The plant family Commelinaceae displays a wide range of variation in vegetative, floral, and inflorescence morphology. This high degree of variation, particularly among characters operating under strong and similar selective pressures (i.e., flowers), has made the assessment of homology among morphological characters difficult, and has resulted in several discordant classification schemes for t...

Background Due to their very high economic importance, Eucalyptus tree species are among the most planted hardwoods in the world with over 20 million hectares. However, as long-lived evergreen species, this genus is particularly exposed to cold. Frost tolerance varies among species and is inversely correlated to productivity. The AP2/ERF gene family includes developmentally and physiologically ...

The evolutionary mode of a multi-gene family can change over time, depending on the functional differentiation and local genomic environment of family members. In this study, we demonstrate such a change in the melanoma antigen (MAGE) gene family on the mammalian X chromosome. The MAGE gene family is composed of ten subfamilies that can be categorized into two types. Type I genes are of relativ...

A new species of the lampyrid genus Oculogryphus Jeng, Engel, and Yang, O. shuensis sp. n. from China (Sichuan Province) is described and figured. The genus previously was known only from Vietnam, and the new species is the first representative of the genus in the Sino-Japanese zoogeographic realm. Some morphological variations of Oculogryphus and the allied genus Stenocladius are discussed and...

The pronghorn antelope (Antilocapra americana) is the rarest and least-known hoofedmammal classified as a game species in the state of Washington. (Woodland caribou, Rangifer tarandus caribou, are rarer, but are classified as Endangered under both Federal and Washington’s state endangered species statute). Although often called simply “antelope”, pronghorns are not true antelope at all; most au...

The 6TM family of K channels comprises the voltage-gated KV subfamilies, EAG subfamily (which includes hERG channels), Ca2+-activated Slo (actually with 7TM, termed BK) and SK subfamily. These possess a pore-forming α subunit that comprise tetramers identical subunits (homomeric) or different (heteromeric). Heteromeric can only be formed within subfamilies (e.g. Kv1.1 Kv1.2; Kv7.2 Kv7.3). pharm...

A new subfamily of glycosyl hydrolase family GH13 was recently proposed for α-amylases from Anoxybacillus species (ASKA and ADTA), Geobacillus thermoleovorans (GTA, Pizzo, and GtamyII), Bacillus aquimaris (BaqA), and 95 other putative protein homologues. To understand this new GH13 subfamily, we report crystal structures of truncated ASKA (TASKA). ASKA is a thermostable enzyme capable of produc...

Bacterial lipases from family I.1 and I.2 catalyze the hydrolysis of triacylglycerol between 25-45°C and are used extensively as biocatalysts. The lipase from Proteus mirabilis belongs to the Proteus/psychrophilic subfamily of lipase family I.1 and is a promising catalyst for biodiesel production because it can tolerate high amounts of water in the reaction. Here we present the crystal structur...

Bothrideridae is a small family of poorly known beetles comprising four subfamilies (Teredinae, Xylariophilinae, Bothriderinae and Anommatinae) and more than 400 species in 38 genera (Ślipiński et al. 2010). Members of the family are found in all major zoogeographical regions of the world with the majority of diversity in the Old World tropics. Although little is known about the biology, most b...

Proteins with Tetratricopeptide-repeat (TPR) domains are encoded by large gene families and distributed in all plant lineages. In this study, the Soluble NSF-Attachment Protein (SNAP) subfamily of TPR containing proteins is characterized. In soybean, five members constitute the SNAP gene family: GmSNAP18, GmSNAP11, GmSNAP14, GmSNAP02, and GmSNAP09. Recently, GmSNAP18 has been reported to mediat...