New hope for powdery mildew resistant barley

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New research at the University of Adelaide has opened the way for the development of new lines of barley with resistance to powdery mildew.In Australia, annual barley production is second only to wheat with 7-8 million tonnes a year. Powdery mildew is one of the most important diseases of barley.Senior Research Scientist Dr Alan Little and team have discovered the composition of special growths on the cell walls of barley plants that block the penetration of the fungus into the leaf.The research, by the ARC Centre of Excellence in Plant Cell Walls in the University’s School of Agriculture, Food and Wine in collaboration with the Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research in Germany, will be presented at the upcoming 5th International Conference on Plant Cell Wall Biology and published in the journal New Phytologist.”Powdery mildew is a significant problem wherever barley is grown around the world,” says Dr Little. “Growers with infected crops can expect up to 25% reductions in yield and the barley may also be downgraded from high quality malting barley to that of feed quality, with an associated loss in market value.”In recent times we’ve seen resistance in powdery mildew to the class of fungicide most commonly used to control the disease in Australia. Developing barley with improved resistance to the disease is therefore even more important.”The discovery means researchers have new targets for breeding powdery mildew resistant barley lines.”Powdery mildew feeds on the living plant,” says Dr Little. “The fungus spore lands on the leaf and sends out a tube-like structure which punches its way through cell walls, penetrating the cells and taking the nutrients from the plant. The plant tries to stop this penetration by building a plug of cell wall material — a papillae — around the infection site. Effective papillae can block the penetration by the fungus.”It has long been thought that callose is the main polysaccharide component of papilla. But using new techniques, we’ve been able to show that in the papillae that block fungal penetration, two other polysaccharides are present in significant concentrations and play a key role.”It appears that callose acts like an initial plug in the wall but arabinoxylan and cellulose fill the gaps in the wall and make it much stronger.”In his PhD project, Jamil Chowdhury showed that effective papillae contained up to four times the concentration of callose, arabinoxylan and cellulose as cell wall plugs which didn’t block penetration.”We can now use this knowledge find ways of increasing these polysaccharides in barley plants to produce more resistant lines available for growers,” says Dr Little.Story Source:The above story is based on materials provided by University of Adelaide. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.


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Meet your match: Using algorithms to spark collaboration between scientists

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Speed dating, in which potential lovers size each other up in brief 10 minute encounters before moving on to the next person, can be an awkward and time-wasting affair. Finding the perfect research partnership is often just as tough. Speed dating-style techniques are increasingly used at academics conferences, but can be equally frustrating — with busy academics being pushed into too many pointless encounters.But now a group of scientists led by geneticist Rafael Carazo Salas have constructed a system that could revolutionise conference speed dating — by treating scientists like genes.Using mathematical algorithms, the team created a method of matching conference-goers according to pre-set criteria, bringing about unforeseen collaboration opportunities while also enabling “would-like-to-meet” match-ups across disciplines and knowledge areas. The results have been recently published in the open-access journal eLife.Funded by the Royal Society to run a small-scale satellite conference on cell polarity, the researchers wanted to find a way to not only break the ice between scientists who did not know each other, but also to “break the heat” — to encourage big name scientists to step outside of their usual small circle, and mix with up-and-coming scientists.”We wanted to avoid the usual pattern that happens at conferences, especially at interdisciplinary meetings, of like sticking with like. Then we came up with an idea — what if we treated the delegates like we treat genes, and used mathematical algorithms to build a connectivity picture that could enable new links to be made?” said Carazo Salas, from the Gurdon Institute and Genetics Department of Cambridge University, who co-developed the technique with colleagues Federico Vaggi and Attila Csikasz-Nagy from Fondazione Edmund Mach, Italy.In the lead-up to the conference, delegates were asked to submit information about their research areas and disciplines and also to come up with a ‘wish list’ of specialist areas that they would like to know more about.”The conference started in a predictable way. After the first couple of talks, questions came entirely from people in the first few rows. We then did a brief presentation about the “speed dating” session that was about to happen. People’s eyes lit up when they got the game — the notion of being treated like genes seemed to appeal.”In the first speed-dating round, the 40 delegates were each paired up with someone who was not known to them and who had a very different knowledge base — so someone specialising in X technique might be paired with a specialist in Y. Pairs were given around 10 minutes to talk and then moved on to new pairs, so that each person met a total of four other people they knew very little about.”The atmosphere in the room after the first round of speed dating was entirely different. There was a buzz, and at the next set of talks questions came from all over the room, not just the usual couple of rows at the front.”In the second round, the pairings made use of the wish lists the delegates had created. …


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Stroke survivors often return to driving without being evaluated for ability

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Date:February 13, 2014Source:American Heart AssociationSummary:Stroke survivors often resume driving without being formally evaluated for ability — though stroke can cause deficits that can impair driving, according to researchers.Stroke survivors often resume driving without being formally evaluated for ability — though stroke can cause deficits that can impair driving, according to research presented at the American Stroke Association’s International Stroke Conference 2014.Researchers surveyed 162 stroke survivors a year after their strokes and found:More than 51 percent returned to driving — many a month after suffering a stroke. Only 5.6 percent received a formal driving evaluation. Eleven percent of those who returned to driving reported their strokes had greatly impacted their abilities to perform important life activities. Among those who returned to driving and reported no effect on their abilities to perform important life activities, more than 45 percent limited their driving. Researchers suggest stroke survivors may benefit from formal evaluation before resuming driving.Story Source:The above story is based on materials provided by American Heart Association. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.Cite This Page:MLA APA Chicago American Heart Association. “Stroke survivors often return to driving without being evaluated for ability.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 13 February 2014. .American Heart Association. (2014, February 13). …


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