There is increasing recognition of the importance wetlands in prairie pothole region (PPR) northern United States for stopover habitat spring-migrating waterfowl. The quality and quantity found near breeding areas can affect speed success migration subsequent events. Conservation management has traditionally focused narrowly on reproductive phases life cycle, little to no research examined how ...

We explored relationships of water quality parameters with landscape pattern metrics (LPMs), land use-land cover (LULC) proportions, and the advanced very high resolution radiometer (AVHRR) normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) or NDVI-derived metrics. Stream sites (271) in Nebraska, Kansas, and Missouri were sampled for water quality parameters, the index of biotic integrity, and a hab...

A significant body of evidence shows that polyglutamine (polyQ) tracts are important for various biological functions. The characteristic polymorphism of polyQ length is thought to play an important role in the adaptation of organisms to their environment. However, proteins with expanded polyQ are prone to form amyloids, which cause diseases in humans and animals and toxicity in yeast. Saccharo...

HIV transmission via breastfeeding accounts for a considerable proportion of infant HIV acquisition. However, the origin and evolution of the virus population in breast milk, the likely reservoir of transmitted virus variants, are not well characterized. In this study, HIV envelope (env) genes were sequenced from virus variants amplified by single-genome amplification from plasmas and milk of 1...

In recent years, a growing body of evidence has recognized the tandem repeat sequences, and specifically satellite DNA, as a functional class of sequences in the genomic "dark matter." Using an original, complementary, and thus an eclectic experimental design, we show that the cat archetypal satellite DNA sequence, FA-SAT, is "frozen" conservatively in several Bilateria genomes. We found differ...

The chromosomal changes accompanying bivalve evolution are an area about which few reports have been published. To improve our understanding on chromosome evolution in Veneridae, ribosomal RNA gene clusters were mapped by fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) to chromosomes of five species of venerid clams (Venerupis corrugata, Ruditapes philippinarum, Ruditapes decussatus, Dosinia exoleta, ...

BACKGROUND Variable minisatellites count among the most polymorphic markers of eukaryotic and prokaryotic genomes. This variability can affect gene coding regions, like in the prion protein gene, or gene regulation regions, like for the cystatin B gene, and be associated or implicated in diseases: the Creutzfeld-Jakob disease and the myoclonus epilepsy type 1, for our examples. When it affects ...

We have investigated the arrangement of the highly reiterated centromeric DNA sequences in Drosophila melanogaster by studying the physical properties of sequences obtained after the hydroxyapatite isolation of rapidly renaturing molecules. It was found that the fraction of material recovered as partially renatured varied with the molecular weight of the starting material, although conservative...

We have recently described in this journal the distribution of CGG repeats of the FMR1 gene, the allelic frequencies at DXS548 and FRAXAC1 microsatellite loci, and DXS548/FRAXAC1 haplotype frequencies in African-derived, European-derived, and Amerindian populations from South America [Mingroni-Netto et al., 2002]. The CGG repeat sequences and AGG interspersion patterns were not available at tha...

Assemblages of small fish from eelgrass (mainly Zostera muelleri) and unvegetated patches in a shallow, marine-dominated estuary were compared over one year as a preliminary step towards finding the consequences of eelgrass loss to small fish. There were more species and more individuals at eelgrass sites than at unvegetated sites at every sampling period. Multivariate analysis (MDS ordination)...