Project description:The soilborne fungus, Verticillium dahliae, causes Verticillium wilt disease in plants. Verticillium wilt is difficult to control since V. dahliae is capable of persisting in the soil for 10 to15 years as melanized microsclerotia, rendering crop rotation strategies for disease control ineffective. Microsclerotia of V. dahliae overwinter and germinate to produce infectious hyphae that give rise to primary infections. Consequentially, microsclerotia formation, maintenance, and germination are critically important processes in the disease cycle of V. dahliae.
Project description:The western corn rootworm (WCR, Diabrotica virgifera virgifera LeConte) is an important pest of corn (Zea mays) in the US. Annual crop rotation between corn and soybean (Glycine max) disrupts the corn-dependent WCR lifecycle and was widely adopted to manage WCR. However, this strategy selected for a rotation-resistant (RR) variant with reduced ovipositional fidelity to cornfields. Previous studies indicated that RR-WCR adults exhibit greater tolerance of soybean tissue diet, different gut physiology, and host-microbe interactions compared to wild-types (WT). To identify genetic mechanisms underlying these phenotypic changes, a de novo assembly of the WCR adult gut transcriptome was constructed and used for RNA-sequencing analyses on RNA libraries from different WCR phenotypes (RR and WT) fed with corn or soybean diets. Differential gene expression analyses and network-based methods were used to identify gene modules transcriptionally correlated with the RR phenotype. Gene ontology enrichment analyses on these modules were then conducted to understand their potential functions and biological importance. Differential gene expression analyses on RNA libraries from adult guts of different WCR phenotypes (rotation-resistant and wild-type) fed with corn or soybean diets
Project description:Human saliva microbiota is phylogenetically divergent among host individuals yet their roles in health and disease are poorly appreciated. We employed a microbial functional gene microarray, HuMiChip 1.0, to reconstruct the global functional profiles of human saliva microbiota from ten healthy and ten caries-active adults. Saliva microbiota in the pilot population featured a vast diversity of functional genes. No significant distinction in gene number or diversity indices was observed between healthy and caries-active microbiota. However, co-presence network analysis of functional genes revealed that caries-active microbiota was more divergent in non-core genes than healthy microbiota, despite both groups exhibited a similar degree of conservation at their respective core genes. Furthermore, functional gene structure of saliva microbiota could potentially distinguish caries-active patients from healthy hosts. Microbial functions such as Diaminopimelate epimerase, Prephenate dehydrogenase, Pyruvate-formate lyase and N-acetylmuramoyl-L-alanine amidase were significantly linked to caries. Therefore, saliva microbiota carried disease-associated functional signatures, which could be potentially exploited for caries diagnosis. The DMFT INDEX (Decayed, Missing, Filled [DMF] teeth index used in dental epidemiology) values are provided for each sample
Project description:Human saliva microbiota is phylogenetically divergent among host individuals yet their roles in health and disease are poorly appreciated. We employed a microbial functional gene microarray, HuMiChip 1.0, to reconstruct the global functional profiles of human saliva microbiota from ten healthy and ten caries-active adults. Saliva microbiota in the pilot population featured a vast diversity of functional genes. No significant distinction in gene number or diversity indices was observed between healthy and caries-active microbiota. However, co-presence network analysis of functional genes revealed that caries-active microbiota was more divergent in non-core genes than healthy microbiota, despite both groups exhibited a similar degree of conservation at their respective core genes. Furthermore, functional gene structure of saliva microbiota could potentially distinguish caries-active patients from healthy hosts. Microbial functions such as Diaminopimelate epimerase, Prephenate dehydrogenase, Pyruvate-formate lyase and N-acetylmuramoyl-L-alanine amidase were significantly linked to caries. Therefore, saliva microbiota carried disease-associated functional signatures, which could be potentially exploited for caries diagnosis. The DMFT INDEX (Decayed, Missing, Filled [DMF] teeth index used in dental epidemiology) values are provided for each sample We employed a microbial functional gene microarray, HuMiChip 1.0, to reconstruct the global functional profiles of human saliva microbiota from ten healthy and ten caries-active adults.