Cysteine Import via the High Affinity Glutathione Transporter Hgt1 Rescues Glutathione Auxotrophy in Yeast.

Glutathione (GSH) is an abundant thiol-containing tripeptide that functions in redox homeostasis, protein folding, and iron metabolism. In Saccharomyces cerevisiae, GSH depletion leads to increased sensitivity to oxidants and other toxic compounds, disruption of Fe-S cluster biogenesis, and eventually cell death. GSH pools are supplied by intracellular biosynthesis and GSH import from the extracellular environment.

Identification of the mechanistic basis of nitrogen responsiveness in two contrasting Setaria italica accessions.

Nitrogen (N) is a macronutrient limiting crop productivity with varied requirements across species and genotypes. Understanding the mechanistic basis of N responsiveness by comparing contrasting genotypes could inform the development and selection of varieties with lower N demands, or inform agronomic practices to sustain yields with lower N inputs. Given the established role of millets in ensuring climate-resilient food and nutrition security, we investigated the physiological and genetic basis of nitrogen responsiveness in foxtail millet (Setaria italica L.

Enabling robustness to failure with modular field robots.

Actuator failure on a remotely deployed robot results in decreased efficiency or even renders it inoperable. Robustness to these failures will become critical as robots are required to be more independent and operate out of the range of repair. To address these challenges, we present two approaches based on modular robotic architecture to improve robustness to actuator failure of both fixed-configuration robots and modular reconfigurable robots.

Multi-environment GWAS identifies genomic regions underlying grain nutrient traits in foxtail millet (Setaria italica).

A total of 104 foxtail millet accessions were evaluated for 11 nutrients in three environments and 67 high-confidence marker-trait associations (MTAs) were identified. Six SNPs showed pleiotropic effect and associated with two or more nutrients, whereas 24 candidate genes were identified for 28 MTAs involving seven traits. Millets are known for their better nutritional profiles compared to major cereals.

Optimisation of a Multi-Functional Piezoelectric Component for a Climbing Robot.

Force sensors on climbing robots give important information to the robot control system, however, off-the-shelf sensors can be both heavy and bulky. We investigate the optimisation of a lightweight integrated force sensor made of piezoelectric material for the multi-limbed climbing robot MAGNETO. We focus on three design objectives for this piezoelectric component.

GWAS identifies genetic loci underlying nitrogen responsiveness in the climate resilient C model Setaria italica (L.).

Introduction: N responsiveness is the capacity to perceive and induce morpho-physiological adaptation to external and internal Nitrogen (N). Crop productivity is propelled by N fertilizer and requires the breeding/selection of cultivars with intrinsically high N responsiveness. This trait has many advantages in being more meaningful in commercial/environmental context, facilitating in-season N management and not being inversely correlated with N availability over processes regulating NUE.

Adaptive robot climbing with magnetic feet in unknown slippery structure.

Firm foot contact is the top priority of climbing robots to avoid catastrophic events, especially when working at height. This study proposes a robust planning and control framework for climbing robots that provides robustness to slippage in unknown environments. The framework includes 1) a center of mass (CoM) trajectory optimization under the estimated contact condition, 2) Kalman filter-like approach for uncertain environment parameter estimation and subsequent CoM trajectory re-planing, and 3) an online weight adaptation approach for whole-body control (WBC) framework that can adjust the ground reaction force (GRF) distribution in real time.

Understanding the role of miRNAs for improvement of tea quality and stress tolerance.

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are an emerging class of small non-coding RNAs that exhibit important role in regulation of gene expression, mostly through the mechanism of cleavage and/or inhibition of translation of target mRNAs during or after transcription. Although much has been unravelled about the role of miRNAs in diverse biological processes like maintenance of functional integrity of genes and genome, growth and development, metabolism, and adaptive responses towards biotic and abiotic stresses in plants, not much is known on their specific roles in majority of cash crops - an area of investigation with potentially significant and gainful economic implications. Tea (Camellia sinensis) is globally the second most consumed beverage after water and its cultivation has major agro-economic and social ramifications.

Transcriptional regulators of nitrate metabolism: Key players in improving nitrogen use in crops.

Green revolution has boosted crop yields by the development of varieties which rely on high fertilizer application. Since then, higher productivity has largely witnessed excessive nitrogen (N) fertilizer application resulting in many environmentally and agronomically unsustainable consequences. One possible solution to this problem is to develop varieties with efficient N use endowed with genetically superior N metabolizing machinery, thereby significantly reducing N loss in soil and facilitating gainful yield performance at lower N conditions.

IRONing out stress problems in crops: a homeostatic perspective.

Iron (Fe) is essential for plant growth and therefore plays a key role in influencing crop productivity worldwide. Apart from its central role in chlorophyll biosynthesis and oxidative phosphorylation (electron transfer), it is an important constituent of many enzymes involved in primary metabolism. Fe has different accessibilities to the roots in the rhizosphere depending upon whether it is ferrous (soluble) or ferric (insoluble) oxidation stages, which in turn, determine two kinds of Fe uptake strategies employed by the plants.

A Precise Method for Analyzing Nitrogen Use in Foxtail Millet.

Optimization of biological nitrogen (N) use is instrumental in ensuring higher crop yields and preventing environmental degradation due to excessive N fertilizer application. Furthermore, understanding how genetic differences differentially influence N remobilization into seeds under contrasting nitrogen nutrition regimes is crucial to our understanding of nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) in crops in addition to enabling a deeper mechanistic understanding of the dynamics of nitrogen metabolism in plants. In this chapter, a method is proposed to precisely measure and analyze nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) in a pot-based system under different nitrogen nutrition regimes in foxtail millet (Setaria italica L.

Opening the dialogue: Research networks between high- and low-income countries further understanding of global agro-climatic challenges.

Societal Impact Statement In the modern world it has become increasingly urgent to balance human food security needs with environmental needs. These needs are not necessarily mutually exclusive, and can be synergistic. The Cambridge-India Network for Translational Research in Nitrogen (CINTRIN) seeks to reduce nitrogen fertilizer overapplication (and the resulting environmental pollution) in Indian agriculture: a situation with various scientific and sociopolitical drivers, which equally have various sociopolitical and scientific solutions.

Genome-Wide Association Study of Major Agronomic Traits in Foxtail Millet (Setaria italica L.) Using ddRAD Sequencing.

Foxtail millet (Setaria italica), the second largest cultivated millet crop after pearl millet, is utilized for food and forage globally. Further, it is also considered as a model crop for studying agronomic, nutritional and biofuel traits. In the present study, a genome-wide association study (GWAS) was performed for ten important agronomic traits in 142 foxtail millet core eco-geographically diverse genotypes using 10 K SNPs developed through GBS-ddRAD approach.

Morpho-physiological and transcriptome profiling reveal novel zinc deficiency-responsive genes in rice.

Intensive farming has depleted the soil zinc (Zn) availability resulting in decreased crop productivity. Here, we attempt to understand the Zn deficiency response in rice through temporal transcriptome analysis. For this, rice seedlings were raised under Zn-deficient conditions up to 4 weeks followed by Zn re-supply for 3 days.

Elucidation of defense-related signaling responses to spot blotch infection in bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L.).

Spot blotch disease, caused by Bipolaris sorokiniana, is an important threat to wheat, causing an annual loss of ~17%. Under epidemic conditions, these losses may be 100%, yet the molecular responses of wheat to spot blotch remain almost uncharacterized. Moreover, defense-related phytohormone signaling genes have been poorly characterized in wheat.

Sexual dimorphic effect in the genetic association of monoamine oxidase A (MAOA) markers with autism spectrum disorder.

Autism spectrum disorders are heritable and behaviorally-defined neurodevelopmental disorders having skewed sex ratio. Serotonin as modulator of behavior and implication of serotonergic dysfunction in ASD etiology corroborates that serotonergic system genes are potential candidates for autism susceptibility. In the current study X-chromosomal gene, MAOA responsible for degradation of serotonin is investigated for possible association with ASD using population-based approach.

Identification of drought tolerant progenies in tea by gene expression analysis.

Understanding the genes that govern tea plant (Camellia sinensis) architecture and response to drought stress is urgently needed to enhance breeding in tea with improved water use efficiency. Field drought is a slow mechanism and the plants go through an adaptive process in contrast to the drastic changes of rapid dehydration in case of controlled experiments. We identified a set of drought responsive genes under controlled condition using SSH, and validated the identified genes and their pattern of expression under field drought condition.

Molecular analysis of drought tolerance in tea by cDNA-AFLP based transcript profiling.

A cDNA-AFLP approach was used to identify transcript and/or genes specifically expressed in response to drought in tea. Drought was artificially induced and whole genome transcript profiling was done at three different stages-6 days before wilting, 3 days before wilting and at wilting stage of both tolerant and susceptible cultivars, and genetic differences was thus visualized as polymorphisms in the transcriptome. The cDNA-AFLP technique allowed genes and transcripts to be identified in the tolerant genotype (TV-23) whose expression is responsive to drought stress.