasionally recurring aberrations which began with the Greeks, thus largely overlooking the historical meaning and continuing importance of "one medicine" irrespective of species. In fact, comparative medicine has probably been basic to medical progress ever since the dawn of a medical science. Recent research indicates that this approach to biomedical mysteries began to evolve in the minds of Egypt's healer-priests long before Aristotle and the later Alexandrian Greeks made the whole process explicit. Here we examine the origins of what were possibly the first two biomedical theories profounded from inferences based upon dissections, confirmed in at least one instance by experiment, and then applied to medical practice.     

Veterinary education in the era of information technology

SUMMARY A major innovation in the delivery of the veterinary curriculum is being implemented at The University of Melbourne using the subject of systematic bacteriology and mycology as a pilot project. Students receive course information as interactive, multimedia databases. These consist of text and an associated library of catalogued digital images, movies and sounds. The databases employ a hypermedia information system to achieve efficient integration within and between subjects. The new delivery method encourages greater autonomy and more active learning roles for students than occurs in traditionally taught courses. Students will use their databases as the principal resource of information for undergraduate studies. A unique feature of this system for delivering the curriculum is that students will modify and expand their databases during the course. The ultimate aim is for students at graduation to receive, on disc, a copy of their own databases, adapted by themselves to their particular future professional needs. As graduate veterinarians they will continue to use their databases as a major resource for information and learning, thus providing continuity from undergraduate to continuing postgraduate education.     

The highest priority: what microbial genomes are telling us about immunity

Study of microbial genomes has provided new insight into the functions that pathogens require for survival in the animal host. Small genome bacterial pathogens, defined as those < or = 1/3 the size of Escherichia coli, include chlamydiae, rickettsiae and ehrlichiae, mycoplasmas, and spirochetes. The small genome size is believed to result from reductive evolution, a process of initial mutation with loss of function followed by progressive accumulation of mutations and eventual gene deletion. This is most notable in the 1.1 Mb genome of Rickettsia prowazekki in which 24% of the genome is non-coding, as compared to approximately 10% in the 4.4 Mb E. coli. Consequently, these pathogens are thus presumed to retain only the most important functions for survival and propagation. There is consistent evidence from small genomes that the genetic deletion is primarily related to the loss of metabolic function and especially reduction of multiple overlapping pathways and duplicated genes. Thus, these pathogens undergo progressive reduction in their genomes yet maintain the ability to infect, survive within, and cause disease in animals. In the face of this reductive process, what genes and associated functions are maintained? Strikingly, these pathogens devote a high percentage of their genomes to paralogous families of polymorphic surface molecules. This retention suggests that evasion of the immune response is the highest priority of obligate microbial pathogens and provides a strategy for identifying protective antigens for vaccine development to control disease.     

带属绦虫线粒体基因组全序列生物信息学分析

通过利用生物生物信息学方法分析带属绦虫线粒体DNA(mtDNA)碱基组成、基因结构、密码子利用、基因变异及其在分子系统进化研究中的应用价值等,以期为带属虫种线粒体功能基因组学研究、分子分类学研究及其疾病诊断提供重要依据。从NCBI GenBank中下载已测序的6种带属绦虫线粒体基因组(mt genome)全序列,以细粒棘球绦虫mtDNA序列作为参考序列(外群),用ClustalX软件(1.83)(http://www2.ebi.ac.uk/clustal w/)进行多重序列比对,用DNAStar软件进行序列差异性分析,用MEGA4软件的邻接法(Neighbor-joining method)构建进化树,核苷酸进化距离算法用最大似然法(Maxi mumlikelihood method),氨基酸进化距离算法用泊松校正法(Poissoncorrection method),进化树检验用自展法(Bootstrap test)。tRNA和2个非编码区RNA二级结构预测分别使用软件ARWEN和RNAstructure Version 4.6。结果显示,带属绦虫mtDNA为双链闭环分子,为13.3~13.7 kb;4种碱基成分中,T含量最高(超过47%),C含量最低(低于9%);共有36个按照相同顺序排列的编码基因,其中蛋白质编码基因有12个,tRNA编码基因有22个(其中编码丝氨酸-tRNA和亮氨酸-tRNA的基因有2个,其余18种tRNA分子各有1个),rRNA编码基因有2个(包括1个大亚基和1个小亚基)。基因组结构紧凑,基因间存在重叠区域,如nad4L和nad4基因;除广泛使用ATG作为起始密码子编码蛋氨酸,部分基因如多头绦虫nad6基因用GTG作为蛋白质翻译的起始密码子。线粒体tRNA长度为58~76 nt,二级结构多数呈典型的三叶草结构,少数呈D-loop结构;2个线粒体rRNA亚基基因rrnL和rrnS被trnC基因分隔开;线粒体基因组有2个大的非编码区,1个长非编码区(LNR)和1个短非编码区(SNR);线粒体基因组中蛋白编码基因之间的差异为5.7%~28.9%,其中cox1和nad4L基因比较保守,而nad5和nad6则变异较大,进化较快。结果表明,根据线粒体基因组序列绘制的带属绦虫分子进化树表明,亚洲带绦虫(T.asiatica)和牛带绦虫(T.saginata)间的亲缘关系最近,成为姊妹种,而多头绦虫(T.multiceps)与前两者的亲缘关系比猪带绦虫(T.solium)与前两者的关系更近,但与虫种的生物学特征存在一定差异。