Clay minerals of soils from olivine basalt in Kyushu

Soil scientists have been encouraged to investigate soils for clay minerals by very fact that soil characteristics fundamentally depend upon the nature of their clay. It is generally recognized that clays of different species develop under different conditions such as drainage, temperature weathering age, and parent rocks. On Kyushu Island, heavy, reddish soils derived from olivine basalt cover a considerably large area of its northeastern part, and a numbar of small islands belonging to Kyushu. Koga ^* Hiroshi Koga, Clay minerals of Oura basaltic soil, 1954 (unpublished). of this laboratory found a basaltic soil of clay consisting of hydrated halloysite, halloysite, hematite, and gibbsite at the eastern foot of Mt. Tara, by examining its clay separates by X-ray, thermal, chemical, and electron microscopical techniques. Kanno et al⁵ reported that in a basaltic soil at Oura, Saga prefecture, hydrated halloysite developed from plagioclase and ferro-magnesian minerals with gibbsite and hematite which was more abundant than in other Red and Yellow Soils. They also found some illite present in the soil derived from unknown minerals, and halloysite dehydrated in upper layers.     

Allophane in Some Ando Soils

Allophane has been known to occur widely in volcanic ash soils in Japan and New Zealand. However, exact knowledge of its nature has not been well established, mainly because of extreme difficulty to separate it in pure state and of its x-amorphous nature. In the course of the studies on soil allophane, it was noticed that certain Ando soils contained two different mineral colloids together, in addition to crystalline clay minerals and free sesquioxides. X-ray examination revealed that one was x-amorphous colloid which would be called allophane, and the other an unknown colloid of low crystallinity. Imogolite*** Imogolite will be described in a subsequent paper by the present authors. was proposed as the name of the latter colloid by the present authors after imogo in which imogolite was first found. Imogo is a brownish yellow, volcanic ash soil. in the Kuma basin in the Kumamoto Prefecture³⁾. When deferration treatment is applied to the soils, allophane disperses both in an acid and alkaline media, whereas imogolite disperses in an acid medium and flocculates in an alkaline one.     

Retention of mercury by soils

During the past one and a half decades there has been a marked increase in the total amount of mercury applied to the crop for control of agricultural pests particularly rice blight. It seems likely that the accumulation of mercury in agricultural products and soils has been increased. FURUTANI and OSAJIMA (3.4.5) investigated the content of mercury in rice, fruits, and vegetables and inferred that the mercury in fond products is partly the residue of fungicides sprayed on crops, and partly due to absorption from the soil by plant roots.     

Clay mineralogy of some volcanic ash soils in which cristobalite predominates

The clay mineralogical composition of soils on volcanic ashes from Mashū and Kamuinupuri-dake volcanoes, Hokkaido, which are rich in cristobalite, was determined using petrological, X-ray diffraction, differential thermal, and selective dissolution and differential infrared spectroscopic methods.

The cristobalite occurred in abundance in every size of fraction from coarse sand to clay and every soli from approximately 1,700 to 8,400 years old, and was concluded to be of igneous origin. The major clay minerals were allophanelike constituents and allophane with some layer silicates as the minor clay mineral, being similar to those of andesitic ash soils and different from those of volcanic ash soils containing abundant quartz. The quartz of volcanic ashes was presumed to bederived from the groundmass-equivalent portion of the ashes which had been formed from magma at a low temperature.     

Cation-exchange capacity of the sand fraction of some Chilean soils

The cation-exchange capacity (CEC) of the soils in the Colina district is in interrelation neither with the texture nor the organic matter content. This apparent inconsistency is largely attributable to the CEC of the coarse fractions of the soils, which contain appreciable amounts of montmorilionite and zeolite with some vermiculite. The coarse particles containing exchange materials are widely distributed in the soils of central and northern Chile regardless of the soil type, and appear to be rather stable under semi-arid climates.     

An efficient molecular technique for sexing tiger pufferfish (fugu) and the occurrence of sex reversal in a hatchery population

The tiger pufferfish (fugu) is one of the most important food fishes in East Asia. Since its testes are regarded as a delicacy, sex determination is economically relevant. Previous studies have identified a missense single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) in the Amhr2 (anti-Müllerian hormone receptor type II) gene as a strong candidate for a master sex-determining polymorphism. To distinguish genotypic sex efficiently, we developed a high-resolution melting (HRM) assay for this SNP site. By screening 396 fish from two independent crosses reared under controlled conditions, we observed perfect concordance between the SNP genotype and phenotypic sex. Thus, this method holds great potential for use in high-throughput sexing. When analyzing 293 progeny from a third cross reared under unknown conditions, we unexpectedly found that 25 % of phenotypic males exhibited female genotype. These results suggest that environmental factors such as rearing conditions could influence the sex-determination pathway in pufferfish. Alternatively, genetic modifiers might override the signals from Amhr2. This finding raises a concern regarding enhanced stock management of this species, because sex-reversed fish could compromise the sex ratio in subsequent generations. The HRM assay will also be useful for monitoring the degree of sex reversal before release.     

Comparison of the antioxidant enzymes of broccoli after cold or heat shock treatment at different storage temperatures

An experiment was conducted to study the association between cold shock treatment (CST) (0 °C, 1 h) and heat shock treatment (HST) (55 °C, 30 s) on antioxidant enzymes of broccoli at different storage temperatures (20, 10, or 5 °C). There was no difference in antioxidant enzyme activities between CST and HST under storage at 20 °C; superoxide dismutase (SOD) and catalase (CAT) activities were increased in comparison with the controls. However, activities of antioxidant enzymes, except for ascorbate peroxidase (APX), with CST were higher than those with HST during storage at 10 °C, while there were opposite results except for CAT activity at 5 °C. These results suggest that CST and HST have the same effect on the antioxidant enzymes of broccoli during 20 °C storage, but have different effects at below 10 °C, which become more pronounced as the temperature is lowered.     

Positional effect of gene insertion on genetic stability of a clover yellow vein virus-based expression vector

The stability of the inserted genes in the viral expression vector varied depending on the sequence introduced and the position of insertion. Infectious cDNA to Clover yellow vein virus (pClYVV) was modified to insert a foreign gene at two independent sites: one, along with a polylinker, between the NIb and CP genes (pClYVV/CP/W) and the other between P1 and HC-Pro (pClYVV-Pst/CP). The green fluorescent protein (GFP) gene was inserted into either pClYVV/CP/W or pClYVV-Pst/CP. GFP gene was stably maintained and expressed in both vectors following serial passages in plants. Progeny viruses from both constructs accumulated in similar amounts and at rates of 70%–80% of that of the wild-type virus. On the other hand, progeny viruses carrying the human interferon- (hIFN) gene cloned in pClYVV-Pst/CP were genetically unstable owing to frequent deletions of the cloned gene during passage through plants. In contrast, the hIFN sequence cloned in pClYVV/CP/W was stably maintained in viruses after several passages in broad bean plants, and the progeny virus accumulated at the rate of about 50%–100% of that of the wild-type virus. The nucleotide sequence analyses indicated that the genetic instability of the inserted sequence results from homologous recombination of viral vector and inserted DNA sequences; it is not due to the inserted sequence alone.     

Effects of supplementary corn silage on the feed intake and milk production of time-restricted grazing dairy cows

The effects of supplementary corn silage (CS) of either 2 or 4 kg of dry matter (DM; S + 2 and S + 4, respectively) above the energy requirement for milk production and maintenance for grazing dairy cows (S) were determined. Time‐restricted grazing was used to compare the feed intake, milk production, and nitrogen and energy use of lactating cows. The experiment was carried out on two different pastures using a 3 × 3 Latin square design for each pasture. Cows were grazed for 5 h on a rotational grazing system and were fed concentrate (1 kg per 5 kg of milk yield). Herbage intake was measured using a weighing technique. To calculate the energy and nitrogen use, whole feces and urine were collected. There was no statistical effect of the pastures. Herbage intake decreased by the addition of CS (P = 0.02). The reduction of herbage DM intake per unit consumption of supplementary CS towards the S group were 0.80 and 0.45 kg for the S + 2 and S + 4 groups, respectively. The total DM intake for the S + 4 group was higher than that for the S and S + 2 groups (P = 0.02). Milk yield did not differ among treatments, even though the total DM intake for the S + 4 group was higher than that of the S and S + 2 groups. Nitrogen and energy use did not differ with the addition of CS.     

Effect of feeding non-fibrous carbohydrate before grazing on intake and nitrogen utilization in dairy cows throughout the grazing season

Ten lactating cows were used to determine the effect of feeding non-fibrous carbohydrate (NFC) supplement before grazing on feed intake and nitrogen (N) utilization throughout a grazing season. The experiment was conducted from June to September. Cows grazed twice a day (2.5 h × 2) under a set stocking system and were fed NFC supplement (1 kg/4 kg of milk yield) 2 h before grazing (PRE) or immediately after grazing (POST). Cows were also fed a grass and corn silage mixture ad libitum. Herbage dry matter intake (DMI) was greater for PRE than for POST throughout the experiment and decreased from June to September. Conversely, silage DMI was less for PRE than for POST throughout the experiment and increased over the grazing season. Consequently, total DMI for PRE did not differ from that for POST. Milk urea-N concentration and urinary urea-N excretion in June did not differ between the treatments, whereas that after July was higher for PRE than for POST. Proportion of urinary N excretion to absorbed N intake in June was lower for PRE than for POST, but that after July was higher for PRE than for POST. Feeding NFC supplement before grazing would improve N utilization when cows eat large amounts of herbage high in N.