Mosquitoes of Northwestern Uganda.

Despite evidence of arbovirus activity in northwestern Uganda (West Nile Sub-region), there is very limited information on the mosquito fauna of this region. The only published study reported 52 mosquito species in northwestern Uganda but this study took place in 1950 and the information has not been updated for more than 60 yr. In January and June 2011, CO2 baited-light traps were used to collect 49,231 mosquitoes from four different locations, Paraa (9,487), Chobe (20,025), Sunguru (759), and Rhino Camp (18,960).

Analysis of a taurine-dependent promoter in Sinorhizobium meliloti that offers tight modulation of gene expression.

Background: Genetic models have been developed in divergent branches of the class Alphaproteobacteria to help answer a wide spectrum of questions regarding bacterial physiology. For example, Sinorhizobium meliloti serves as a useful representative for investigating rhizobia-plant symbiosis and nitrogen fixation, Caulobacter crescentus for studying cell cycle regulation and organelle biogenesis, and Zymomonas mobilis for assessing the potentials of metabolic engineering and biofuel production. A tightly regulated promoter that enables titratable expression of a cloned gene in these different models is highly desirable, as it can facilitate observation of phenotypes that would otherwise be obfuscated by leaky expression.