Association of toxic indoor air with multi-organ symptoms in pupils attending a moisture-damaged school in Finland.

Background: There is an on-going debate on how best to test toxic indoor air. Toxicological methods based on condensed water samples and cell culture technique are newly introduced research tools which were tested in this study.

Methods: Pupils (n=47) from a water-damaged and (n=56) healthy schools were interviewed using a questionnaire.

A synergistic interaction between salt-tolerant Pseudomonas and Mesorhizobium strains improves growth and symbiotic performance of liquorice (Glycyrrhiza uralensis Fish.) under salt stress.

Chinese liquorice (Glycyrrhiza uralensis Fish.) is a salt-tolerant medicinal legume that could be utilized for bioremediation of salt-affected soils. We studied whether co-inoculation of the symbiotic Mesorhizobium sp.

Stable isotope labelling reveals that NaCl stress decreases the production of Ensifer (Sinorhizobium) arboris lipochitooligosaccharide signalling molecules.

Ensifer (Sinorhizobium) arboris is a symbiont of salt-tolerant leguminous trees in the genera Acacia and Prosopis that are utilized in the prevention of soil erosion and desertification and in phytoremediation of salinized soil. Signalling between the plant and the rhizobia is essential for the formation of effective symbiosis that increases the success of reclaiming saline sites. We assessed the effect of salt stress on the growth and the production of lipochitooligosaccharide signalling molecules (LCOs) of S.

Diversity of sporadic symbionts and nonsymbiotic endophytic bacteria isolated from nodules of woody, shrub, and food legumes in Ethiopia.

Fifty-five bacterial isolates were obtained from surface-sterilized nodules of woody and shrub legumes growing in Ethiopia: Crotalaria spp., Indigofera spp., and Erythrina brucei, and the food legumes soybean and common bean.

Phylogenetically diverse groups of Bradyrhizobium isolated from nodules of Crotalaria spp., Indigofera spp., Erythrina brucei and Glycine max growing in Ethiopia.

Ethiopian Bradyrhizobium strains isolated from root nodules of Crotalaria spp., Indigofera spp., Erythina brucei and soybean (Glycine max) represented genetically diverse phylogenetic groups of the genus Bradyrhizobium.

Phylogeny and genetic diversity of native rhizobia nodulating common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) in Ethiopia.

The diversity and phylogeny of 32 rhizobial strains isolated from nodules of common bean plants grown on 30 sites in Ethiopia were examined using AFLP fingerprinting and MLSA. Based on cluster analysis of AFLP fingerprints, test strains were grouped into six genomic clusters and six single positions. In a tree built from concatenated sequences of recA, glnII, rpoB and partial 16S rRNA genes, the strains were distributed into seven monophyletic groups.

Biogeography of symbiotic and other endophytic bacteria isolated from medicinal Glycyrrhiza species in China.

A total of 159 endophytic bacteria were isolated from surface-sterilized root nodules of wild perennial Glycyrrhiza legumes growing on 40 sites in central and northwestern China. Amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) genomic fingerprinting and sequencing of partial 16S rRNA genes revealed that the collection mainly consisted of Mesorhizobium, Rhizobium, Sinorhizobium, Agrobacterium and Paenibacillus species. Based on symbiotic properties with the legume hosts Glycyrrhiza uralensis and Glycyrrhiza glabra, we divided the nodulating species into true and sporadic symbionts.

Effects of biotic and abiotic constraints on the symbiosis between rhizobia and the tropical leguminous trees Acacia and Prosopis.

N2-fixing, drought tolerant and multipurpose Acacia and Prosopis species are appropriate trees for reforestation of degraded areas in arid and semiarid regions of the tropics and subtropics. Acacia and Prosopis trees form N2-fixing nodules with a wide range of rhizobia, for example African acacias mainly with Sinorhizobium sp. and Mesorhizobium sp.

Persistence, population dynamics and competitiveness for nodulation of marker gene-tagged Rhizobium galegae strains in field lysimeters in the boreal climatic zone.

Abstract A non-indigenous wild-type strain Rhizobium galegae HAMBI 540, which specifically nodulates perennial goat's rue (Galega orientalis), and its marker gene-tagged derivatives R. galegae HAMBI 2363(luc), R. galegae HAMBI 2368(gusA21) and R.

Endotoxins associated with cyanobacteria and their removal during drinking water treatment.

The aim of this study was to investigate endotoxin concentrations in cyanobacterial water blooms and strains, and to assess the removal of endotoxins during drinking water treatment. Endotoxin concentrations were measured from 151 hepatotoxic, neurotoxic and non-toxic cyanobacterial water blooms by using Limulus amebocyte lysate (LAL) assay, and the results were compared to bacterial data. Endotoxin activities ranged from 20 to 3.