Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) variety mixtures represent a relatively unexplored avenue for maintaining yield and improving flour quality. A field experiment was conducted to examine the responses of three spring wheat varieties in pure variety and in variety mixtures under continuous cropping in Northeast China. Three modern spring wheat varieties, along with a three-variety mixture and a t...

Homologous recombination affects myriad aspects of genome evolution, from standing levels of nucleotide diversity to the efficacy of natural selection. Rates of crossing over show marked variability at all scales surveyed, including species-, population-, and individual-level differences. Even within genomes, crossovers are nonrandomly distributed in a wide diversity of taxa. Although intra- an...

The paper deals with the mechanical behavior of a micro-beam bonded with two piezoelectric layers. The micro-beam is suspended over a fixed substrate and undergoes the both piezoelectric and electrostatic actuation. The piezoelectric layers are poled through the thickness and equipped with surface electrodes. The equation governing the micro-beam deflection under electrostatic pressure is deriv...

INTRODUCTION It has previously been reported that patients aged over 65 years account for 15% of Accident and Emergency (A&E) attendances. Despite this, there have been few studies looking at older people's use of A&E. This study describes the A&E attendance patterns of older people, defined as those aged 65 years and over, using data from an NHS region over a number of years. Their attendances...

The MUS-81, SLX-1, and XPF-1 structureselective endonucleases have been implicated in meiotic crossover (CO) formation in a variety of organisms, but their contributions to C. elegans CO formation have been unclear. In this issue of PLOS Genetics, Agostinho et al., Saito et al., and O’Neil et al. demonstrate that MUS-81 and XPF-1 function in two parallel pathways during the formation of meiotic...

Robyn Ott is the 2004-2005 Managing Editor for the Oklahoma Journal of Law and Technology. She wrote this eBrief while working under the direction of Professor Drew Kershen on the Project on Intellectual Property Rights in Living Matter. Below, Ms. Ott gives an overview of patentability requirements in India for plants, animals, and microorganisms. India is a signatory country to the Trade Rela...

OBJECTIVE The goal was to determine whether breakfast had effects on the cognitive performance and mood of high school students. METHODS A crossover trial was performed in boarding schools, involving 104 students between 13 and 20 years of age. The participants were randomly assigned to 2 equal-size groups on the morning of the first testing day. One half of the total sample received a standa...

Four new intra-H-2 recombinants were characterized serologically and functionally. In two of these recombinants, B10.ASR1 and B10.ASR7, crossing over occurred between the A alpha and E alpha subregions, very probably in E beta since most intra-I region recombinants thus far investigated at the DNA level appear to involve recombination within the E beta gene. In the other two recombinants, B10.A...

A plasmid gap repair assay was used to assess the role of three known nucleases, Exo1, Mre11 and Rad1, in the processing of DNA ends and resolution of recombination intermediates during double-strand gap repair. In this assay, alterations in end processing or branch migration are reflected by the frequency of co-conversion of a chromosomal marker 200 bp from the gap. Gap repair associated with ...