Microbiomics and cloud-based analytics advance sustainable soil management.

Soil constitutes a major component of the agro-ecosystem. Unrestrained uses of chemical pesticides and increased human activities have contributed to unprecedented changes in soil microflora affecting productivity. Modern microbiomics has proven to be an indispensable tool to understand the adaptations underlying complex soil microbial communities and their beneficial applications.

Comparative genomics of rice false smut fungi Uv-Gvt strain from India reveals genetic diversity and phylogenetic divergence.

False smut disease of rice caused by is an emerging threat to rice cultivation worldwide due to its detrimental effects on grain yield and quality. False smut disease severity was 4.44‒17.

Basin-wide sea level coherency in the tropical Indian Ocean driven by Madden-Julian Oscillation.

Changes in sea level may be attributed either to barotropic (involving the entire water column) or baroclinic processes (governed by stratification). It has been widely accepted that barotropic sea level changes in the tropics are insignificant at intraseasonal time scales (periods of 30-80 days). Based on bottom pressure records, we present evidence for significant basin-wide barotropic sea level variability in the tropical Indian Ocean during December-April with standard deviations amounting to ∼30-60% of the standard deviation in total intraseasonal sea level variability.

Developmental Deformity Due to scalloped Non-Function in Drosophila Brain Leads to Cognitive Impairment.

Neural identity and wiring specificity are fundamental to brain function. Factors affecting proliferation of the progenitor cells leading to an expansion or regression of specific neuronal clusters are expected to challenge the process of formation of precise synaptic connections with their partners and their further integration to result in proper functional neural circuitry. We have investigated the role of scalloped, a Hippo pathway gene in Drosophila brain development and have shown that its function is critical to regulate proliferation of Mushroom Body Neuroblasts and to limit the neuronal cluster size to normal in the fly brain.

Scalloped a member of the Hippo tumor suppressor pathway controls mushroom body size in Drosophila brain by non-canonical regulation of neuroblast proliferation.

Cell proliferation, growth and survival are three different basic processes which converge at determining a fundamental property -the size of an organism. Scalloped (Sd) is the first characterised transcriptional partner to Yorkie (Yki), the downstream effector of the Hippo pathway which is a highly potential and evolutionarily conserved regulator of organ size. Here we have studied the hypomorphic effect of sd on the development of Mushroom Bodies (MBs) in Drosophila brain.