Fruits are an important evolutionary acquisition of angiosperms, which afford protection for seeds and ensure their optimal dispersal in the environment. Fruits can be divided into dry or fleshy. Dry fruits are the more ancient and provide for mechanical seed dispersal. In contrast, fleshy fruits develop soft tissues in which flavor compounds and pigments accumulate during the ripening process....

Twenty-eight varieties of cowpea seeds from Nigeria and USA origins showed significant variation in physical characteristics and proximate composition. Seed size dimensions namely; seed length, width and thickness had range values of 6-10mm, 4-7mm and 3-5mm, respectively. Seed hydration index had values between 95-137; 100seed weight ranged between 11-26g and seed hardness recorded values betwe...

The nature and origin of turbulence and magnetic fields in the intergalactic space are important problems that are yet to be understood. We propose a scenario in which turbulent-flow motions are induced via the cascade of the vorticity generated at cosmological shocks during the formation of the large-scale structure. The turbulence in turn amplifies weak seed magnetic fields of any origin. Sup...

DNA replication initiation is mediated across all domains of life by initiator proteins oligomerizing at replication origins. Recently, it was shown that initiators can directly bind single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) and thus might enhance origin melting. In this study, we used single-molecule fluorescence assays to probe the ssDNA binding mechanism of the replication initiator DnaA. Our experiments ...

Fruits are the defining feature of angiosperms, likely have contributed to angiosperm successes by protecting and dispersing seeds, and provide foods to humans and other animals, with many morphological types and important ecological and agricultural implications. Rosaceae is a family with ∼3000 species and an extraordinary spectrum of distinct fruits, including fleshy peach, apple, and strawbe...

Seeds are multi-generational structures containing a small embryonic plant enclosed in layers of diverse parental origins. The evolution of seeds was a pinnacle in an evolutionary trend towards a progressive retention of embryos and gametes within parental tissue. This strategy, which dates back to the first land plants, allowed an increased protection and nourishing of the developing embryo. F...

Weedy rice is a conspecific form of cultivated rice (Oryza sativa L.) that infests rice fields and results in severe crop losses. Weed strains in different world regions appear to have originated multiple times from different domesticated and/or wild rice progenitors. In the case of Malaysian weedy rice, a multiple-origin model has been proposed based on neutral markers and analyses of domestic...

Blazars are characterized by rapid variability at virtually all wavelengths from radio through TeV gamma-rays. The challenge since their discovery has been to understand the origin of their luminous, apparently nonthermal, nuclear emission. Considerable progress has been made in recent years thanks to a handful of multiwavelength monitoring campaigns with high enough temporal sampling to resolv...

We report a case of pure squamous cell carcinoma involving the prostate and urinary bladder and describe the diagnostic dilemmas that we faced in trying to determine its origin. The patient was diagnosed ten years ago with prostatic adenocarcinoma treated with radioactive seed implantation. During the last year he also underwent a TURP procedure for urinary obstruction complicated by multiple i...

chaffy-seeded grasses can be debearded, i.e., removal of the hairs and awn (Ahring et al., 1964) or processed to Drought is the most frequent cause of stand establishment failure remove all appendages leaving only caryopses (Beisel, of native grasses. An experiment was conducted to determine the interactions of seed processing and simulated dry conditions on seed 1985). When conditions are favo...