Comparative Analysis of Gut Microbiota Following Changes in Training Volume Among Swimmers.

Exercise can influence gut microbial community structure and diversity; however, the temporal dynamics of this association have rarely been explored. Here we characterized fecal microbiota in response to short term changes in training volume. Fecal samples, body composition, and training logs were collected from Division I NCAA collegiate swimmers during peak training through their in-season taper in 2016 (n=9) and 2017 (n=7), capturing a systematic reduction in training volume near the conclusion of their athletic season.

Differential Functional Constraints Cause Strain-Level Endemism in Populations.

The adaptation of bacterial lineages to local environmental conditions creates the potential for broader genotypic diversity within a species, which can enable a species to dominate across ecological gradients because of niche flexibility. The genus maintains both free-living and symbiotic ecotypes and maintains an apparently ubiquitous distribution in freshwater ecosystems. Subspecies-level resolution supplemented with metagenome-derived genotype analysis revealed that differential functional constraints, not geographic distance, produce and maintain strain-level genetic conservation in populations across three geographically proximal riverine environments.

Endogenous siRNA and miRNA targets identified by sequencing of the Arabidopsis degradome.

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) regulate the expression of target mRNAs in plants and animals [1]. Plant miRNA targets have been predicted on the basis of their extensive and often conserved complementarity to the miRNAs [2-4], as well as on miRNA overexpression experiments [5]; many of these target predictions have been confirmed by isolation of the products of miRNA-directed cleavage. Here, we present a transcriptome-wide experimental method, called "degradome sequencing," to directly detect cleaved miRNA targets without relying on predictions or overexpression.

Epigenetic maintenance of the vernalized state in Arabidopsis thaliana requires LIKE HETEROCHROMATIN PROTEIN 1.

Vernalization is the process by which sensing a prolonged exposure to winter cold leads to competence to flower in the spring. In winter annual Arabidopsis thaliana accessions, flowering is suppressed in the fall by expression of the potent floral repressor FLOWERING LOCUS C (FLC). Vernalization promotes flowering via epigenetic repression of FLC.