Plant growth requires the integration of internal and external cues, perceived and transduced into a developmental programme of cell division, elongation and wall thickening. Mechanical forces contribute to this regulation, and thigmomorphogenesis typically includes reducing stem height, increasing stem diameter, and a canonical transcriptomic response. We present data on a bZIP transcription factor involved in this process in grasses. Brachypodium distachyon SECONDARY WALL INTERACTING bZIP (SWIZ) protein translocated into the nucleus following mechanostimulation. Classical touch-responsive genes were upregulated in B. distachyon roots following touch, including significant induction of the glycoside hydrolase 17 family, which may be unique to grass thigmomorphogenesis. SWIZ protein binding to an E-box variant in exons and introns was associated with immediate activation followed by repression of gene expression. SWIZ overexpression resulted in plants with reduced stem and root elongation. These data further define plant touch-responsive transcriptomics and physiology, offering insights into grass mechanotranduction dynamics.

Chinese sprangletop [Leptochloa chinensis (L.) Nees] is one grass weed severely affecting rice (Oryza sativa L.) growth in paddies in China. Cyhalofop-butyl is the main herbicide used to control grass weeds in Chinese paddy fields, especially for controlling L. chinensis; however, L. chinensis has evolved resistance to cyhalofop-butyl due to continuous and extensive application. To investigate cyhalofop-butyl resistance levels and mechanisms in L. chinensis in some of the Chinese rice areas, 66 field populations were collected and treated with cyhalofop-butyl. Of these tested populations, 10 showed a high level of resistance to cyhalofop-butyl; the 50% effective dose ranged within 108.4 to 1,443.5 g ai ha−1 with resistance index values of 9.1 to 121.8 when compared with the susceptible population. Acetyl-coenzyme A carboxylase genes (ACCase) of susceptible and all 10 resistant populations were amplified and sequenced. Among them, Ile-1781-Leu, Trp-2027-Cys, Trp-2027-Ser, and Ile-2041-Asn mutations were found in five resistant populations. No known resistance-related mutations were found in the other five resistant populations, indicating that resistance to cyhalofop-butyl in these populations was likely to be endowed by non–target site resistance mechanisms. Notably, the Ile-1781-Leu and Trp-2027-Cys substitutions have previously been reported, but this is the first report of Trp-2027-Ser and Ile-2041-Asn mutations in L. chinensis. Furthermore, three derived cleaved amplified polymorphic sequence methods were developed to rapidly detect these mutations in L. chinensis.

In recent years, there has been an increasing interest in detecting disease-related rare variants in sequencing studies. Numerous studies have shown that common variants can only explain a small proportion of the phenotypic variance for complex diseases. More and more evidence suggests that some of this missing heritability can be explained by rare variants. Considering the importance of rare variants, researchers have proposed a considerable number of methods for identifying the rare variants associated with complex diseases. Extensive research has been carried out on testing the association between rare variants and dichotomous, continuous or ordinal traits. So far, however, there has been little discussion about the case in which both genotypes and phenotypes are ordinal variables. This paper introduces a method based on the γ-statistic, called OV-RV, for examining disease-related rare variants when both genotypes and phenotypes are ordinal. At present, little is known about the asymptotic distribution of the γ-statistic when conducting association analyses for rare variants. One advantage of OV-RV is that it provides a robust estimation of the distribution of the γ-statistic by employing the permutation approach proposed by Fisher. We also perform extensive simulations to investigate the numerical performance of OV-RV under various model settings. The simulation results reveal that OV-RV is valid and efficient; namely, it controls the type I error approximately at the pre-specified significance level and achieves greater power at the same significance level. We also apply OV-RV for rare variant association studies of diastolic blood pressure.

Asia minor bluegrass (AmB) is a major weed impacting rapeseed production in Dongting Lake District, China. Growth chamber experiments were conducted to determine the influence of environmental factors on germination and emergence of AmB. The optimum constant temperature for germination was around 20 C. Seeds showed germination percentages above 60% under 22/15 and 24/19 C day/night temperature regimes. Seeds could germinate in the dark, but light exposure significantly enhanced the germination percentage. More than 50% of seeds germinated over a pH range between 4 and 10. Seeds were highly sensitive to osmotic stress, and germination was completely inhibited at an osmotic potential of −0.4 MPa, indicating that it was favored by a moist environment. Increasing salinity reduced germination of AmB seeds from 58% at 0 mM to 13% at 80 mM NaCl. The highest seedling emergence (62%) was observed when seeds were placed on the soil surface, and no seedlings emerged from seeds placed at a depth of 5 cm. This work shows that the climate and soil conditions in Dongting Lake District are suitable for AmB seed germination and that no-till fields, where seeds remain on the soil surface, promote the successful establishment of the weed.

A solution-processed method is developed to fabricate fully transparent resistive random access memory (RRAM) devices with a configuration of FTO/ZrO2/ITO, where the zirconium dioxide (ZrO2) layer was firstly deposited on fluorine tin oxide (FTO) substrate by sol-gel and then indium tin oxide (ITO) films were deposited on ZrO2 layer by sol-gel as the top electrodes.The solution processed FTO/ZrO2/ITO based RRAM devices show the fully transparency and excellent bipolar resistance switching behaviors. The resistance ratio between high and low resistance states was more than 10, and more than 100 switching cycles and good data retention and multilevel resistive switching have been demonstrated.

The transformation plateau on the strain-stress curve is the characteristic of superelasticity of bulk shape memory alloys upon tension/compression loading. However, recent studies show that such transformation plateau is hard to see when the sample size of shape memory alloys decreases to submicrons. In order to see what happened in such small scale samples during loading, in-situ compression test has been done with single crystal Cu-14.2Al-4.0Ni (wt %) submicron pillars. Our in-situ observation during compression demonstrates that the stress-induced martensitic transformation indeed occurs in submicron pillars, but is not suppressed. Furthermore, the transformation proceeds in a sequential nucleation-growth-nucleation dominated mode, but not the transient way like that in bulk materials. As a result, the stress keeps increasing throughout the transformation and no obvious transformation plateau can be detected. However, the underlying reason for such contrast transformation behaviors between our submicron pillars and bulk materials still needs further investigation.

A novel ZnO/TiO2 assorted photoelectrode for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) is proposed. The impacts of the ZnO/TiO2 assorted photoelectrode on the photovoltaic performance of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) were investigated. The measurements of the light transmission spectra showed the higher transmittance through ZnO/FTO than through FTO during the effective wavelength region of 536nm˜800nm for DSSCs, indicating that ZnO/TiO2 assorted photoelectrode is beneficial for the photovoltaic performance of DSSCs. The measurements on the photovoltaic characteristics of the DSSC cell indicate that the inserted ZnO layer can cause the increased open circuit voltage (Voc) more than 70 mV and fill factor (FF) but the decreased short circuit current. The enhanced Voc and FF could be attributed to the suppressed the recombination of photon-generated carriers between the ZnO/TiO2 assorted photoelectrode and electrolyte (dye) compared to TiO2 photoelectrode. However, the additional series resistance of inserted ZnO layer causes the reduced short circuit current. The optimized conversion efficiency can be achieved in the DSSC with ZnO/TiO2 assorted photoelectrode by using low series resistance of ZnO layer.

The clogging of the Submerged Entry Nozzle (SEN) duringbillet continuous casting of mid-carbon steel is studied.Clogging materials and inclusions in steel samples taken atladles, tundish and billets are investigated. The total oxygen onthe whole section of the billet is measured. Steel cleanliness atunsteady casting states, including cast start, ladle change, SENchange, cast end, and the special unsteady pouring periodinduced by SEN clogging, are studied. Fluid flow and inclusionmotion and entrapment to SEN surface are also simulated.