Genetics and Genomics Commons^™

Ranking And Clustering Of Drosophila Olfactory Receptors Using Mathematical Morphology, Jayanta Kumar Das, Pabitra Pal Choudhury, Neelambuj Chaturvedi, Mohd Tayyab, Sk Sarif Hassan

Journal Articles

This article introduces an alignment-free clustering method in order to cluster all the 66 DORs sequentially diverse protein sequences. Two different methods are discussed: one is utilizing twenty standard amino acids (without grouping) and another one is using chemical grouping of amino acids (with grouping). Two grayscale images (representing two protein sequences by order pair frequency matrices) are compared to find the similarity index using morphology technique. We could achieve the correlation coefficients of 0.9734 and 0.9403 for without and with grouping methods respectively with the ClustalW result in the ND5 dataset, which are much better than some of the …

Host Genetics And Geography Influence Microbiome Composition In The Sponge Ircinia Campana, Sarah M. Griffiths, Rachael E. Antwis, Luca Lenzi, Anita Lucaci, Donald C. Behringer, Mark J. Butler, Richard F. Preziosi

Biological Sciences Faculty Publications

1. Marine sponges are host to large, diverse communities of microorganisms. These microbiomes are distinct among sponge species and from seawater bacterial communities, indicating a key role of host identity in shaping its resident microbial community. However, the factors governing intraspecific microbiome variability are underexplored, and may shed light on the evolutionary and ecological relationships between host and microbiome.

2. Here, we examined the influence of genetic variation and geographic location on the composition of the Ircinia campana microbiome.

3. We developed new microsatellite markers to genotype I. campana from two locations in the Florida Keys, USA, and characterised their …

Engineering Mankind: The Sociopolitical Impact Of Eugenics In America, Megan Lee

Voces Novae

During the early twentieth century, the American eugenics movement prospered, spreading its influence within the sociopolitical framework of the United States. The notion of eugenics – the control of human breeding to increase desirable traits, was extensively propagated through the creation of sterilization laws and public programs. Eventually, the public came to view eugenics as a necessity in order to preserve and improve the quality of mankind for the future.

Phospholipases D: Making Sense Of Redundancy And Duplication, Andrew J. Morris

Internal Medicine Faculty Publications

Why have two genes when one would suffice? Evolutionary pressure means that biology, unlike government, is generally intolerant of wasted effort. Therefore, when multiple genes exist presumably they are there to provide some benefit to the organism even if that benefit is not immediately obvious to us scientists. A recent report from Raghu and colleagues (Biosci. Rep. (2018) 38, pii: BSR20181690) [1] sheds some light on one possible reason for the existence of two Phospholipases D genes in chordates when only one is present in invertebrates.

Unraveling The Neurogenin/Ngn-1 Gene Regulatory Network Of C. Elegans Using Classical Genetics And Comparative Transcriptomics, Elyse Christensen

Master of Science in Integrative Biology Theses

Proper nervous system development is required for an organism’s survival and function. Defects in neurogenesis have been linked to neurodevelopmental disorders such as schizophrenia and autism spectrum disorders. Understanding the gene regulatory networks that orchestrate neural development, specifically cascades of proneural transcription factors, can better elucidate which genes are most essential in governing early neurogenesis. Neurogenins are a family of such factors that are both sufficient and necessary for the development of neural sub-types in mice, primarily through the regulation of other factors, particularly NeuroD. The objective of this study was to evaluate previously established regulatory targets of neurogenin(ngn-1 …

Microrna Regulation Of Epigenetic Modifiers In Breast Cancer, Brock Humphries, Zhishan Wang, Chengfeng Yang

Toxicology and Cancer Biology Faculty Publications

Epigenetics refers to the heritable changes in gene expression without a change in the DNA sequence itself. Two of these major changes include aberrant DNA methylation as well as changes to histone modification patterns. Alterations to the epigenome can drive expression of oncogenes and suppression of tumor suppressors, resulting in tumorigenesis and cancer progression. In addition to modifications of the epigenome, microRNA (miRNA) dysregulation is also a hallmark for cancer initiation and metastasis. Advances in our understanding of cancer biology demonstrate that alterations in the epigenome are not only a major cause of miRNA dysregulation in cancer, but that miRNAs …

Cross-Species Genome-Wide Analysis Reveals Molecular And Functional Diversity Of The Unconventional Interferon-Ω Subtype, Lauren E. Shields, Jordan Jennings, Qinfang Liu, Jinhwa Lee, Wenjun Ma, Frank Blecha, Laura C. Miller, Yongming Sang

Agricultural and Environmental Sciences Faculty Research

Innate immune interferons (IFNs), particularly type I IFNs, are primary mediators regulating animal antiviral, antitumor, and cell-proliferative activity. These antiviral cytokines have evolved remarkable molecular and functional diversity to confront ever-evolving viral threats and physiological regulation. We have annotated IFN gene families across 110 animal genomes, and showed that IFN genes, after originating in jawed fishes, had several significant evolutionary surges in vertebrate species of amphibians, bats and ungulates, particularly pigs and cattle. For example, pigs have the largest but still expanding type I IFN family consisting of nearly 60 IFN-coding genes that encode seven IFN subtypes including multigene subtypes …

Drought And Freezing Vulnerability Of The Isolated Hybrid Aspen Populus X Smithii Relative To Its Parental Species, P. Tremuloides And P. Grandidentata, Nicholas J. Deacon, Jake J. Grossman, Jeannine Cavender-Bares

Aspen Bibliography

Aim

We assessed the vulnerability of an isolated, relictual Pleistocene hybrid aspen population of conservation interest (Populus x. smithii ) and the nearest populations of its parent species (Populus grandidentata and Populus tremuloides ) to springtime post‐bud break freezing and growing season drought stress. Response to these stressors in the three taxa was compared in terms of avoidance and tolerance.

Location

North American Midwest; USA.

Methods

Unique genets from the hybrid Niobrara River population and from the two parental populations were propagated in a common garden from rhizome cuttings. We tracked their phenology before and after bud break …

The Yeast Protein Mam33 Functions In The Assembly Of The Mitochondrial Ribosome, Gabrielle A Hillman, Michael F Henry

Rowan-Virtua School of Osteopathic Medicine Departmental Research

Mitochondrial ribosomes are functionally specialized for the synthesis of several essential inner membrane proteins of the respiratory chain. Although remarkable progress has been made toward understanding the structure of mitoribosomes, the pathways and factors that facilitate their biogenesis remain largely unknown. The long unstructured domains of unassembled ribosomal proteins are highly prone to misfolding and often require dedicated chaperones to prevent aggregation. To date, chaperones that ensure safe delivery to the assembling ribosome have not been identified in the mitochondrion. In this study, a respiratory synthetic lethality screen revealed a role for an evolutionarily conserved mitochondrial matrix protein called Mam33 …

Nrxn1 Deletion And Exposure To Methylmercury Increase Astrocyte Differentiation By Different Notch-Dependent Transcriptional Mechanisms, Marilena Raciti, Salma Jahan, Stefan Spulber, Giulia Gaudenzi, Zahra Khalajzeyqami, Mirko Conti, Britt-Marie Anderlid, Anna Falk, Ola Hermans, Sandra Ceccatelli

Centre for Regenerative Medicine & Stem Cell Research

Controversial evidence points to a possible involvement of methylmercury (MeHg) in the etiopathogenesis of autism spectrum disorders (ASD). In the present study, we used human neuroepithelial stem cells from healthy donors and from an autistic patient bearing a bi-allelic deletion in the gene encoding for NRXN1 to evaluate whether MeHg would induce cellular changes comparable to those seen in cells derived from the ASD patient. In healthy cells, a subcytotoxic concentration of MeHg enhanced astroglial differentiation similarly to what observed in the diseased cells (N1), as shown by the number of GFAP positive cells and immunofluorescence signal intensity. In both …

Genome Of The Tropical Plant Marchantia Inflexa: Implications For Sex Chromosome Evolution And Dehydration Tolerance, Rose A. Marks, Jeramiah J. Smith, Quentin Cronk, Christopher J. Grassa, D. Nicholas Mcletchie

Biology Faculty Publications

We present a draft genome assembly for the tropical liverwort, Marchantia inflexa, which adds to a growing body of genomic resources for bryophytes and provides an important perspective on the evolution and diversification of land plants. We specifically address questions related to sex chromosome evolution, sexual dimorphisms, and the genomic underpinnings of dehydration tolerance. This assembly leveraged the recently published genome of related liverwort, M. polymorpha, to improve scaffolding and annotation, aid in the identification of sex-linked sequences, and quantify patterns of sequence differentiation within Marchantia. We find that genes on sex chromosomes are under greater …

Divergent Transcriptional Regulation Of Suppressors Of Cytokine Signaling Genes In Adipocytes, Paula Mota De Sa

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The Janus Kinase - Signal Transducer and Activator of Transcription (JAK-STAT) signaling pathway transduces several signals crucial for development and homeostasis. Suppressors of cytokine signaling (SOCS) proteins control JAK-STAT signaling via a negative feedback loop. The transcription factor STAT5 is known to play a significant role in fat cell development and function, and several studies suggest that acetylation may affect STAT5 transcriptional activity. To test this hypothesis, we treated 3T3-L1 adipocytes with growth hormone (GH) to activate STAT5 in the presence or absence of histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitors. STAT5 acetylation levels were low in adipocytes and mostly unchanged by the …

Preoperative Stimulation Of Resolution And Inflammation Blockade Eradicates Micrometastases., Dipak Panigrahy, Allison Gartung, Jun Yang, Haixia Yang, Molly M Gilligan, Megan L Sulciner, Swati S Bhasin, Diane R Bielenberg, Jaimie Chang, Birgitta A Schmidt, Julia Piwowarski, Anna Fishbein, Dulce Soler-Ferran, Matthew A Sparks, Steven J Staffa, Vidula Sukhatme, Bruce D Hammock, Mark W Kieran, Sui Huang, Manoj Bhasin, Charles N Serhan, Vikas P Sukhatme

Articles, Abstracts, and Reports

Cancer therapy is a double-edged sword, as surgery and chemotherapy can induce an inflammatory/immunosuppressive injury response that promotes dormancy escape and tumor recurrence. We hypothesized that these events could be altered by early blockade of the inflammatory cascade and/or by accelerating the resolution of inflammation. Preoperative, but not postoperative, administration of the nonsteroidal antiinflammatory drug ketorolac and/or resolvins, a family of specialized proresolving autacoid mediators, eliminated micrometastases in multiple tumor-resection models, resulting in long-term survival. Ketorolac unleashed anticancer T cell immunity that was augmented by immune checkpoint blockade, negated by adjuvant chemotherapy, and dependent on inhibition of the COX-1/thromboxane A2 …

Xx Sex Chromosome Complement Promotes Atherosclerosis In Mice, Yasir Alsiraj, Xuqi Chen, Sean E. Thatcher, Ryan E. Temel, Lei Cai, Eric M. Blalock, Wendy Katz, Heba M. Ali, Michael C. Petriello, Pan Deng, Andrew J. Morris, Xuping Wang, Aldons J. Lusis, Arthur P. Arnold, Karen Reue, Katherine L. Thompson, Patrick Tso, Lisa A. Cassis

Pharmacology and Nutritional Sciences Faculty Publications

Men and women differ in circulating lipids and coronary artery disease (CAD). While sex hormones such as estrogens decrease CAD risk, hormone replacement therapy increases risk. Biological sex is determined by sex hormones and chromosomes, but effects of sex chromosomes on circulating lipids and atherosclerosis are unknown. Here, we use mouse models to separate effects of sex chromosomes and hormones on atherosclerosis, circulating lipids and intestinal fat metabolism. We assess atherosclerosis in multiple models and experimental paradigms that distinguish effects of sex chromosomes, and male or female gonads. Pro-atherogenic lipids and atherosclerosis are greater in XX than XY mice, indicating …

An Integrative Cross-Omics Analysis Of Dna Methylation Sites Of Glucose And Insulin Homeostasis, Jun Liu, Elena Carnero-Montoro, Jenny Van Dongen, Samantha Lent, Ivana Nedeljkovic, Symen Ligthart, Pei-Chien Tsai, Tiphaine C. Martin, Pooja R. Mandaviya, Rick Jansen, Marjolein J. Peters, Liesbeth Duijts, Vincent W. V. Jaddoe, Henning Tiemeier, Janine F. Felix, Gonneke Willemsen, Eco J. C. De Geus, Audrey Y. Chu, Daniel Levy, Shih-Jen Hwang, Jan Bressler, Rahul Gondalia, Elias L. Salfati, Christian Herder, Bertha A. Hidalgo, Toshiko Tanaka, Ann Zenobia Moore, Rozenn N. Lemaitre, Min A. Jhun, Jennifer A. Smith, Donna K. Arnett

Epidemiology and Environmental Health Faculty Publications

Despite existing reports on differential DNA methylation in type 2 diabetes (T2D) and obesity, our understanding of its functional relevance remains limited. Here we show the effect of differential methylation in the early phases of T2D pathology by a blood-based epigenome-wide association study of 4808 non-diabetic Europeans in the discovery phase and 11,750 individuals in the replication. We identify CpGs in LETM1, RBM20, IRS2, MAN2A2 and the 1q25.3 region associated with fasting insulin, and in FCRL6, SLAMF1, APOBEC3H and the 15q26.1 region with fasting glucose. In silico cross-omics analyses highlight the role of differential methylation …

Proteomics Standards Initiative Extended Fasta Format., Pierre-Alain Binz, Jim Shofstahl, Juan Antonio Vizcaíno, Harald Barsnes, Robert J Chalkley, Gerben Menschaert, Emanuele Alpi, Karl Clauser, Jimmy K Eng, Lydie Lane, Sean L Seymour, Luis Francisco Hernández Sánchez, Gerhard Mayer, Martin Eisenacher, Yasset Perez-Riverol, Eugene A Kapp, Luis Mendoza, Peter R Baker, Andrew Collins, Tim Van Den Bossche, Eric W Deutsch

Articles, Abstracts, and Reports

Mass-spectrometry-based proteomics enables the high-throughput identification and quantification of proteins, including sequence variants and post-translational modifications (PTMs) in biological samples. However, most workflows require that such variations be included in the search space used to analyze the data, and doing so remains challenging with most analysis tools. In order to facilitate the search for known sequence variants and PTMs, the Proteomics Standards Initiative (PSI) has designed and implemented the PSI extended FASTA format (PEFF). PEFF is based on the very popular FASTA format but adds a uniform mechanism for encoding substantially more metadata about the sequence collection as well as …

Utilizing An Electronic Feeder To Measure Mineral And Energy Supplement Intake In Beef Heifers Grazing Native Range, Kacie L. Mccarthy, Sarah R. Underdahl, Michael Undi, Stephanie Becker, Carl R. Dahlen

Department of Animal Science: Faculty Publications

Introduction

Grasslands in the Northern Plains provide the primary forage source for ruminants throughout much of the year (Schauer et al., 2004). Supplementation practices are often necessary to maintain production and offset forage nutritive decline throughout the grazing season (Schauer et al., 2004; Cline et al., 2009). Typically, to maintain a targeted production level, energy and protein supplementations are used for grazing livestock (Caton and Dhuyvetter, 1997). For developing heifers consuming low-quality forages, inclusion of energy ingredients into supplements may be beneficial for growth and reproductive performance (Schillo et al., 1992; Ciccioli et al., 2005; Cappellozza et al., 2014). In …

Novel Algorithms For Ldd Motif Search, Peng Xiao, Martin Schiller, Sanguthevar Rajasekaran

Life Sciences Faculty Research

Background: Motifs are crucial patterns that have numerous applications including the identification of transcription factors and their binding sites, composite regulatory patterns, similarity between families of proteins, etc. Several motif models have been proposed in the literature. The (l,d)-motif model is one of these that has been studied widely. However, this model will sometimes report too many spurious motifs than expected. We interpret a motif as a biologically significant entity that is evolutionarily preserved within some distance. It may be highly improbable that the motif undergoes the same number of changes in each of the species. To address this issue, …

Identification And Evaluation Of A Core Microsatellite Panel For Use In White-Tailed Deer (Odocoileus Virginianus), William L. Miller, Jessie Edson, Peter Pietrandrea, Cassandra Miller-Butterworth

University Faculty Publications and Creative Works

Background: Microsatellite loci have been used extensively over the past two decades to study the genetic characteristics of non-model species. The ease of microsatellite development and ability to adapt markers from related species has led to the proliferation of available markers for many commonly studied species. Because it is often infeasible to genotype individuals across all available loci, researchers generally rely on subsets of markers. Marker choice can bias inferences made using disparate suites of loci. This has been a primary motivation for efforts to identify uniform marker panels. Here, we use the geographic distribution of previous studies to identify …

High-Performance Computing Frameworks For Large-Scale Genome Assembly, Sayan Goswami

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Genome sequencing technology has witnessed tremendous progress in terms of throughput and cost per base pair, resulting in an explosion in the size of data. Typical de Bruijn graph-based assembly tools demand a lot of processing power and memory and cannot assemble big datasets unless running on a scaled-up server with terabytes of RAMs or scaled-out cluster with several dozens of nodes. In the first part of this work, we present a distributed next-generation sequence (NGS) assembler called Lazer, that achieves both scalability and memory efficiency by using partitioned de Bruijn graphs. By enhancing the memory-to-disk swapping and reducing the …

A Mendelian Randomization Study Of Coronary Artery Disease And Three Amino Acids: Alanine, Glycine, And Glutamine, Allan Uribe

Dissertations and Theses

Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death worldwide. Coronary Artery Disease (CAD) accounts for the majority of those deaths. Observational studies have identified risk factors that have been helpful in lowering the death rate, including hypertension, high cholesterol, diabetes, smoking, physical inactivity and poor diet. The effects of these risk factors on CAD remain unclear. To clarify the effect of three amino acids, alanine, glutamine, and glycine on CAD I applied a two sample Mendelian randomization analysis to extensively genotyped observational data. In a sample with up to 184,000 individuals and approximately 60,000 controls, SNPs that reached genome wide …

The Anti-Sigma Factor Muca Of Pseudomonas Aeruginosa: Dramatic Differences Of A Muca22 Vs. A Δmuca Mutant In Anaerobic Acidified Nitrite Sensitivity Of Planktonic And Biofilm Bacteria In Vitro And During Chronic Murine Lung Infection, Warunya Panmanee, Shengchang Su, Michael J. Schurr, Gee W. Lau, Xiaoting Zhu, Zhaowei Ren, Cameron T. Mcdaniel, Long J. Lu, Dennis E. Ohman, Daniel A. Muruve, Ralph J. Panos, Hongwei D. Yu, Thomas B. Thompson, Boo Shan Tseng, Daniel J. Hassett

Life Sciences Faculty Research

Mucoid mucA22 Pseudomonas aeruginosa (PA) is an opportunistic lung pathogen of cystic fibrosis (CF) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients that is highly sensitive to acidified nitrite (A-NO2-). In this study, we first screened PA mutant strains for sensitivity or resistance to 20 mM A-NO2- under anaerobic conditions that represent the chronic stages of the aforementioned diseases. Mutants found to be sensitive to A-NO2- included PA0964 (pmpR, PQS biosynthesis), PA4455 (probable ABC transporter permease), katA (major catalase, KatA) and rhlR (quorum sensing regulator). In contrast, mutants lacking PA0450 (a putative phosphate transporter) and PA1505 (moaA2) were A-NO2- resistant. However, …

Fishermp: Fully Parallel Algorithm For Detecting Combinatorial Motifs From Large Chip-Seq Datasets., Shaoqiang Zhang, Ying Liang, Xiangyun Wang, Zhengchang Su, Yong Chen

College of Science & Mathematics Departmental Research

Detecting binding motifs of combinatorial transcription factors (TFs) from chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing (ChIP-seq) experiments is an important and challenging computational problem for understanding gene regulations. Although a number of motif-finding algorithms have been presented, most are either time consuming or have sub-optimal accuracy for processing large-scale datasets. In this article, we present a fully parallelized algorithm for detecting combinatorial motifs from ChIP-seq datasets by using Fisher combined method and OpenMP parallel design. Large scale validations on both synthetic data and 350 ChIP-seq datasets from the ENCODE database showed that FisherMP has not only super speeds on large datasets, but also …

The Effect Of Intracellular Zinc Levels In Escherichia Coli On Metallo-Β-Lactamase Activity, Jill Thompson

Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences Theses and Dissertations

Antibiotic resistance is a consequence of evolution via natural selection and poses a serious threat to the world's population. Escherichia coli, and other bacterial species, have acquired genes encoding Metallo-β-Lactamases (MBLs). MBLs are zinc-dependent enzymes that degrade most β-lactam antibiotics, and have emerged as important antibacterial resistance determinants in multidrug resistant pathogens. There are several different families of MBLs, and the major clinically relevant ones are Verona Integrated-encoded Metallo-β-Lactamases (VIMs), Imipenemases (IMPs), and New Delhi Metallo-β-Lactamases (NDMs). These enzymes confer high level resistance to penicillins, cephalosporins, and carbapenems, and are not inhibited by FDA-approved β-lactamase inhibitors. Variants of NDM have …

Downregulation Of Cenpf Remodels Prostate Cancer Cells And Alters Cellular Metabolism., Muhammad Shahid, Minhyung Kim, Min Young Lee, Austin Yeon, Sungyong You, Hyung L Kim, Jayoung Kim

Articles, Abstracts, and Reports

Metabolic alterations in prostate cancer (PC) are associated with progression and aggressiveness. However, the underlying mechanisms behind PC metabolic functions are unknown. The authors' group recently reported on the important role of centromere protein F (CENPF), a protein associated with the centromere-kinetochore complex and chromosomal segregation during mitosis, in PC MRI visibility. This study focuses on discerning the role of CENPF in metabolic perturbation in human PC3 cells. A series of bioinformatics analyses shows that CENPF is one gene that is strongly associated with aggressive PC and that its expression is positively correlated with metastasis. By identifying and reconstructing the …

Phenotypic Heterogeneity And Evolution Of Melanoma Cells Associated With Targeted Therapy Resistance., Yapeng Su, Marcus Bintz, Yezi Yang, Lidia Robert, Alphonsus H C Ng, Victoria Liu, Antoni Ribas, James R Heath, Wei Wei

Articles, Abstracts, and Reports

Phenotypic plasticity is associated with non-genetic drug tolerance in several cancers. Such plasticity can arise from chromatin remodeling, transcriptomic reprogramming, and/or protein signaling rewiring, and is characterized as a cell state transition in response to molecular or physical perturbations. This, in turn, can confound interpretations of drug responses and resistance development. Using BRAF-mutant melanoma cell lines as the prototype, we report on a joint theoretical and experimental investigation of the cell-state transition dynamics associated with BRAF inhibitor drug tolerance. Thermodynamically motivated surprisal analysis of transcriptome data was used to treat the cell population as an entropy maximizing system under the …

Protocol Measuring Horizontal Gene Transfer From Algae To Non-Photosynthetic Organisms, James Weifu Lee

Chemistry & Biochemistry Faculty Publications

Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) is a natural process for an organism to transfer genetic material to another organism that is a completely different species, for example, from a blue-green alga to a non-photosynthetic bacterium. The phenomenon of HGT is not only of an interest to the science of molecular genetics and biology, but also to the biosafety issue of genetic engineering. The novel protocol reported here for the first time teaches how to measure HGT from a genetically engineered (GE) blue-green alga (gene donor) to wild-type E. coli (recipient). This novel protocol can be used to measure HGT frequency for …

Participant Perspectives On A Phase I/Ii Ocular Gene Therapy Trial (Nct02077361), Stephanie P. Brooks, Shelly Benjaminy, Tania M. Bubela

Office of the Provost

Background: To learn from the experiences of potential clinical trial participants, participants in a Phase 1 ocular gene therapy trial, and their partners to improve communications and trial conduct.
Materials and methods: Primary and secondary qualitative analysis of semi-structured interviews of potential participants (n = 20), clinical trial participants (n = 2) and their partners (n = 2) in a gene therapy clinical trial for choroideremia (NCT02077361). Analysis included: 1) thematic analysis of transcribed entrance and exit semi-structured interviews with trial participants and their partners; and 2) secondary qualitative analysis of interviews with potential trial participants, …

Effects Of Meiotic Drive On Developing Eye-Stalks In Stalk-Eyed Flies, Christopher Lepore, Olivia Smith, Heather Wood, Josephine Reinhardt Phd

McNair Scholars Program

Teleopsis dalmanni, commonly known as Stalk-Eyed flies, are known for their sexually dimorphic eye-stalks which females use to pick mates. Within the Gombak-12 population, some individuals contain meiotic drive which is known to influence eye-stalk length and sex ratios. Our goal was to identify genes in developing eye tissue that play a role in causing meiotic drive. To identify these candidate genes, we determined the sex and meiotic drive status of individuals by dissecting 3rd instar larvae for their carcasses. After finding that Qiagen Puregene and Qiagen DNEasy columns DNA extraction techniques worked best—determined by using gel electrophoresis—we prepared …

Beef Production Systems In The Nebraska Sandhills, Mckay Reed Erickson

Department of Animal Science: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Four studies were conducted to determine the effectiveness of improving production systems of beef cattle in the Sandhills region of Nebraska. These studies were to determine impacts of modified estrus synchronization protocols, genomic testing heifer calves for longevity, and evaluation of 2 differing calving systems (March or May) for improving biological outcome and improved production. Experiment 1 utilized 180 yearling heifers to determine the effectiveness of a second dose of prostaglandin F_2α(PGF) with those females not expressing estrus after an initial 14 d MGA-PG estrus synchronization protocol. The treatment of PGF did increase estrus expression, but did not …