As there is limited information on the mechanisms of vegetative desiccation tolerance in pteridophytes, we undertook a comprehensive anatomical, ultrastructural, physiological and biochemical study on the fern Mohria caffrorum. Our data show that this species is desiccation-tolerant during the dry season, and desiccation-sensitive in the rainy season. This system allows the verification of prot...

Dry state preservation at ambient temperatures (lyopreservation) is a biomimetic alternative to low temperature stabilization (cryopreservation) of biological materials. Lyopreservation is hypothesized to rely upon the creation of a glassy environment, which is commonly observed in desiccation-tolerant organisms. Non-uniformities in dried samples have been indicated as one of the reasons for in...

We studied larval development and acquisition of metabolic resources in Drosophila melanogaster selected for adult desiccation resistance. Desiccation-selected (D) flies had longer developmental times in comparison with control populations, resulting in significantly higher body mass. No differences were found in larval growth rates, suggesting that increased body mass results from the extended...

Rotifers of class Bdelloidea are common invertebrate animals with highly unusual characteristics, including apparently obligate asexuality, the ability to resume reproduction after desiccation at any life stage, and a paucity of transposable genetic elements of types not prone to horizontal transmission. We find that bdelloids are also extraordinarily resistant to ionizing radiation (IR). Repro...

To learn more about the function and regulation of small heat shock proteins (sHSPs) during seed development, we studied sHSP expression in wild-type and seed maturation mutants of Arabidopsis by western analysis and using an HSP17.4 promoter-driven beta-glucuronidase (GUS) reporter gene in transgenic plants. In the absence of stress, GUS activity increases during development until the entire e...

Aeroterrestrial green algae are exposed to desiccation in their natural habitat, but their actual volume changes have not been investigated. Here, we measure the relative volume reduction (RVRED ) in Klebsormidium crenulatum and Zygnema sp. under different preset relative air humidities (RH). A new chamber allows monitoring RH during light microscopic observation of the desiccation process. The...

The corneal-protective effects of an artificial tear containing sodium hyaluronate (SH) and castor oil (CO) were evaluated on a porcine short-term dry eye model. Fresh porcine eyes with an intact cornea were treated with an artificial tear of saline, SH solution (0.1%, 0.5% or 1%), CO solution (0.5%, 1% or 5%) or a mixture solution containing 0.5% SH and 1% CO and then desiccated for 60, 90 or ...

This study evaluated the antimicrobial and desiccation resistance of Cronobacter sakazakii and Cronobacter malonaticus isolates from powdered infant formula and processing environments. The antimicrobial susceptibility tests showed that the 70 Cronobacter strains, representing 19 sequence types, were susceptible to the most of the antibiotics except for amoxicillin-clavulanate, ampicillin, and ...

Seasonally varying populations of ectothermic insect taxa from a given locality are expected to cope with simultaneous changes in temperature and humidity through phenotypic plasticity. Accordingly, we investigated the effect of saturation deficit on resistance to desiccation in wild-caught flies from four seasons (spring, summer, rainy and autumn) and corresponding flies reared in the laborato...