The low temperature (LT) in spring has become one of the principal abiotic stresses that restrict the growth and development of wheat.  Diverse analyses were performed to investigate the mechanism underlying the response of wheat grain development to LT stress during booting.  These included morphological observation, measurements of starch synthase activity, and determination of amylose and amylopectin content of wheat grain after exposure to treatment with LT during booting.  Additionally, proteomic analysis was performed using tandem mass tags (TMT).  The results showed that the plumpness of wheat grains decreased after LT stress.  Moreover, the activities of sucrose synthase (SuS, EC 2.4.1.13) and ADP-glucose pyrophosphorylase (AGPase, EC 2.7.7.27) exhibited a significant reduction, leading to a significant reduction in the contents of amylose and amylopectin.  A total of 509 differentially expressed proteins (DEPs) were identified by proteomics analysis.  The GO enrichment analysis showed that the protein difference multiple in the nutritional repository activity was the largest among the molecular functions, and the up-regulated seed storage protein (SSP) played an active role in the response of grains to LT stress and subsequent damage.  The KEGG enrichment analysis showed that LT stress reduced the expression of DEPs such as sucrose phosphate synthase (SPS), glucose-1-phosphate adenosine transferase (glgC), and β-fructofuranosidase (FFase) in sucrose and starch metabolic pathways, thus affecting the synthesis of grain starch.  In addition, many heat shock proteins (HSPs) were found in the protein processing in the endoplasmic reticulum pathways, which can resist some damage caused by LT stress.  These findings provide a new theoretical foundation for elucidating the underlying mechanism governing wheat yield development after exposure to LT stress in spring.

Maize (Zea mays L.) is a monoecious grass species with separate male and female inflorescences which form the tassel and ear, respectively.  The mature ear inflorescences usually bear hundreds of grains, thus directly influence maize grain production and yield.  Here, we isolated a recessive maize mutant, tasselseed2016 (ts2016), which exhibits pleiotropic inflorescence defects and a reduction in grain yield.  These defects include loss of determinacy and identity in meristems and floral organs, as well as a lack of the lower floret abortion in maize ear, and the smaller grain size.  Using map-based cloning and allelic test, we identified and confirmed a microRNA gene MIR172e as the target gene controlling these related traits.  Furthermore, our evidence uncovered a new potential miR172e/ETHYLENE RESPONSIVE ELEMENT BINDING197 (EREB197) regulatory module which controls the abortion of lower floret in maize ear. Transcriptome analysis revealed that the mutation of MIR172e represses multiple biological processes, particularly the flower development and hormone-related pathways in maize ear.  Additionally, we found the mutation in the DNA sequence of MIR172e affects in RNA transcription, resulting in elongation blockage at the mutant site.  Our results reveal the function and molecular mechanism of MIR172e in maize inflorescences and grain yield, and this study deepens our knowledge of maize inflorescence development.

The mirid bug Apolygus lucorum (Hemiptera: Miridae) is a polyphagous pest that affects a wide range of host plants. Its control remains challenging mainly due to its rapid reproduction, necessitating an understanding of sex pheromone communication. The recognition of sex pheromones is vital for courtship and mating behaviors, and is mediated by various chemosensory-associated proteins. Among these, sensory neuron membrane protein (SNMP), a CD36-related protein, is suggested to play crucial roles in detecting sex pheromones. In this study, we employed transcriptomic and genomic data from A. lucorum and phylogenetic approaches, and identified four putative SNMP genes (AlucSNMP1a, AlucSNMP1b, AlucSNMP2a, and AlucSNMP2b) with full open reading frames. Expression analysis revealed the ubiquitous presence of AlucSNMP transcripts in multiple tissues, with only AlucSNMP1a exhibiting male-biased expression in the antennae, suggesting its potential role in male chemosensation. Functional analysis using the Xenopus oocyte expression system, coupled with two-electrode voltage clamp recording, demonstrated that the co-expression of AlucSNMP1a with specific pheromone receptors (PRs) and the co-receptor (Orco) significantly enhanced electrophysiological responses to sex pheromones compared to the co-expression of PRs and Orco alone. Moreover, the results indicated that the presence of AlucSNMP1a not only affected the responsiveness to sex pheromones but also influenced the kinetics (activation and inactivation) of the induced signals. In contrast, the co-expression of AlucSNMP1b with AlucPR/Orco complexes had no impact on the inward currents induced by two pheromone compounds. An examination of the selective pressures on SNMP1 genes across 20 species indicated strong purifying selection, implying potential functional conservation in various insects. These findings highlight the crucial role of AlucSNMP1a in the response to sex pheromones.

Dry-hot wind stress causes losses in wheat productivity in major growing regions worldwide, especially for winter wheat in the Huang-Huai-Hai Plain of China, and both the occurrence and the severity of such events are likely to increase with global climate change.  To investigate the recovery of physiological function and yield formation using a non-commercial new chemical regulator (NCR) following dry-hot wind stress, we conducted a three-year field experiment (2018-2021), and sprayed tap water (control), monopotassium phosphate (CKP), NCR at both the jointing and flowering stage (CFS), and NCR only at the jointing stage (FSJ) or flowering stage (FSF).  The leaf physiology, biomass accumulation and translocation, grain-filling process, and yield components in winter wheat were investigated.  Among the single spraying treatments, the FSJ treatment was beneficial to accumulation of dry matter before anthesis, and to a larger increase of maximum grain-filling rate and mean grain-filling rate.  The FSF treatment performed better in maintaining a high relative chlorophyll content as SPAD value, and low rate of excised leaf water loss in flag leaves, promoting dry matter accumulation and contribution to grain after anthesis, prolonging the duration of grain filling, and inducing the period until maximum grain-filling rate to be reached earlier.  The CFS treatment was better than any other treatments in relieving effects of dry-hot wind.  The exogenous NCR treatments significantly increased grain yields by 12.45–18.20% in 2018–2019, 8.89–13.82% in 2019–2020, and 8.10–9.00% in 2020–2021.  The conventional measure of CKP treatment only increased grain yield by 6.69% in 2020–2021.  The CFS treatment had the greatest mitigating effect on loss of yield under dry-hot wind stress, following by the FSF and FSJ treatments, and the CKP treatment had a minimal effect.  In summary, the CFS treatment could be used as the main chemical control measure for wheat stress resistance and yield stability in areas with high incidence of dry-hot wind.  This can effectively regulate green retention and water status of leaves, promote dry matter accumulation and efficient translocation, improve grain-filling process, and ultimately reduce yield losses.

The foundation parents play key roles in the genetic improvement of both yield potential and end-use quality in wheat.  Characterizing the genetic basis that underlies certain beneficial traits in the foundation parents will provide theoretical reference for molecular breeding by a design approach.  ‘Kenong 9204’ (KN9204) is a candidate foundation parent characterized by ideotype, high yield potential, and particularly high nitrogen fertilizer utilization.  To better understand the genetic basis of its high yield potential, high throughput whole-genome re-sequencing (10×) was performed on KN9204, its parental lines and its derivatives.  A high-resolution genetic composition map of KN9204 was constructed, which showed the parental origin of the favorable genomic segments based on the identification of excellent yield-related quantitative trait loci (QTL) from a bi-parental mapping population.  Xiaoyan 693 (XY693), a wheat–Thinopyrum ponticum partial amphidiploid, contributed a great deal to the high yield potential of KN9204, and three major stable QTLs from XY693 were fine mapped.  The transmissibility of key genomic segments from KN9204 to its derivatives were delineated, indicating that haplotype blocks containing beneficial gene combinations were conserved along with directional selection by breeders.  Evidence for selection sweeps in the breeding programs was identified.  This study provides a theoretical reference for the breeding of high-yield wheat varieties by a molecular design approach.

Maize (Zea mays L.) can exhibit yield penalties as a result of unfavorable changes to growing conditions.  The main threat to current and future global maize production is heat stress.  Maize may suffer from heat stress in all of the growth stages, either continuously or separately.  In order to manage the impact of climate driven heat stress on the different growth stages of maize, there is an urgent need to understand the similarities and differences in how heat stress affects maize growth and yield in the different growth stages.  For the purposes of this review, the maize growth cycle was divided into seven growth stages, namely the germination and seedling stage, early ear expansion stage, late vegetative growth stage before flowering, flowering stage, lag phase, effective grain-filling stage, and late grain-filling stage.  The main focus of this review is on the yield penalty and the potential physiological changes caused by heat stress in these seven different stages.  The commonalities and differences in heat stress related impacts on various physiological processes in the different growth stages are also compared and discussed.  Finally, a framework is proposed to describe the main influences on yield components in different stages, which can serve as a useful guide for identifying management interventions to mitigate heat stress related declines in maize yield.

Crop improvement is crucial for addressing the global challenges of food security and sustainable agriculture.  Recent advancements in high-throughput phenotyping technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) have revolutionized the field, enabling rapid and accurate assessment of crop traits on a large scale.  The integration of AI and machine learning algorithms with high-throughput phenotyping data has unlocked new opportunities for crop improvement.  AI algorithms can analyze and interpret large datasets, extracting meaningful patterns and correlations between phenotypic traits and genetic factors.  These technologies have the potential to revolutionize plant breeding programs by providing breeders with efficient and accurate tools for trait selection, reducing the time and cost required for variety development.  However, further research and collaborations are needed to overcome the challenges and fully unlock the power of high-throughput phenotyping and AI in crop improvement.  By leveraging AI algorithms, researchers can efficiently analyze phenotypic data, uncover complex patterns, and establish predictive models that enable precise trait selection and crop breeding.  The aim of this review is to explore the transformative potential of integrating high-throughput phenotyping and AI in crop improvement.  The review will encompass an in-depth analysis of recent advancements and applications, highlighting the numerous benefits and challenges associated with high-throughput phenotyping and intelligence.

Pre-harvest sprouting (PHS) adversely affects wheat quality and yield, and grain color (GC) is associated with PHS resistance.  However, the genetic relationship between GC and PHS resistance remains unclear.  In this study, 168 wheat varieties (lines) with significant differences in GC and PHS resistance were genotyped using an Illumina 90K iSelect SNP array.  Genome-wide association study (GWAS) based on a mixed linear model showed that 67 marker-trait associations (MTAs) assigned to 29 loci, including 17 potentially novel loci, were significantly associated with GC, which explained 1.1–17.0% of the phenotypic variation.  In addition, 100 MTAs belonging to 54 loci, including 31 novel loci, were significantly associated with PHS resistance, which accounted for 1.1–14.7% of the phenotypic variation.  Subsequently, two cleaved amplified polymorphic sequences (CAPS) markers, 2B-448 on chromosome 2B and 5B-301 on chromosome 5B, were developed from the representative SNPs of the major common loci Qgc.ahau-2B.3/Qphs.ahau-2B.4 controlling GC/PHS resistance and PHS resistance locus Qphs.ahau-5B.4, respectively.  Further validation in 171 Chinese mini-core collections confirmed significant correlations of the two CAPS markers with GC and PHS resistance phenotypes under different environments (P<0.05).  Furthermore, the wheat public expression database, transcriptomic sequencing, and gene allelic variation analysis identified TraesCS5B02G545100, which encodes glutaredoxin, as a potential candidate gene linked to Qphs.ahau-5B.4.  The new CAPS marker CAPS-356 was then developed based on the SNP (T/C) in the coding sequences (CDS) region of TraesCS5B02G545100.  The high-density linkage map of the Jing 411/Hongmangchun 21 recombinant inbred lines (RILs) constructed based on specific locus amplified fragment sequencing markers showed that CAPS-356 collocated with a novel QTL for PHS resistance, supporting the role of TraesCS5B02G545100 as the potential candidate gene linked to Qphs.ahau-5B.4.  These results provide valuable information for the map-based cloning of Qphs.ahau-5B.4 and breeding of PHS resistant white-grained varieties.

The physiological and metabolic differences in maize under different nitrogen (N) levels are the basis of reasonable N management, which is vital in improving fertilizer utilization and reducing environmental pollution.  In this paper, on the premise of defining the N fertilizer efficiency and yield under different long-term N fertilization treatments, the corresponding differential metabolites and their metabolic pathways were analyzed by untargeted metabolomics in maize.  N stress, including deficiency and excess, affects the balance of carbon (C) metabolism and N metabolism by regulating C metabolites (sugar alcohols and tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle intermediates) and N metabolites (various amino acids and their derivatives).  L-alanine, L-phenylalanine, L-histidine, and L-glutamine decreased under N deficiency, and L-valine, proline, and L-histidine increased under N excess.  In addition to sugar alcohols and the above amino acids in C and N metabolism, differential secondary metabolites, flavonoids (e.g., kaempferol, luteolin, rutin, and diosmetin), and hormones (e.g., indoleacetic acid, trans-zeatin, and jasmonic acid) were initially considered as indicators for N stress diagnosis under this experimental conditions.  This study also indicated that the leaf metabolic levels of N2 (120 kg ha^–1 N) and N3 (180 kg ha^–1 N) were similar, consistent with the differences in their physiological indexes and yields over 12 years.  This study verified the feasibility of reducing N fertilization from 180 kg ha^–1 (locally recommended) to 120 kg ha^–1 at the metabolic level, which provided a mechanistic basis for reducing N fertilization without reducing yield, further improving the N utilization rate and protecting the ecological environment.

Plant chlorophyll biosynthesis and chloroplast development are two complex processes that are regulated by exogenous and endogenous factors.  In this study, we identified OsDXR, a gene encoding a reductoisomerase that positively regulates chlorophyll biosynthesis and chloroplast development in rice.  OsDXR knock-out lines displayed the albino phenotype and could not complete the whole life cycle process.  OsDXR was highly expressed in rice leaves, and subcellular localization indicated that OsDXR is a chloroplast protein.  Many genes involved in chlorophyll biosynthesis and chloroplast development were differentially expressed in the OsDXR knock-out lines compared to the wild type.  Moreover, we found that the RNA editing efficiencies of ndhA-1019 and rpl2-1 were significantly reduced in the OsDXR knock-out lines.  Furthermore, OsDXR interacted with the RNA editing factor OsMORF1 in a yeast two-hybrid screen and bimolecular fluorescence complementation assay.  Finally, disruption of the plastidial 2-C-methyl-derythritol-4-phosphate pathway resulted in defects in chloroplast development and the RNA editing of chloroplast genes.

The oriental fruit fly, Bactrocera dorsalis (Hendel), is a devastating pest of citrus fruits.  After successful mating, adult females insert their eggs into the ripened fruit, resulting in moldy and rotten fruit and causing great economic losses for the citrus industry.  In the field, flies initiate copulatory behaviors as twilight approaches, and decreasing light intensity in this period is the normal stimulus for copulation.  In this study, ten light intensities ranging from 0–30 000 lux were set to identify the typical intensity that strongly regulates the copulation behavior of B. dorsalis.  Three light intensities found to regulate the copulation behavior were then selected to verify their effects on adult male wing fanning and female chemotaxis towards 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (TMP).  At last, strong light and complete darkness were artificially combined in the lab to verify whether they could prevent copulation to inform behavioral manipulation of oriental flies in the future.  The results indicated that adult flies generally initiated copulatory behaviors at low light intensity (<1 000 lux).  
Stronger light significantly prevented copulation in proportion to intensity, with nearly no copulation events initiated when light intensity was above 20 000 lux.  Both male wing fanning and female chemotaxis towards TMP were attenuated as light intensity became stronger.  However, at 10 000 lux, males still fanned their wings to a certain extent while TMP completely lost its attractiveness to females.  In the darkness, adults did not initiate any sexual behaviors, e.g., copulation, wing fanning, or chemotaxis to TMP.  One hour of strong light (10 000 lux) combined with continuous darkness completely prevented mating.  These results show that light condition is an essential factor for copulatory behaviors in the oriental fruit fly.  Researchers could thus manipulate light conditions artificially or disrupt the molecular target in flies’ light transduction pathway to develop environmentally-friendly techniques to control this pest.

The effect of nitrogen (N) fertilizer on the development of maize kernels has yet to be fully explored.  MicroRNA-mRNA analyses could help advance our understanding of how kernels respond to N.  This study analyzed the morphological, physiological, and transcriptomic changes in maize kernels under different N rates (0, 100, 200, and 300 kg ha^–1).  The result showed that increasing N application significantly increased maize grains’ fresh and dry weight until N reached 200 kg ha^–1.  Higher levels of indole-3-acetic acid, cytokinin, gibberellin, and a lower level of ethylene were associated with increased N applications.  We obtained 31 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in hormone synthesis and transduction, and 9 DEGs were regulated by 14 differentially expressed microRNAs (DEMIs) in 26 pairs.  The candidate DEGs and DEMIs provide valuable insight for manipulating grain filling under different N rates.

Genetic control strategies such as the sterile insect technique have successfully fought insect pests worldwide.  The CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) technology, together with high-quality genomic resources obtained in more and more species, greatly facilitates the development of novel genetic control insect strains that can be used in area-wide and species-specific pest control programs.  Here, we review the research progress towards state-of-art CRISPR-based genetic control strategies, including gene drive, sex ratio distortion, CRISPR-engineered genetic sexing strains, and precision-guided sterile insect technique.  These strategies’ working mechanisms, potential resistance development mechanisms, and regulations are illustrated and discussed.  In addition, recent developments such as stacked and conditional systems are introduced.  We envision that the advances in genetic technology will continue to be one of the driving forces for developing the next generation of pest control strategies.  

Tissue factor pathway inhibitor 2 (TFPI2) plays a key role in female reproduction. However, its expression and function in chickens are still unclear. In the present study, ovarian tissues from 30 w and 15 w laying chickens were analyzed using RNA-seq to identify the differentially expressed gene TFPI2. The full-length cDNA of TFPI2 was obtained from adult chicken ovaries by rapid-amplification of cDNA ends (RACE), and the putative TFPI2 protein was found to share a highly conserved amino acid sequence with known bird homologs. In addition, TFPI2 was widely expressed in the tissues of adult chicken follicles according to quantitative real-time PCR (qRT‒PCR) and Western blotting. Immunohistochemistry suggested that the TFPI2 protein existed in chicken ovary follicles at different developmental states, such as primordial follicles, the ovarian stroma, and the granulosa and theca layers of prehierarchical follicles (6-8 mm) and preovulatory follicles (F1). In vitro, Follicle stimulating hormone or Luteinizing hormone (FSH/LH) stimulated the expression of TFPI2 in chicken granulosa cells. FSH-/LH-induced TFPI2 mRNA expression was mediated by signaling pathways such as the PKA, PKC, PI3K, and mTOR pathways. Functionally, TFPI2 promoted the proliferation and viability of cultured granulosa cells and decreased the secretion of Progesterone (P4) and Estrogen (E2) and the mRNA abundance of key steroidogenic enzymes (STAR, Cyp17a1, Cyp19a1 and 3B-HSD) as well as MMPs (MMP2, 7, 9 and 11). Mechanistically, TFPI2 inhibited the expression of MMP7 via the Wnt signaling pathway. These findings indicate that TFPI2 may play an important role in regulating chicken follicular development and ovulation and suggest the molecular regulation mechanisms.

Small auxin up RNA (SAUR) is a large gene family that is widely distributed among land plants.  In this study, a comprehensive analysis of the SAUR family was performed in sweet cherry, and the potential biological functions of PavSAUR55 were identified using the method of genetic transformation.  The sweet cherry genome encodes 86 SAUR members, the majority of which are intron-less.  These genes appear to be divided into seven subfamilies through evolution.  Gene duplication events indicate that fragment duplication and tandem duplication events occurred in the sweet cherry.  Most of the members mainly underwent purification selection pressure during evolution.  During fruit development, the expression levels of PavSAUR16/45/56/63 were up-regulated, and conversely, those of PavSAUR12/61 were down-regulated.  Due to the significantly differential expressions of PavSAUR13/16/55/61 during the fruitlet abscission process, they might be the candidate genes involved in the regulation of physiological fruit abscission in sweet cherry.  Overexpression of PavSAUR55 in Arabidopsis produced earlier reproductive growth, root elongation, and delayed petal abscission.  In addition, this gene did not cause any change in the germination time of seeds and was able to increase the number of lateral roots under abscisic acid (ABA) treatment.  The identified SAURs of sweet cherry play a crucial role in fruitlet abscission and will facilitate future insights into the mechanism underlying the heavy fruitlet abscission that can occur in this fruit crop.

Climate change which is mainly caused by carbon emissions is a global problem affecting the economic development and well-being of human society. Low-carbon agriculture is of particular significance in slowing down global warming and reaching the goal of “carbon peak and carbon neutrality”. Therefore, taking straw incorporation as an example, this paper aims to investigate the impact of risk preferences on farmers’ low-carbon agricultural technology (LCAT) adoption. Based on a two-phase micro-survey data of 1,038 rice farmers in Jiangsu, Jiangxi, and Hunan provinces, this paper uses experimental economics methods to measure farmers’ risk aversion and loss aversion to obtain the real risk preferences information of the farmers. We also explore the data to examine the actual LCAT adoption behavior of farmers. The results revealed that both risk aversion and loss aversion significantly inhibit farmers’ LCAT adoption: more risk averse or more loss averse farmers are less likely to adopt LCAT. It is further found that crop insurance, farm scale and governmental regulations can alleviate the negative impact of risk aversion and loss aversion on farmers’ LCAT adoption. Therefore, we propose that local governments need to promote low-carbon agricultural development by propagating the benefits of LCAT, extending crop insurance, promoting appropriate scale operations, and strengthening governmental regulations to promote farmers’ LCAT adoption.

Chlorophyll (Chl) content, especially Chl b content, and stomatal conductance (G_s) are key factors that greatly affect net photosynthetic rate (P_n).  Setaria italica, a diploid C₄ panicoid species with a simple genome and high transformation efficiency, has been widely accepted as a model in photosynthesis and drought-tolerance research.  In the current study, Chl content, G_s, and P_n of 48 Setaria mutants induced by ethyl methanesulfonate were characterized.  A total of 24, 34 and 35 mutants had significant variations in Chl content, G_s, and P_n, respectively. Correlation analysis showed that positive correlation exists between increased G_s and increased Pn, and a weak correlation between decreased Chl b content and decreased P_n was also found. Remarkably, two mutants behaved significantly decreased Chl b content but increased P_n when compared that of Yugu 1. Seven mutants behaved significantly decreased G_s but non-decreasing P_n when compared that of Yugu 1.  The current study thus identified various genetic lines, further exploration of which would be beneficial to elucidate the relationship between Chl content, G_s and P_n and the mechanism underlying why C₄ species are efficient at photosynthesis and water saving.

Wheat relative species are important for agriculture production, functional genomics study and wheat improvement as useful genetic resources.  In this study, a regeneration related wheat gene TaWOX5 was applied to establish the Agrobacterium-mediated transformation systems of Triticum monococcum, hexaploid triticale, and rye (Secale cereale L.) using their immature embryos.  Transgenic plants were efficiently generated.  During the transformation process, the Agrobacterium infection efficiency was assessed by histochemical staining for β-glucuronidase (GUS).  Finally, the transgenic nature of regenerated plants was verified by polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based genotyping for presence of the GUS and bialaphos resistance (bar) genes, histochemical staining for GUS protein, and QuickStix strip assay for bar protein. The transformation efficiency of T. monococcum genotype PI428182 was 94.4%; the efficiencies of four hexaploid triticale genotypes Lin456, ZS3297, ZS1257, and ZS3224 were 52.1, 41.2, 19.4, and 16.0%, respectively; the transformation efficiency of rye cultivar Lanzhou Heimai was 7.8%.  Fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) and genomic in situ hybridization (GISH) analysis indicated that the GUS transgenes were integrated into the distal or near centromere (proximal) region of the chromosomes in transgenic T. monococcum and hexaploid triticale plants; in the transgenic hexaploid triticale plants, the foreign DNA fragment was randomly integrated into the AABB genome and RR genome.  Furthermore, the transgene was proved to be almost stably inherited in the next generation by Mendel’s law.  The findings in this study will promote genetic improvement for grain or forage production of the three plant species and for functional genomics study of cereal species including wheat.

Straw returning to the field is a technical measure of crop production widely adopted in arid areas.  It is unknown whether crop yield can be further increased by improving the eco-physiological characteristics when straw returning is applied in the crop production system.  So, a three-year field experiment was conducted with various straw returning treatments for wheat production: (i) no-tillage with straw mulching (NTSM), (ii) no-tillage with straw standing (NTSS), (iii) conventional tillage with straw incorporation (CTS), and (iv) conventional tillage with no straw returning (CT, control).  The eco-physiological and yield formation indicators were investigated to provide the basis for selecting the appropriate straw returning method to increase wheat yield and clarifying its regulation mechanism on eco-physiology.  The results showed that NTSM and NTSS treatments had better regulation of eco-physiological characteristics and had a higher yield increase than CTS and CT.  Meanwhile, NTSM had a relatively higher yield than NTSS through better regulation of eco-physiological characteristics.  Compared to CT, the leaf area index of NTSM was decreased by 6.1–7.6% before the Feekes 10.0 stage of wheat, but that of NTSM was increased by 38.9–45.1% after the Feekes 10.0 stage.  NTSM effectively regulated the dynamics of the photosynthetic source of green leaves during the wheat growth period.  NTSM improved net photosynthetic rate by 10.2–21.4% and 11.0–21.6%, raised transpiration rate by 4.4–10.0% and 5.3–6.1%, increased leaf water use efficiency by 5.6–10.4% and 5.4–14.6%, at Feekes 11.0 and 11.2 stages of wheat, compared to CT, respectively.  NTSM had higher leaf water potential (LWP) by 7.5–12.0% and soil water potential (SWP) by 8.9–24.0% from Feekes 10.3 to 11.2 stages of wheat than CT.  Meanwhile, the absolute value of difference on LWP and SWP with NTSM was less than that with CT, indicating that NTSM was conducive to holding the stability of water demand for wheat plants and water supply of soil at arid conditions.  Thus, NTSM had a greater grain yield of wheat by 18.6–27.3% than CT, and the high yield was attributed to the synchronous increase and cooperative development of ear number, grain number per ear, and 1 000-grain weight.  NTSM had a positive effect on regulating the eco-physiological characteristics and can be recommended to enhance wheat grain yield in arid conditions.

Understanding the composition and contents of carotenoids in various soybean seed accessions is important for their nutritional assessment.  This study investigated the variability in the concentrations of carotenoids and chlorophylls and revealed their associations with other nutritional quality traits in a genetically diverse set of Chinese soybean accessions comprised of cultivars and landraces.  Genotype, planting year, accession type, seed cotyledon color, and ecoregion of origin significantly influenced the accumulation of carotenoids and chlorophylls.  The mean total carotenoid content was in the range of 8.15–14.72 µg g^–1 across the ecoregions.  The total carotenoid content was 1.2-fold higher in the landraces than in the cultivars.  Soybeans with green cotyledons had higher contents of carotenoids and chlorophylls than those with yellow cotyledons.  Remarkably, lutein was the most abundant carotenoid in all the germplasms, ranging from 1.35–37.44 µg g^–1.  Carotenoids and chlorophylls showed significant correlations with other quality traits, which will help to set breeding strategies for enhancing soybean carotenoids without affecting the other components.  Collectively, our results demonstrate that carotenoids are adequately accumulated in soybean seeds, however, they are strongly influenced by genetic factors, accession type, and germplasm origin.  We identified novel germplasms with the highest total carotenoid contents across the various ecoregions of China that could serve as the genetic materials for soybean carotenoid breeding programs, and thereby as the raw materials for food sectors, pharmaceuticals, and the cosmetic industry.

The tea plant [Camellia sinensis (L.) O. Kuntze] is an industrial crop in China.  The Anhui Province has a long history of tea cultivation and has a large resource of tea germplasm with abundant genetic diversity.  To reduce the cost of conservation and utilization of germplasm resources, a core collection needs to be constructed.  To this end, 573 representative tea accessions were collected from six major tea-producing areas in Anhui Province.  Based on 60 pairs of simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers, phylogenetic relationships, population structure and principal coordinate analysis (PCoA) were conducted.  Phylogenetic analysis indicated that the 573 tea individuals clustered into five groups were related to geographical location and were consistent with the results of the PCoA.  Finally, we constructed a core collection consisting of 115 tea individuals, accounting for 20% of the whole collection.  The 115 core collections were considered to have a 90.9% retention rate for the observed number of alleles (Na), and Shannon’s information index (I) of the core and whole collections were highly consistent.  Of these, 39 individuals were preserved in the Huangshan area, accounting for 33.9% of the core collection, while only 10 individuals were reserved in the Jinzhai County, accounting for 8.9% of the core set.  PCoA of the accessions in the tea plant core collection exhibited a pattern nearly identical to that of the accessions in the entire collection, further supporting the broad representation of the core germplasm in Anhui Province.  The results demonstrated that the core collection could represent the genetic diversity of the original collection.  Our present work is valuable for the high-efficiency conservation and utilization of tea plant germplasms in Anhui Province

Rice research has always been the top priority in China and China produces the highest number of scientific journal papers on rice, particularly on rice genetics and breeding.  In this study, we used a bibliometric approach to analyze the trends of papers published by Chinese researchers on rice physiology and management.  Data were collected from three major agronomic journals (i.e., Agronomy Journal, Crop Science, and Field Crops Research) by searching in the Web of Science on September 8, 2017.  A total of 186 rice papers were published by Chinese researchers on crop physiology and management in the three journals since their establishment.  Yearly average number of such papers was 1.6, 6.5, and 21.0 for the periods of 1993–2005, 2006–2011, and 2012–2017, respectively.  Their quality in terms of citation performance has also improved significantly in the recent decade.  Huazhong Agricultural University, Yangzhou University, and Nanjing Agricultural University were leading organizations and published 54.4% of all 186 papers.  Huang Min of Hunan Agricultural University and Peng Shaobing of Huazhong Agricultural University published the most number of rice papers on crop physiology and management as the first and corresponding authors, respectively.  Yield potential and nitrogen-related research such as nitrogen use efficiency, nitrogen management, and plant nitrogen diagnosis have been the research focuses for rice crop.  In recent years, research on global warming including high temperature stress, direct seeding, zero tillage, Bt rice, and critical nitrogen dilution curve were becoming popular.  New research is emerging on yield gap, rice ratooning, and simplified and reduced-input practices in rice production.

Fruit development and ripening is a complex procedure (Malus×domestica Borkh.) and can be caused by various factors such as cell structure, cell wall components, and cell wall hydrolytic enzymes.  In our study, we focused on the variations in fruit firmness, cell wall morphology and components, the activity of cell wall hydrolytic enzymes and the expression patterns of associated genes during fruit development in two different types of apple cultivars, the hard-crisp cultivar and the loose-crisp cultivar.  In this paper, the aim was to find out the causes of the texture variations between the different type cultivars.  Cell wall materials (CWMs), hemicellulose and cellulose content were strongly associated with variations in fruit firmness during the fruit development.  The content of water soluble pectin (WSP) and chelator soluble pectin (CSP) gradually increased, while the content of ionic soluble pectin (ISP) showed inconsistent trends in the four cultivars.  The activities of polygalacturonase (PG), β-galactosidase (β-gal), cellulase (CEL), and pectate lyase (PL) gradually increased in four cultivars.  And the activities of PG, β-gal, and CEL were higher in ‘Fuji’ and ‘Honeycrisp’ fruit with the fruit development, while the activity of PL of ‘Fuji’ and ‘Honeycrisp’ was lower than that of ‘ENVY’ and ‘Modi’.  Both four cultivars of fruit cells progressively became bigger as the fruit expanded, with looser cell arrangements and larger cell gaps.  According to the qRT-PCR, the relative expression levels of MdACO and Mdβ-gal were notably enhanced.  Our study showed that there were large differences in the content of ISP and hemicellulose, the activity of PL and the relative expression of Mdβ-gal between two different types of apple cultivars, and these differences might be responsible for the variations in the texture of the four cultivars.

Big data with its vast volume and complexity is increasingly concerned, developed and used for all professions and trades. Remote sensing, as one of the sources for big data, is generating earth-observation data and analysis results daily from the platforms of satellites, manned/unmanned aircrafts, and ground-based structures. Agricultural remote sensing is one of the backbone technologies for precision agriculture, which considers within-field variability for site-specific management instead of uniform management as in traditional agriculture. The key of agricultural remote sensing is, with global positioning data and geographic information, to produce spatially-varied data for subsequent precision agricultural operations. Agricultural remote sensing data, as general remote sensing data, have all characteristics of big data. The acquisition, processing, storage, analysis and visualization of agricultural remote sensing big data are critical to the success of precision agriculture. This paper overviews available remote sensing data resources, recent development of technologies for remote sensing big data management, and remote sensing data processing and management for precision agriculture. A five-layer-fifteenlevel (FLFL) satellite remote sensing data management structure is described and adapted to create a more appropriate four-layer-twelve-level (FLTL) remote sensing data management structure for management and applications of agricultural remote sensing big data for precision agriculture where the sensors are typically on high-resolution satellites, manned aircrafts, unmanned aerial vehicles and ground-based structures. The FLTL structure is the management and application framework of agricultural remote sensing big data for precision agriculture and local farm studies, which outlooks the future coordination of remote sensing big data management and applications at local regional and farm scale.

Plant height is a key plant architectural trait that affects the seed yield, harvest index and lodging resistance in Brassica napus L., although the genetic mechanisms affecting plant height remain unclear.  Here, a semi-dwarf mutant, df34, was obtained by ethyl methanesulphonate-induced mutagenesis.  Genetic analysis showed that the semi-dwarf phenotype is controlled by one semi-dominant gene, which was located on chromosome C03 using a bulked segregant analysis coupled with whole-genome sequencing, and this gene was named BnaSD.C3.  Then BnaSD.C3 was fine-mapped to a 297.35-kb segment of the “Darmor-bzh” genome, but there was no potential candidate gene for the semi-dwarf trait underlying this interval.  Furthermore, the interval was aligned to the Zhongshuang 11 reference genome.  Finally, combining structural variation analysis, transcriptome sequencing, phytohormone analyses and gene annotation information, BnaC03G0466900ZS and BnaC03G0478900ZS were determined to be the most likely candidate genes affecting the plant height of df34.  This study provides a novel major locus for breeding and new insights into the genetic architecture of plant height in B. napus

As there is a strong interest in red-skinned pears, the molecular mechanism of anthocyanin regulation in red-skinned pears has been widely investigated; however, little is known about the molecular mechanism of anthocyanin regulation in red-fleshed pears due to limited availability of such germplasm, primarily found in European pears (Pyrus communis).  In this study, based on transcriptomic analysis in red-fleshed and white-fleshed pears, we identified an ethylene response factor (ERF) from P. communis, PcERF5, of which expression level in fruit flesh was significantly correlated with anthocyanin content.  We then verified the function of PcERF5 in regulating anthocyanin accumulation by genetic transformation in both pear skin and apple calli.  PcERF5 regulated anthocyanin biosynthesis by different regulatory pathways.  On the one hand, PcERF5 can activate the transcription of flavonoid biosynthetic genes (PcDFR, PcANS and PcUFGT) and two key transcription factors encoding genes PcMYB10 and PcMYB114.  On the other hand, PcERF5 interacted with PcMYB10 to form the ERF5-MYB10 protein complex that enhanced the transcriptional activation of PcERF5 on its target genes.  Our results suggested that PcERF5 functioned as a transcriptional activator in regulating anthocyanin biosynthesis, which provides new insights into the regulatory mechanism of anthocyanin biosynthesis.  This new knowledge will provide guidance for molecular breeding of red-fleshed pear.

The use of plant-protecting unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for pesticide spraying is an essential operation in modern agriculture.  The balance between reducing pesticide consumption and energy consumption is a significant focus of current research in the path-planning of plant-protecting UAVs.  In this study, we proposed a binarization multi-objective model for the irregular field area, specifically an improved non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm–II based on the knee point and plane measurement (KPPM-NSGA-ii).  The binarization multi-objective model is applied to convex polygons, concave polygons and fields with complex terrain.  The experiments demonstrated that the proposed KPPM-NSGA-ii can obtain better results than the unplanned path method whether the optimization of pesticide consumption or energy consumption is preferred.  Hence, the proposed algorithm can save energy and pesticide usage and improve the efficiency in practical applications.

Rice is one of the most important crops worldwide. Diseases of the rice plant can drastically reduce crop yield and even lead to complete loss of production. Early diagnosis can reduce the severity and help efforts to establish effective treatment and reduce the usage of pesticides. Traditional machine learning approaches have already been employed for automatic diagnosis. However, they heavily rely on manual preprocessing of images and handcrafted features, which is challenging, time-consuming, and may require domain expertise. Recently, a single end-to-end deep learning (DL)-based approach was employed to diagnose rice diseases. However, it is not highly robust, nor is it generalizable to every dataset. Hence, we propose a novel end-to-end training of convolutional neural network (CNN) and attention (E2ETCA) ensemble framework that fuses the features of two CNN-based state-of-the-art (SOTA) models along with those of an attention-based vision transformer model. These fused features are utilized for diagnosis by the addition of an extra fully connected layer with softmax. The whole procedure is performed end-to-end, which is very important for real-world applications. Additionally, we feed the extracted features into a traditional machine learning approach support vector machine for classification and further analysis. To verify the effectiveness of our proposed E2ETCA framework, we demonstrate it on three publicly available datasets: the Mendeley Rice Leaf Disease Image Samples dataset, the Kaggle Rice Diseases Image dataset, the Bangladesh Rice Research Institute dataset, and a combination of these three datasets. On the basis of various evaluation metrics (accuracy, precision, recall, and F1-score), our proposed  E2ETCA framework exhibits superior performance to existing SOTA approaches for rice disease diagnosis, which can also be generalizable in similar other domains.

Previous studies have revealed the miR164 family and the miR164-targeted NAC transcription factor genes in rice (Oryza sativa) and Arabidopsis that play versatile roles in developmental processes and stress responses.  In wheat (Triticum aestivum L.), we found nine genetic loci of tae-miR164 (tae-MIR164 a to i) producing two mature sequences that down-regulate the expression of three newly identified target genes of TaNACs (TaNAC1, TaNAC11, and TaNAC14) by the cleavage of the respective mRNAs.  Overexpression of tae-miR164 or one of its target genes (TaNAC14) demonstrated that the miR164-TaNAC14 module greatly affects root growth and development and stress (drought and salinity) tolerance in wheat seedlings, and TaNAC14 promotes root growth and development in wheat seedlings and enhances drought tolerance, while tae-miR164 inhibits root development and reduces drought and salinity tolerance by down-regulating the expression of TaNAC14.  These findings identify the miR164-TaNAC14 module as well as other tae-miR164-regulated genes which can serve as new genetic resources for stress-resistance wheat breeding.

The fully mulched ridge–furrow (FMRF) system has been widely used on the semi-arid Loess Plateau of China due to its high maize (Zea mays L.) productivity and rainfall use efficiency.  However, high outputs under this system led to a depletion of soil moisture and soil nutrients, which reduces its sustainability in the long run.  Therefore, it is necessary to optimize the system for the sustainable development of agriculture.  The development, yield-increasing mechanisms, negative impacts, optimization, and their relations in the FMRF system are reviewed in this paper.  We suggest using grain and forage maize varieties instead of regular maize; mulching plastic film in autumn or leaving the mulch after maize harvesting until the next spring, and then removing the old film and mulching new film; combining reduced/no-tillage with straw return; utilizing crop rotation or intercropping with winter canola (Brassica campestris L.), millet (Setaria italica), or oilseed flax (Linum usitatissimum L.); reducing nitrogen fertilizer and partially replacing chemical fertilizer with organic fertilizer; using biodegradable or weather-resistant film; and implementing mechanized production.  These integrations help to establish an environmentally friendly, high quality, and sustainable agricultural system, promote high-quality development of dryland farming, and create new opportunities for agricultural development in the semi-arid Loess Plateau.

African swine fever virus (ASFV) is a lethal pathogen that causes severe threats to the global swine industry and it has already had catastrophic socio-economic effects.  To date, no licensed prophylactic vaccine exists.  Limited knowledge exists about the major immunogens of ASFV and the epitope mapping of the key antigens.  As such, there is a considerable requirement to understand the functional monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) and the epitope mapping may be of utmost importance in our understanding of immune responses and designing improved vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics.  In this study, we generated an ASFV antibody phage-display library from ASFV convalescent swine PBMCs, further screened a specific ASFV major capsid protein (p72) single-chain antibody and fused with an IgG Fc fragment (scFv-83-Fc), which is a specific recognition antibody against ASFV Pig/HLJ/2018 strain.  Using the scFv-83-Fc mAb, we selected a conserved epitope peptide (²²¹MTGYKH²²⁶) of p72 retrieved from a phage-displayed random peptide library.  Moreover, flow cytometry and cell uptake experiments demonstrated that the epitope peptide can significantly promote BMDCs maturation in vitro and could be effectively uptaken by DCs, which indicated its potential application in vaccine and diagnostic reagent development.  Overall, this study provided a valuable platform for identifying targets for ASFV vaccine development, as well as to facilitate the optimization design of subunit vaccine and diagnostic reagents

In Bacillus thuringenesis (Bt) transgenic cotton, the cotton boll has the lowest insecticidal protein content when compared to the other organs.  The present study investigated the effects of amino acid spray application at the peak flowering stage on the cotton boll Bt toxin concentration and yield formation.  Boll protein synthesis and carbohydrate conversion were also studied to reveal the fundamental mechanism.  Three treatments (i.e., CK, the untreated control; LA1, five amino acids; LA2, 21 amino acids) were applied to two Bt cultivars of G. hirsutum (i.e., the hybrid Sikang 3 and the conventional Sikang 1) in the cotton-growing seasons during 2017 and 2018.  Amino acid spray application at the peak flowering stage resulted in an increase of 5.2–16.4% in the boll Bt protein concentration and an increase of 5.5–11.3% in the seed cotton yield, but there was no difference between the two amino acid treatments.  In addition, amino acid applications led to increases in the amino acid content, soluble protein content, glutamate pyruvate transaminase (GPT) activity, glutamate oxaloacetate transaminase (GOT) activity, glucose content, fructose content and soluble acid invertase (SAI) activity.  This study also found that Bt protein content, enhanced boll number and the weight of opened bolls were closely related to carbon and nitrogen metabolism.  The Bt protein content had significant linear positive correlations with amino acid and soluble protein contents.  Enhanced boll number had significant linear positive correlations with the GPT and GOT activities from 15–25 days after flowering (DAF).  The weight of opened bolls from 55–65 DAF had a significant linear positive correlation with the SAI activity.  These results indicate that the enhancement of boll protein synthesis and carbohydrate conversion by amino acid application resulted in a simultaneous increase in the boll Bt protein concentration and cotton lint yield.

Excessive use of organophosphate pesticides (OP), such as dichlorvos, in farming system poses a threat to human health through potential contamination of environment.  To date, biodegradation has been prospected most promising approach to eliminate environmental OP residues.  Trichoderma species as a biological control microorganism is often exposed to the chemical pesticides applied in environments, so it is necessary to understand the mechanism of degradation of dichlorvos by Trichoderma.  In this study, dichlorvos significantly inhibited the growth, sporulation and pigmentation of T. atroviride T23, and the dichlorvos degradation activity of T23 required the initial induction effect of dichlorvos and the culture conditions, including the nutrient and pH values of the medium.  Various changed primary and secondary metabolites released from T23 in the presence of dichlorvos were speculated as the energy and antioxidants for the strain itself to tolerate dichlorvos stress.  The results showed that T23 could produce a series of enzymes, especially the intracellular enzymes, to degrade dichlorvos.  The activities of the intracellular enzyme generated by T23 were differentially changed along time course and especially relied on initial dichlorvos concentration, ammonium sulfate and phosphate added in the medium.  In conclusion, some dichlorvos-induced chemical degradation related enzymes of T23 were proved to be involved in the degradation of dichlorvos.

Flesh firmness (FF) is an important and complex trait for melon breeders and consumers.  However, the genetic mechanism underlying FF is unclear.  Here, a soft fruit melon (P5) and a hard fruit melon (P10) were crossed to generate F₂, and the FF and fruit-related traits were recorded for two years.  By performing quantitative trait locus (QTL) specific-locus amplified fragment (SLAF) (QTL-SLAF) sequencing and molecular marker-linkage analysis, 112 844 SLAF markers were identified, and 5 919 SNPs were used to construct a genetic linkage map with a total genetic distance of 1 356.49 cM.  Ten FF- and fruit-related QTLs were identified.  Consistent QTLs were detected for fruit length (FL) and fruit diameter (FD) in both years, and QTLs for single fruit weight (SFW) were detected on two separate chromosomes in both years.  For FF, the consistent major locus (ff2.1) was located in a 0.17-Mb candidate region on chromosome 2.  Using 429 F₂ individuals derived from a cross between P5 and P10, we refined the ff2.1 locus to a 28.3-kb region harboring three functional genes.  These results provide not only a new candidate QTL for melon FF breeding but also a theoretical foundation for research on the mechanism underlying melon gene function.

Fertilization is an effective technique to improve soil fertility and increase crop yield. The long-term effects of different fertilizers on soil considerably vary. Over 38 consecutive years of different fertilization positioning experiments in a double cropping rice field of Qiyang Red Soil Experimental Station, seven different fertilization treatments including CK (no fertilization), NPK (nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium fertilizer), M (cow manure), NPKM (nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium with cow manure), NPM (nitrogen and phosphorus with cow manure), NKM (nitrogen and potassium with cow manure), and PKM (phosphorus and potassium with cow manure) were applied to study the effects on rice yield, soil fertility, and nutrient apparent balance in a paddy field. The results showed that the annual average yields of rice in NPKM, NPM, NKM, PKM, M, NPK and CK treatments ranged from 6 214 to 11 562 kg ha^–1. Yields under longterm organic and inorganic treatments (NPKM, NPM, NKM and PKM) were 22.58, 15.35, 10.53 and 4.41%, respectively, greater than under the NPK treatment. Soil organic carbon (SOC), total nitrogen (TN), available nitrogen (AN) and available potassium (AK) concentration with long-term organic and inorganic treatment (NPKM, NPM, NKM and PKM) were significantly higher than in inorganic fertilizer (NPK) treatments. Soil total phosphorus (TP) and available phosphorus (AP) contentration with organic fertilizer combined with inorganic N and P fertilizer treatment (NPKM, NPM and PKM) were significantly higher than with inorganic fertilizer alone (NPK treatments). The average annual rice yield (11 562 kg ha–1), SOC (20.88 g kg–1), TN (2.30 g kg^–1), TP (0.95 g kg^–1), TK (22.50 g kg^–1) and AP (38.94 mg kg^–1) concentrations were the highest in the NPKM treatment. The soil AN concentration (152.40 mg kg^–1) and AK contentration (151.00 mg kg^–1) were the highest in the NKM treatment. N and P application led to a surplus of nitrogen and phosphorus in the soil, but NPKM treatment effectively reduced the surplus compared with other treatments. Soils under all treatments were deficient in potassium. Correlation analysis showed that SOC, TN, AN, TP, and AP contentration was significantly correlated with rice yield; the correlation coefficients were 0.428, 0.496, 0.518, 0.501, and 0.438, respectively. This study showed that the combined application of N, P, and K with cow manure had important effects on rice yield and soil fertility, but balanced application of N, P, and K with cow manure was required.

The co-utilization of green manure (GM) and rice straw (RS) in paddy fields has been widely applied as an effective practice in southern China. However, its effects on soil aggregate and soil organic carbon (SOC) stability remain unclear. In the present study, the effect of GM, RS, and co-utilization of GM and RS on particle size distribution of soil aggregates and SOC density fractions were measured in a field experiment. The experiment included six treatments, i.e., winter fallow (WF) without RS return (Ctrl), WF with 50% RS return (1/2RS), WF with 100% RS return (RS), GM without RS return (GM), GM with 50% RS return (GM1/2RS) and GM with 100% RS return (GMRS). The results showed that the proportion of small macro-aggregates (0.25–2 mm) and the mean weight diameter (MWD) of aggregates in the GMRS treatment was greater (by 18.9 and 3.41%, respectively) than in the RS treatment, while the proportion of silt+clay particles (<0.053 mm) was lower (by 14.4%). The concentration of SOC in microaggregates (0.053–0.25 mm) and silt+clay particles was higher in the GMRS treatment than in GM and RS treatments individually. The concentration and proportion of free light organic carbon (fLOC) in aggregates of various particle sizes and bulk soil was greater in the GMRS treatment than the RS treatment, whereas the concentration and proportion of mineral-associated organic carbon in small macroaggregates, microaggregates, and bulk was lower in the GMRS treatment than in the RS treatment. The proportion of intra-aggregate particulate organic carbon (iPOC) was greater in the GMRS treatment than in GM treatment. The GMRS treatment had strong positive effects on iPOC in small macroaggregates, suggesting that SOC was transferred from fLOC to iPOC. In conclusion, co-utilizing green manure and rice straw cultivated the SOC pool by increasing the concentration of fLOC and improved soil carbon stability by promoting the sequestration of organic carbon in iPOC as a form of physical protection.

This study investigated the effects of dioscorea opposite waste (DOW) on the growth performance, blood parameters, rumen fermentation and rumen microbiota of weaned lambs.  Sixty healthy weaned Small-Tailed Han lambs (male, (22.68±2.56) kg initially) were used as the experimental animals.  Four levels of concentrate: 0 (control, CON), 10% (DOW1), 15% (DOW2) and 20% (DOW3), were replaced with DOW in the basal diet as experimental treatments.  The results showed that lambs fed the DOW2 diet had a higher (P<0.05) dry matter intake (DMI) than the other groups.  There was no significant difference (P>0.05) among DOW groups in average daily weight gain (ADG), and replacing concentrate with DOW linearly or quadratically increased (P<0.05) the ADG, while lambs fed the DOW2 diet showed greater (P<0.05) ADG than the CON group.  The relative plasma concentration of growth hormone (GH), insulin like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) and insulin were affected by DOW, replacing concentrate with DOW linearly or quadratically (P<0.05) enhanced the plasma concentration of GH, IGF-1 and insulin, which was significantly higher (P<0.05) in the DOW2 group than in the CON, DOW1 and DOW3 groups.  In addition, the DOW treatment showed a lower (P<0.05) concentration of blood urea nitrogen (BUN) than the CON group.  Replacing concentrate with DOW quadratically decreased (P<0.05) the ruminal ammonia nitrogen (NH₃-N) and increased (P<0.05) the total of volatile fatty acids (TVFAs) at 0 and 4 h after feeding as well as linearly decreased (P<0.05) the NH₃-N at 8 h after feeding.  Replacing concentrate with DOW linearly decreased (P<0.05) the propionate and increased the aceate before feeding, and linearly decreased (P<0.05) propionate and quadratically increased (P<0.05) the aceate at 4 and 8 h after feeding.  Lambs fed the DOW2 diet increased the phylum Firmicutes and genera Succiniclasticum and Ruminococcus_1 groups, whereas decreased (P<0.05) the relative abundance of phylum Deferribacteres and genera intestinimonas and Ruminiclostridium.  In summary, replacing the concentrate with 15% DOW was beneficial for improving the rumen fermentation and ADG by increasing the DMI and modulating the rumen microbial community.

Plant architecture and leaf color are important factors influencing cotton fiber yield. In this study, based on genetic analysis, stem paraffin sectioning, and phytohormone treatments, we showed that the dwarf-red (DR) cotton mutant is a gibberellin-sensitive mutant caused by a mutation in a single dominant locus, designated GhDR. Using bulked segregant analysis (BSA) and genotyping by target sequencing (GBTS) approaches, we located the causative mutation to a ~197-kb genetic interval on chromosome A09 containing 25 annotated genes. Based on gene annotation and expression changes between the mutant and normal plants, GH_A09G2280 was considered to be the best candidate gene responsible for the dwarf and red mutant phenotypes. A 2-nucleotide deletion was found in the coding region of GhDR/GH_A09G2280 in the DR mutant, which caused a frameshift and truncation of GhDR. GhDR is a homolog of Arabidopsis AtBBX24, and encodes a B-box zinc finger protein. The frameshift deletion eliminated the C-terminal nuclear localization domain and the VP domain of GhDR, and altered its subcellular localization. A comparative transcriptome analysis demonstrated downregulation of the key genes involved in gibberellin biosynthesis and the signaling transduction network, as well as upregulation of the genes related to gibberellin degradation and the anthocyanin biosynthetic pathway in the DR mutant. The results of this study