Correction: Ahmed et al. The Barley Gene Positively Regulates the Tolerance to Combined Drought and Salinity Stress in Tibetan Wild Barley. 2020, , 1530.

In the original publication [...

Role of the BB2.A.1 and BB2.1.1 Bacterial Strains in Maize Trace Metal Stress Management.

Plant-growth-promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR), in addition to their well-known direct effects on plant growth and development, have been reported to be effective in plant abiotic (trace metal, drought, etc.) and biotic (phytopathogens, insects, etc.) stress management.

Are comparable studies really comparable? Suggestions from a problem-solving experiment on urban and rural great tits.

Performance in tests of various cognitive abilities has often been compared, both within and between species. In intraspecific comparisons, habitat effects on cognition has been a popular topic, frequently with an underlying assumption that urban animals should perform better than their rural conspecifics. In this study, we tested problem-solving ability in great tits Parus major, in a string-pulling and a plug-opening test.

Double-brooding and annual breeding success of great tits in urban and forest habitats.

Urban areas differ from natural habitats in several environmental features that influence the characteristics of animals living there. For example, birds often start breeding seasonally earlier and fledge fewer offspring per brood in cities than in natural habitats. However, longer breeding seasons in cities may increase the frequency of double-brooding in urban compared with nonurban populations, thus potentially increasing urban birds' annual reproductive output and resulting in lower habitat difference in reproductive success than estimated by studies focusing on first clutches only.

Modification of storage proteins in the barley grain increases endosperm zinc and iron under both normal and elevated atmospheric CO.

Increasing atmospheric CO concentration is expected to enhance the grain yield of C cereal plants, while at the same time reducing the concentrations of minerals and proteins. This will lead to a lower nutritional quality and increase global problems associated with micronutrient malnutrition. Among the barley grain storage proteins, the C-hordein fraction has the lowest abundance of sulfur (S) containing amino acids and is poorest in binding of zinc (Zn).

Great tits feed their nestlings with more but smaller prey items and fewer caterpillars in cities than in forests.

Rapidly increasing urbanisation is one of the most significant anthropogenic environmental changes which can affect demographic traits of animal populations, for example resulting in reduced reproductive success. The food limitation hypothesis suggests that the shortage of high-quality nestling food in cities is a major factor responsible for the reduced reproductive performance in insectivorous birds. To study this explanation, we collected data on the parental provisioning behaviour of urban and forest great tits (Parus major) in three years that varied both in caterpillar availability (the main food of great tit nestlings) and in reproductive success of the birds.

Contrasting effects of the COVID-19 lockdown on urban birds' reproductive success in two cities.

The ubiquitous activity of humans is a fundamental feature of urban environments affecting local wildlife in several ways. Testing the influence of human disturbance would ideally need experimental approach, however, in cities, this is challenging at relevant spatial and temporal scales. Thus, to better understand the ecological effects of human activity, we exploited the opportunity that the city-wide lockdowns due to the COVID-19 pandemic provided during the spring of 2020.

The Barley Gene Positively Regulates the Tolerance to Combined Drought and Salinity Stress in Tibetan Wild Barley.

Drought and salinity are two of the most frequently co-occurring abiotic stresses. Despite recent advances in the elucidation of the effects of these stresses individually during the vegetative stage of plants, significant gaps exist in our understanding of the combined effects of these two frequently co-occurring stresses. Here, Tibetan wild barley XZ5 (drought tolerant), XZ16 (salt tolerant), and cultivated barley .

Does offspring sex ratio differ between urban and forest populations of great tits (Parus major)?

Since male and female offspring may have different costs and benefits, parents may use sex ratio adjustment to increase their own fitness under different environmental conditions. Urban habitats provide poorer conditions for nestling development in many birds. Therefore, we investigated whether great tits (Parus major) produce different brood sex ratios in urban and natural habitats.

Impact of urbanization on abundance and phenology of caterpillars and consequences for breeding in an insectivorous bird.

Urbanization can have marked effects on plant and animal populations' phenology, population size, predator-prey, interactions and reproductive success. These aspects are rarely studied simultaneously in a single system, and some are rarely investigated, e.g.

Enrichment and Identification of the Most Abundant Zinc Binding Proteins in Developing Barley Grains by Zinc-IMAC Capture and Nano LC-MS/MS.

: Zinc accumulates in the embryo, aleurone, and subaleurone layers at different amounts in cereal grains. Our hypothesis is that zinc could be stored bound, not only to low MW metabolites/proteins, but also to high MW proteins as well. : In order to identify the most abundant zinc binding proteins in different grain tissues, we microdissected barley grains into (1) seed coats; (2) aleurone/subaleurone; (3) embryo; and (4) endosperm.

Improving zinc accumulation in cereal endosperm using HvMTP1, a transition metal transporter.

Zinc (Zn) is essential for all life forms, including humans. It is estimated that around two billion people are deficient in their Zn intake. Human dietary Zn intake relies heavily on plants, which in many developing countries consists mainly of cereals.

Targeted expression of HvHMA2 increases the mineral content of the inner endosperm in barley.

Cereals are a major source of dietary energy and protein but are nutritionally poor in micronutrients. Zinc (Zn) biofortification of staple crops has been proposed as a promising strategy to combat the global challenge of human Zn-deficiency. The aim of this study was to improve the Zn content in the edible part of the barley (Hordeum vulgare L.

Problem-solving performance and reproductive success of great tits in urban and forest habitats.

Success in problem solving, a form of innovativeness, can help animals exploit their environments, and recent research suggests that it may correlate with reproductive success. Innovativeness has been proposed to be especially beneficial in urbanized habitats, as suggested by superior problem-solving performance of urban individuals in some species. If there is stronger selection for innovativeness in cities than in natural habitats, we expect problem-solving performance to have a greater positive effect on fitness in more urbanized habitats.

Comparison of Predictive Immunohistochemical Marker Expression of Primary Breast Cancer and Paired Distant Metastasis using Surgical Material: A Practice-Based Study.

Parallel studies of primary breast carcinomas and corresponding distant metastases samples reveal considerable differences. Our aim was to highlight this issue from another perspective and provide further data based on 98 patient samples: 69 primary breast carcinoma and 85 distant metastases from bone, central nervous system (CNS) and lung (56 paired). Two independent series of immunohistochemical reactions with different antibodies for estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PgR) and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (Her2), along with HER2 fluroscence in situ hybridization (FISH) were performed on tissue microarrays to classify breast carcinoma and distant metastases samples into Luminal A, Luminal B-proliferating, Luminal B-HER2+, HER2+ and triple negative (TNBC) surrogate breast cancer groups.

Flowering phenological changes in relation to climate change in Hungary.

The importance of long-term plant phenological time series is growing in monitoring of climate change impacts worldwide. To detect trends and assess possible influences of climate in Hungary, we studied flowering phenological records for six species (Convallaria majalis, Taraxacum officinale, Syringa vulgaris, Sambucus nigra, Robinia pseudoacacia, Tilia cordata) based on phenological observations from the Hungarian Meteorological Service recorded between 1952 and 2000. Altogether, four from the six examined plant species showed significant advancement in flowering onset with an average rate of 1.

Targeted modification of storage protein content resulting in improved amino acid composition of barley grain.

C-hordein in barley and ω-gliadins in wheat are members of the prolamins protein families. Prolamins are the major component of cereal storage proteins and composed of non-essential amino acids (AA) such as proline and glutamine therefore have low nutritional value. Using double stranded RNAi silencing technology directed towards C-hordein we obtained transgenic barley lines with up to 94.

DNA microarray revealed and RNAi plants confirmed key genes conferring low Cd accumulation in barley grains.

Background: Understanding the mechanism of low Cd accumulation in crops is crucial for sustainable safe food production in Cd-contaminated soils.

Results: Confocal microscopy, atomic absorption spectrometry, gas exchange and chlorophyll fluorescence analyses revealed a distinct difference in Cd accumulation and tolerance between the two contrasting barley genotypes: W6nk2 (a low-grain-Cd-accumulating and Cd-sensitive genotype) and Zhenong8 (a high-grain-Cd-accumulating and tolerant genotype). A DNA microarray analysis detected large-scale changes of gene expression in response to Cd stress with a substantial difference between the two genotypes.

HvEXPB7, a novel β-expansin gene revealed by the root hair transcriptome of Tibetan wild barley, improves root hair growth under drought stress.

Tibetan wild barley is a treasure trove of useful genes for crop improvement including abiotic stress tolerance, like drought. Root hair of single-celled structures plays an important role in water and nutrition uptake. Polyethylene-glycol-induced drought stress hydroponic/petri-dish experiments were performed, where root hair morphology and transcriptional characteristics of two contrasting Tibetan wild barley genotypes (drought-tolerant XZ5 and drought-sensitive XZ54) and drought-tolerant cv.

EZH2 is a sensitive marker of malignancy in salivary gland tumors.

Background: The immunohistochemical detection of Enhancer of zeste homologue 2 (EZH2) proved to be a useful tool to recognize the malignant nature of tumors in a wide variety of neoplasms. The histological diagnostics of salivary gland tumors is a challenging task, and a reliable marker of malignancy would be extremely helpful.

Methods: EZH2 expression was investigated in 54 malignant and 40 benign salivary gland tumors of various histological types by standard immunohistochemistry.

Lysine metabolism in antisense C-hordein barley grains.

The grain proteins of barley are deficient in lysine and threonine due to their low concentrations in the major storage protein class, the hordeins, especially in the C-hordein subgroup. Previously produced antisense C-hordein transgenic barley lines have an improved amino acid composition, with increased lysine, methionine and threonine contents. The objective of the study was to investigate the possible changes in the regulation of key enzymes of the aspartate metabolic pathway and the contents of aspartate-derived amino acids in the nontransgenic line (Hordeum vulgare L.

An infrared motion detector system for lossless real-time monitoring of animal preference tests.

Automated behavioural observations are routinely used in many fields of biology, including ethology, behavioural ecology and physiology. When preferences for certain resources are investigated, the focus is often on simple response variables, such as duration and frequency of visits to choice chambers. Here we present an automated motion detector system that use passive infrared sensors to eliminate many drawbacks of currently existing methods.

Effects of Zn fertilization on hordein transcripts at early developmental stage of barley grain and correlation with increased Zn concentration in the mature grain.

Zinc deficiency is causing malnutrition for nearly one third of world populations. It is especially relevant in cereal-based diets in which low amounts of mineral and protein are present. In biological systems, Zn is mainly associated with protein.

Does urbanization facilitate individual recognition of humans by house sparrows?

Wild animals living in proximity to humans may benefit from recognizing people individually and adjusting their behaviour to the potential risk or gain expected from each person. Although several urban-dwelling species exhibit such skills, it is unclear whether this is due to pre-existing advanced cognitive abilities of taxa predisposed for city life or arises specifically in urban populations either by selection or through ontogenetic changes facilitated by exposure to humans. To test these alternatives, we studied populations of house sparrows (Passer domesticus) along the urbanization gradient.