Health and human services professionals are increasingly using mobile devices to support clinical decision-making and evidence-based practice. However, research on self-directed learning in an era of ...growing digital technology utilization is underdeveloped. This study explored the adoption and use of mobile learning as a continuing professional development (CPD) activity.
A mixed-methods case study using semistructured interviews and a web-based questionnaire was conducted with health and human services professionals in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada.
Respondents reported using a smartphone (53.8%), tablets (50.4%), YouTube (43.0%), and mobile apps (35.8%) for CPD. The highest-rated benefits of mobile learning included improved access to information (M = 3.51); potential for enhanced knowledge acquisition (M = 3.45); staying up to date (M = 3.44); and verifying information (M = 3.40). The greatest barriers included cost of some apps and resources (M = 3.07); websites/programs not functional on mobile devices (M = 2.84); workplace barriers preventing access to digital resources (M = 2.82); and social media use linked to negative perceptions of professionalism (M = 2.65). Interview respondents described the flexibility and convenience of mobile learning, the level of autonomy it offered, and the advantages of learning on their own time. Technical issues, particularly for rural and remote practitioners, and digital professionalism also emerged as potential barriers.
A systems model organizes the factors influencing the adoption and use of mobile devices and resources to support "just-in-time" learning. Addressing policies, practices, and regulations that enable or inhibit adoption of mobile learning for CPD may foster enhanced use to support better clinical decision-making, improved accuracy, and greater patient safety.
Arginine methylation of non-histone proteins by protein arginine methyltransferase (PRMT) has been shown to be important for various biological processes from yeast to human. Although PRMT genes are ...well conserved in fungi, none of them have been functionally characterized in plant pathogenic ascomycetes. In this study, we identified and characterized all of the four predicted PRMT genes in Fusarium graminearum, the causal agent of Fusarium head blight of wheat and barley. Whereas deletion of the other three PRMT genes had no obvious phenotypes, the Δamt1 mutant had pleiotropic defects. AMT1 is a predicted type I PRMT gene that is orthologous to HMT1 in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The Δamt1 mutant was slightly reduced in vegetative growth but normal in asexual and sexual reproduction. It had increased sensitivities to oxidative and membrane stresses. DON mycotoxin production and virulence on flowering wheat heads also were reduced in the Δamt1 mutant. The introduction of the wild-type AMT1 allele fully complemented the defects of the Δamt1 mutant and Amt1-GFP fusion proteins mainly localized to the nucleus. Hrp1 and Nab2 are two hnRNPs in yeast that are methylated by Hmt1 for nuclear export. In F. graminearum, AMT1 is required for the nuclear export of FgHrp1 but not FgNab2, indicating that yeast and F. graminearum differ in the methylation and nucleo-cytoplasmic transport of hnRNP components. Because AMT2 also is a predicted type I PRMT with limited homology to yeast HMT1, we generated the Δamt1 Δamt2 double mutants. The Δamt1 single and Δamt1 Δamt2 double mutants had similar defects in all the phenotypes assayed, including reduced vegetative growth and virulence. Overall, data from this systematic analysis of PRMT genes suggest that AMT1, like its ortholog in yeast, is the predominant PRMT gene in F. graminearum and plays a role in hyphal growth, stress responses, and plant infection.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
Flumes have been widely used in water conservancy science and environmental science research. It is of great significance to obtain the hydrodynamic characteristics and flow field uniformity in the ...flume. In this study, a new type of annular flume was taken as an example. The 3D flow field was simulated by using a commercial computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code, and was also measured by acoustic doppler velocimeter (ADV) to verify the simulation results. The average relative error range was between 8.37% and 9.95%, the simulated results basically reflected the actual situation of the flow field. On this basis, the structural characteristics of flow field were analyzed. A new calculation method of flow velocity uniformity was presented according to the flow characteristics of natural open channels. The velocity uniformity in the straight channel was calculated and analyzed based on this method, and the influence of speed on the velocity uniformity was further discussed. The length of uniform section was negatively correlated with the rotational speed (average velocity), which was between 39 cm and 101 cm in the straight, and the uniformity coefficient was less than 10%. Finally, the water flow characteristics in the straight channel without wheel were compared with the natural open channel flow. The longitudinal velocity was well fitted with the Prandtl logarithmic distribution formula (R2 > 0.977), and the application feasibility of the flume was analyzed. This study can provide technical support for the development and application of annular flume.
Serine/arginine (SR) proteins are essential pre-mRNA splicing factors in eukaryotic organisms. Our previous studies have shownthat the unique SR-specific protein kinase Srk1 is important for RNA ...splicing and gene transcription in Fusarium graminearum, and interacts with two SR proteins, FgSrp1 and FgSrp2. In this study, we have identified an SR-like protein called Sgh1 in F. graminearum, which is orthologous to budding yeast paralogous Gbp2 and Hrb1. Our data have shownthat the Sgh1 is involved in vegetative growth, conidiation, sexual reproduction, DON synthesis, and plant infection. Moreover, the Sgh1 is mainly localized to the nucleus. RNA-seq analysis has shownthat the expression of over 1100 genes and the splicing efficiency in over 300 introns were affected in the Δsgh1 mutant. Although the RS domain and all three of the RRM domains are important for the Sgh1 functions, only the RS domain is responsible for its nuclear localization. Finally, we verified that the Sgh1 interacts with the unique SR-specific kinase Srk1 in F. graminearum by the yeast-two hybrid (Y2H) and bimolecular fluorescence complementation (BiFC) assays. Taken together, our results have revealed that the Sgh1 regulates the fungal development, plant infection, and the pre-mRNA processing, and the RS domain regulates the function of the Sgh1 by modulating its nucleocytoplasmic shuttling.
Wheat cultivar Xingzi 9104 (XZ) possesses adult plant resistance (APR) to stripe rust caused by Puccinia striiformis f. sp. tritici (Pst). In this study, histological and cytological experiments were ...conducted to elucidate the mechanisms of APR in XZ. The results of leaf inoculation experiments indicated that APR was initiated at the tillering stage, gradually increased as the plant aged and highly expressed after boot stage. The histology and oxidative burst in infected leaves of plants at seedling, tillering and boot stages were examined using light microscopic and histochemical methods. Subcellular changes in the host–pathogen interactions during the seedling and boot stages were analyzed by transmission electron microscopy. The results showed that haustorium formation was retarded in the adult plants and that the differentiation of secondary intercellular hyphae was significantly inhibited, which decreased the development of microcolonies in the adult plants, especially in plants of boot stage. The expression of APR to stipe rust during wheat development was clearly associated with extensive hypersensitive cell death of host cells and localized production of reactive oxygen species, which coincided with the restriction of fungal growth in infection sites in adult plants. At the same time, cell wall-related resistance in adult plants prevented ingression of haustorial mother cells into plant cells. Haustorium encasement was coincident with malformation or death of haustoria. The results provide useful information for further determination of mechanisms of wheat APR to stripe rust. Key message The expression of APR to stipe rust in wheat cultivar Xingzi 9104 (XZ) was clearly associated with extensive hypersensitive cell death of host cells and the localized production of reactive oxygen species.
Fusarium head blight or scab caused by Fusarium graminearum is an important disease of wheat and barley. The pathogen not only causes severe yield losses but also contaminates infested grains with ...mycotoxins. In a previous study, we identified several pathogenicity mutants by random insertional mutagenesis. One of these mutants was disrupted in the ZIF1 gene, which encodes a b-ZIP transcription factor unique to filamentous ascomycetes. The Δzif1 mutant generated by gene replacement was significantly reduced in deoxynivalenol (DON) production and virulence on flowering wheat heads. It was defective in spreading from inoculated florets to the rachis and other spikelets. Deletion of the ZIF1 ortholog MoZIF1 in the rice blast fungus also caused reductions in virulence and in invasive growth. In addition, the Δzif1 mutant is defective in sexual reproduction. Although it had normal male fertility, when selfed or mated as the female in outcrosess, the Δzif1 mutant produced small, pigmented perithecia that were sterile (lack of asci and ascospores), suggesting a female-specific role for ZIF1 during fertilization or ascus development. Similar female-specific defects in sexual reproduction were observed in the ΔMozif1 mutant. When mated as the female, the ΔMozif1 perithecia failed to develop long necks and asci or ascospores. The ZIF1 gene is well conserved in filamentous ascomycetes, particularly in the b-ZIP domain, which is essential for its function. Expression of ZIF1 in Magnaporthe oryzae complemented the defects of the ΔMozif1 mutant. These results indicate that this b-ZIP transcription factor is functionally conserved in these two fungal pathogens for plant infection and sexual reproduction.
The fungal plant pathogen, Fusarium graminearum, contains two genes, FgCPK1 and FgCPK2, encoding the catalytic subunits of cAMP-dependent protein kinase A. FgCPK1 and FgCPK2 are responsible for most ...of the PKA activities and have overlapping functions in various cellular processes in F. graminearum. The cpk1 cpk2 double mutant was significantly reduced in growth, rarely produced conidia, and was non-pathogenic. In this study, we found that the cpk1 cpk2 double mutant was unstable and produced fast-growing spontaneous sectors that were defective in plant infection. All spontaneous suppressor strains had mutations in FgSFL1, a transcription factor gene orthologous to SFL1 in yeast. Thirteen suppressor strains had non-sense mutations at Q501, three suppressor strains had frameshift mutations at W198, and five suppressor strains had mutations in the HSF binding domain of FgSfl1. Only one suppressor strain had both a non-synonymous mutation at H225 and a non-sense mutation at R490. We generated the SFL1 deletion mutant and found that it produced less than 2% of conidia than that of the wild-type strain PH-1. The sfl1 mutant was significantly reduced in the number of perithecia on carrot agar plates at 7 days post-fertilization (dpf). When incubated for more than 12 days, ascospore cirrhi were observed on the sfl1 mutant perithecia. The infection ability of the sfl1 deletion mutant was also obviously defective. Furthermore, we found that in addition to the S223 and S559 phosphorylation sites, FgSFL1 had another predicted phosphorylation site: T452. Interestingly, the S223 phosphorylation site was responsible for sexual reproduction, and the T452 phosphorylation site was responsible for growth and sexual reproduction. Only the S559 phosphorylation site was found to play an important role in conidiation, sexual reproduction, and infection. Overall, our results indicate that FgSFL1 and its conserved PKA phosphorylation sites are important for vegetative growth, conidiation, sexual reproduction, and pathogenesis in F. graminearum.
Puccinia striiformis f. sp. tritici is a fungal pathogen causing stripe rust, one of the most important wheat diseases worldwide. The fungus is strictly biotrophic and thus, completely dependent on ...living host cells for its reproduction, which makes it difficult to study genes of the pathogen. In spite of its economic importance, little is known about the molecular basis of compatible interaction between the pathogen and wheat host. In this study, we identified wheat and P. striiformis genes associated with the infection process by conducting a large-scale transcriptomic analysis using cDNA-AFLP.
Of the total 54,912 transcript derived fragments (TDFs) obtained using cDNA-AFLP with 64 primer pairs, 2,306 (4.2%) displayed altered expression patterns after inoculation, of which 966 showed up-regulated and 1,340 down-regulated. 186 TDFs produced reliable sequences after sequencing of 208 TDFs selected, of which 74 (40%) had known functions through BLAST searching the GenBank database. Majority of the latter group had predicted gene products involved in energy (13%), signal transduction (5.4%), disease/defence (5.9%) and metabolism (5% of the sequenced TDFs). BLAST searching of the wheat stem rust fungus genome database identified 18 TDFs possibly from the stripe rust pathogen, of which 9 were validated of the pathogen origin using PCR-based assays followed by sequencing confirmation. Of the 186 reliable TDFs, 29 homologous to genes known to play a role in disease/defense, signal transduction or uncharacterized genes were further selected for validation of cDNA-AFLP expression patterns using qRT-PCR analyses. Results confirmed the altered expression patterns of 28 (96.5%) genes revealed by the cDNA-AFLP technique.
The results show that cDNA-AFLP is a reliable technique for studying expression patterns of genes involved in the wheat-stripe rust interactions. Genes involved in compatible interactions between wheat and the stripe rust pathogen were identified and their expression patterns were determined. The present study should be helpful in elucidating the molecular basis of the infection process, and identifying genes that can be targeted for inhibiting the growth and reproduction of the pathogen. Moreover, this study can also be used to elucidate the defence responses of the genes that were of plant origin.
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DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
A. Perithecia produced by 14-day-old carrot agar cultures of the wild type (PH-1) and different MAT locus gene deletion mutants.(2013) The MAT Locus Genes Play Different Roles in Sexual Reproduction ...and Pathogenesis in Fusarium graminearum.
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Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
The version of this article published in BMC Genomics 2013, 14: 274, contains 9 unpublished genomes (Botryobasidium botryosum, Gymnopus luxurians, Hypholoma sublateritium, Jaapia argillacea, Hebeloma ...cylindrosporum, Conidiobolus coronatus, Laccaria amethystina, Paxillus involutus, and P. rubicundulus) downloaded from JGI website. In this correction, we removed these genomes after discussion with editors and data producers whom we should have contacted before downloading these genomes. Removing these data did not alter the principle results and conclusions of our original work. The relevant Figures 1, 2, 3, 4 and 6; and Table 1 have been revised. Additional files 1, 3, 4, and 5 were also revised. We would like to apologize for any confusion or inconvenience this may have caused. Fungi produce a variety of carbohydrate activity enzymes (CAZymes) for the degradation of plant polysaccharide materials to facilitate infection and/or gain nutrition. Identifying and comparing CAZymes from fungi with different nutritional modes or infection mechanisms may provide information for better understanding of their life styles and infection models. To date, over hundreds of fungal genomes are publicly available. However, a systematic comparative analysis of fungal CAZymes across the entire fungal kingdom has not been reported. In this study, we systemically identified glycoside hydrolases (GHs), polysaccharide lyases (PLs), carbohydrate esterases (CEs), and glycosyltransferases (GTs) as well as carbohydrate-binding modules (CBMs) in the predicted proteomes of 94 representative fungi from Ascomycota, Basidiomycota, Chytridiomycota, and Zygomycota. Comparative analysis of these CAZymes that play major roles in plant polysaccharide degradation revealed that fungi exhibit tremendous diversity in the number and variety of CAZymes. Among them, some families of GHs and CEs are the most prevalent CAZymes that are distributed in all of the fungi analyzed. Importantly, cellulases of some GH families are present in fungi that are not known to have cellulose-degrading ability. In addition, our results also showed that in general, plant pathogenic fungi have the highest number of CAZymes. Biotrophic fungi tend to have fewer CAZymes than necrotrophic and hemibiotrophic fungi. Pathogens of dicots often contain more pectinases than fungi infecting monocots. Interestingly, besides yeasts, many saprophytic fungi that are highly active in degrading plant biomass contain fewer CAZymes than plant pathogenic fungi. Furthermore, analysis of the gene expression profile of the wheat scab fungus Fusarium graminearum revealed that most of the CAZyme genes related to cell wall degradation were up-regulated during plant infection. Phylogenetic analysis also revealed a complex history of lineage-specific expansions and attritions for the PL1 family. Our study provides insights into the variety and expansion of fungal CAZyme classes and revealed the relationship of CAZyme size and diversity with their nutritional strategy and host specificity.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
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