Cellular retinoic acid-binding protein 1 (CRABP1) is a well-conserved member of cytosolic lipid-binding protein family. It is an important modulator of retinoic acid signaling. Long serial analysis of gene expression (LongSAGE) analysis suggested that CRABP1 gene was differentially expressed during prenatal skeletal muscle development in porcine. Here, we obtained the full-length coding region sequence and genomic sequence of the porcine CRABP1 gene and analyzed its genomic structures. Subsequently, we examined CRABP1 chromosome assignment using INRA-University of Minnesota 7 000 porcine radiation hybrid panel (IMpRH) and explored its tissue distribution in adult Tongcheng pigs and dynamical expression profiles in prenatal skeletal muscle (33, 65 and 90 days post coitus, dpc) from Landrace (lean-type) (described as L33, L65 and L90) and Tongcheng pigs (obese-type) (described as T33, T65 and T90). The CRABP1 gene was mapped to chromosome 7q11-q23 and closely linked to the microsatellite marker SWR1928. Quantitative real-time PCR showed that CRABP1 mRNA was highly expressed in lung and stomach, moderately expressed in placenta and uterus, and weakly expressed in other tissues. Moreover, CRABP1 gene was down-regulated during prenatal skeletal muscle development in both Landrace and Tongcheng pigs and it was expressed much higher in T33 than L33. Two single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were detected by sequencing and mass spectrometry methods, allele frequency analysis indicated that g. 281 (G>A) and g. 2992 (G>A) were deviated from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium in the Landrace and DLY (Duroc×(Landrace×Yorkshire)) pig breeds.

The introduction of reduced height (Rht) genes Rht-B1b and Rht-D1b led to impressive increases in wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) yields during the Green Revolution. In the present study, the dynamic elongation of peduncle in a set of near-isogenic lines (NILs) carrying different Rht alleles (Rht-B1b, Rht-D1b, Rht-B1c, Rht-D1b+Rht-B1b, and Rht-D1b+Rht-B1c) were investigated. The reduction of the final length of peduncle in NILs was dependent mainly on the elongation rate, which was reduced by Rht genes, during rapid elongation phase. Resin sections showed that Rht genes strongly reduced the cell extension in peduncle. The expression of expansin genes, which mediate cell wall loosening and leading to cell expansion, were analysed by using realtime quantitative PCR (qPCR). Among the 23 possible wheat expansin genes, 17 were expressed in the peduncle. The spatial distribution of expression was further analysed for five expansins that showed high expression levels in the peduncles of Rht lines. Compared to wild type plants, the incorporation of Rht-D1b allele decreased about 37 and 80% of the expression levels of ExpA7 and ExpA3 in elongation zone, respectively. The presence Rht-B1c dwarfing genes, however, produced 53% reduction in the expression level of ExpA7, and seriously decreased about 70% of ExpB9 expression. Although the expression levels of five genes exhibited variability among the lines, an expansin gene, ExpB2, showed its expression level highly associated with the cell elongation rate in peduncle of different Rht lines.

Simple sequence repeats (SSR) have been widely used as molecular markers due to their abundance and high polymorphism. However, up to now, the SSR markers had not been developed in the obligate biotrophic phytopathogenic fungus, Blumeria graminis f.sp. tritici. From (AC)10 and (AG)10 enriched genomic libraries for Bgt, 25 primer pairs were designed using the FIASCO (fast isolation by AFLP of sequences containing repeats) protocol. Five primer pairs exhibited polymorphism with allelic diversity from two to seven alleles and produced 29 alleles in a survey of 90 isolates collected from six provinces (cities) in China, while the others displayed monomorphic. Levels of observed heterozygosity ranged from 0.000-0.044 (mean 0.025) and expected heterozygosity ranged from 0.297-0.816 (mean 0.538). These molecular markers provide a novel source to genetic diversity assays and to genetic and physical mapping of Bgt. SSR markers of Bgt need to be further explored.

Dairy industry has become an increasingly important enterprise in China as people’s dietary preferences and composition have changed dramatically with rapid economic development in the past several decades. A number of problems, however, exist in China’s relatively young dairy industry, including the imbalanced allocation of profits throughout the dairy supply chain. One of the root causes of the melamine infant powered milk scandal in 2008 was the unfair profit allocation mechanism in dairy supply chain. The revenue sharing contract approach has proven to be effective in generating market shares and total profits. In this study, we apply the three-stage revenue sharing contract model of Giannoccaro and Pontrandolfo (2004) in an analysis of dairy supply chain to explore its problems in profit allocation and possible solutions to them. The analysis was conducted by a case study of Hohhot, often called as “milk capital of China”. Our results show that the current profit distribution in the dairy supply chain is not balanced: the supermarket’s profit>farmer’s profit>manufacturer’s profit. Under the revenue sharing contract setting, the dairy industry’s total profit increased by 12.49%. By exploring different parameters in the revenue sharing contract model, we have found that a win-win situation can be created among all the members of the supply chain. In dairy supply chain, the ratio of the revenue reserved for the supermarket itself is equal or greater than 47% and the ratio of the revenue reserved for the manufacturer itself is between 46.4 and 50.2%. The values of the parameters that generate a sustainable or win-win situation are related to the bargaining position in the dairy supply chain. The revenue sharing contract has proven to be effective and desirable by all the dairy chain partners in dairy supply chain. The results of this study provide relevant information for improving the dairy supply chain structure and the revenue sharing contract model can be applied to other industries, sectors and regions.

Since maize is one of the most important cereal crops in the world, establishment of an efficient genetic transformation system is critical for its improvement. In the current study, several elite corn lines were tested for suitability of Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated transformation by using immature embryos as explants. Infection ability and efficiency of transformation of A. tumefaciens sp. strains EHA105 and LBA4404, different heat treatment times of immature embryos before infection, influence of L-cysteine addition in co-cultivation medium after transformation, and how different ways of selection and cultivation influence the efficiency of transformation were compared. Glyphosate-resistant gene 2mG2-EPSPS was transformed into several typical maize genotypes including 78599, Zong 31 and BA, under the optimum conditions. Results showed that the hypervirulent Agrobacterium tumefaciens sp. strain EHA105 was more infectious than LBA4404. Inclusion of L-cysteine (100 mg L-1) in co-cultivation medium, and heating of the immature embryos for 3 min prior to infection led to a significant increase in the transformation efficiency. Growth in resting medium for 4-10 d and delaying selection was beneficial to the survival of resistant calli. During induction of germination, adding a high concentration of 6-BA (5 mg L-1) and a low concentration of 2,4-D (0.2 mg L-1) to regeneration medium significantly enhanced germination percentage. Using the optimized transformation procedure, more than 800 transgenic plants were obtained from 78599, Zong 31 and BA. By spraying herbicide glyphosate on leaves of transgenic lines, we identified 66 primary glyphosate-resistant plants. The transformation efficiency was 8.2%. PCR and Southern-blot analyses confirmed the integration of the transgenes in the maize genome.