Molecular data was reviewed for the woody bamboo account in the English language Flora of China. The implications for recognition of suprageneric taxa and genera, for macro-morphological characters used in classification systems, and for the inferred biogeographical history of Asian bamboos are discussed. Support was not found for large supertribes based on inflorescence structure. Instead a re...

A newly developed maize Illumina GoldenGate Assay with 1536 SNPs from 582 loci was used to genotype a highly diverse global maize collection of 632 inbred lines from temperate, tropical, and subtropical public breeding programs. A total of 1229 informative SNPs and 1749 haplotypes within 327 loci was used to estimate the genetic diversity, population structure, and familial relatedness. Populat...

Bacteriophages (or phages) dominate the biosphere both numerically and in terms of genetic diversity. In particular, genomic comparisons suggest a remarkable level of horizontal gene transfer among temperate phages, favoring a high evolution rate. Molecular mechanisms of this pervasive mosaicism are mostly unknown. One hypothesis is that phage encoded recombinases are key players in these horiz...

Understanding the causes underlying changes in species diversity is a fundamental pursuit of ecology. Animal species richness and composition often change with decreased forest structural complexity associated with logging. Yet differences in latitude and forest type may strongly influence how species diversity responds to logging. We performed a meta-analysis of logging effects on local specie...

Migration plays a fundamental part in the life of most temperate bird species. The re­ gu lar, large­scale seasonal movements that characterize temperate migration systems appear to have originated in parallel with the postglacial northern expansion of tropical species. Migratoriness is also influenced by a number of ecological factors, such as the ability to survive harsh winters. Hence, under...

The direct progenitor of maize, teosinte, is indigenous to a relatively small range of tropical and sub-tropical latitudes. In contrast, domesticated maize thrives in temperate climates around the world as a result of artificial selection for adaption to these regions. Tripsacum, a sister genus to maize and teosinte, is naturally endemic to almost all areas in the western hemisphere where maize...

Bacteriophages are a common and constant threat to proper milk fermentation. It has become evident that lysogeny is widespread in lactic acid bacteria, and in this work the temperate lactococcal bacteriophage phi LC3 was used as a model to study prophage stability in lactococci. The stability was analyzed in six phi LC3 lysogenic Lactococcus lactis subsp. cremoris host strains when they were gr...

Of central importance in adapting plants of tropical origin to temperate cultivation has been selection of daylength-neutral genotypes that flower early in the temperate summer and take full advantage of its long days. A cross between tropical and temperate sorghums [Sorghum propinquum (Kunth) Hitchc.×S. bicolor (L.) Moench], revealed a quantitative trait locus (QTL), FlrAvgD1, accounting for 8...

Temperate and dry deciduous forest covers major portion of terrestrial ecosystem in India. The two forest types with different dominant tree species differ in litter quality and root exudates, thereby exerting species-specific impact on soil properties and microbial activity. This study aims to examine the influence of forest type or dominant tree species on soil physico-chemical properties and...

Attributes of an animal's life history, such as reproductive rate or longevity, typically fall along a 'slow-fast' continuum. Animals at the fast end of this continuum, such as temperate birds, are thought to experience high rates of mortality and invest more resources in reproduction, whereas animals at the slow end, such as tropical birds, live longer, have fewer offspring and invest more res...