Background: There is a current lack of research on the molecular pathways by which lysine regulates feed intake in chicks. Regulation is controlled by the hypothalamus and lysine metabolism links the availability of amino acids and nutritional perception with food intake. The mechanism underlying this phenomenon remains unclear. To investigate the regulatory mechanism of lysine on feed intake in chicks, this study used Yao chickens as a research model. The levels of lysine in the feed of chicks were adjusted to determine the effect on feed intake. The hypothalamus tissue of the chicks was analyzed using RNA-seq and metabolomics to identify the relevant genes. We employed Gene Ontology and identification of signaling pathways to characterize the molecular regulatory biological pathways of lysine in poultry feeding. 
 
Methods: This study used RNA-seq technology to investigate the genes and marker metabolites involved in lysine regulation of feed intake in chickens. The study explored the molecular mechanism by which dietary lysine regulates feed intake in chickens via the hypothalamus. Four hundred healthy 1-day-old chicks (Yao chickens) were randomly divided&nbsp; into four groups, with five replicates in each group (n = 20). 
 
Result: There was a significant difference in feed intake among chicks fed with diets containing 0.65% (abbreviated as MGO), 0.85% (FIH), 1.0% (MGS) and 1.2% (FIL) lysine levels. The group with the highest feed intake was FIH, while the group with the lowest feed intake was FIL. By conducting RNA-seq of the hypothalamic tissue of chickens in both the highest and lowest feed intake groups, we obtained 2006 differentially expressed genes, comprising 1275 upregulated genes and 731 downregulated genes. Fourteen genes were related to food intake, including growth hormone, recombinant glutamate receptor, metabotropic 1&nbsp;(GRM1) and recombinant glutamate receptor, metabotropic 3&nbsp;(GRM3). Using liquid chromatograph mass spectrometer (LC-MS) metabolomics, we identified 25 differential metabolites. Nine metabolites, including C3H5NO4, C10H15NO2&nbsp;and C13H14N203, were downregulated, while 16 metabolites, including C2H8NO3P, C3H7NO3&nbsp;and C7H7NO2, were upregulated. Marker metabolites included 5-hydroxytryptophan and L-valine. A KEGG enrichment analysis revealed that the differential metabolites between the FIH and FIL groups were enriched in 26 pathways, with the significantly enriched pathway being the ABC transporter protein pathway (ID: map02010). RNA-seq and LC-MS analyses revealed that in chicks, the expression of the neuropeptides cocaine- and Amphetamine-Regulated Transcript Protein (CARTPT) and neuropeptide Y (NPY)/agouti-related protein (AGRP), along with genes such as sucrose synthase (SS 2), &nbsp;recombinant cholecystokinin A receptor (CCKAR) and recombinant cholecystokinin B receptor (CCKBR), was regulated by the hypothalamic feeding regulation center that senses the level of lysine in the feed. These molecules bind to specific receptors and initiate a signaling cascade in specific hypothalamic neuronal groups, thereby regulating chick feed intake and in turn affecting growth, development and production performance. 
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Investigating the Molecular Mechanisms of Lysine&rsquo;s Effect on Feed Intake in Chicks Through the Hypothalamus using RNA-seq and Metabolomics

<div>Legumes being a major source of protein have a wide range of economic importance. But the major constraints in growing legumes are poor germination, seedling emergence, non uniform stand establishment and crop mortality leading to lower pulse productivity. Thus, pre-sowing seed treatments are critical parameters which attribute to efficient plant growth and high yield. Uniform seed germination, seedling growth and uniform establishment are the critical stages during the growth of crops. Seed priming is a very promising presowing treatment employed to improve seed germination, better crop establishment, enhance the seed quality and induces tolerance against biotic and abiotic stresses in plants thereby providing a balanced healthy diet to the citizens. Priming is a cost effective and feasible strategy involving controlled hydration of seeds followed by drying to stimulate the pre-germinative metabolic activities to occur promoting rapid germination of seedlings, break dormancy and enhance crop yield. Enzymatic, metabolic and biochemical processes of the primed seeds attributes to rapid and uniform seedling emergence. Seed priming methods comprises of conventional methods including hydro priming, osmopriming, biopriming, chemical priming and the advanced methods including nano priming and priming with physical agents. In this review paper, the underlying physiological, biochemical and molecular aspects of priming in pulses were discussed.</div>

​Physiological, Biochemical and Molecular Mechanisms of Seed Priming: A Review

Ca-B interactions in crop plants are essential in crop productivity, quality and stress-tolerance in a variety of agro-climatic conditions. This review discusses the complex processes behind Ca-B nutrition in plants, both at the molecular interaction level and in the field. Calcium ionically bridges with the pectin compounds at the cellular level and boron forms borate crosslinking with rhamnogalacturonan II (RG-II). The resulting B-RG-II complex that involves two molecules of boric acid and two Ca2+&nbsp;ions is important to retain the cell wall integrity. The effect of these nutrients during the plant development is synergistic and when there is deficiency of boron, it leads to increased cytosolic Ca2+&nbsp;and also calcium-regulated gene expression. Physicochemical properties of soil play a great role in Ca-B dynamics. Boron adsorption on clay minerals is enhanced as pH rises reaching a peak of about pH 9.0 in alkaline environment. The arable land of the world is estimated at around 50% of the global land, with 50% of this area being acid in nature making the availability of the two nutrients to be limited and thus requires strategic interventions. Optimised Ca-B nutrition leads to significant increases in yield of major crops. This can only be achieved through combined methods of soil testing, precise fertilisation and environmental concerns to facilitate good management. Nutrient management strategies are being transformed with the new technologies such as genomics, metabolomics, precision agriculture, mycorrhizal associations and machine learning algorithms. New areas of research should be directed towards new decision support systems, molecular level interventions, sustainable boron recovery of waste streams and mycorrhizal-mediated nutrient interactions. 
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Calcium-boron Interactions in Plant Nutrition: From Molecular Mechanisms to Agricultural Applications: A Review

<div>Background:&nbsp;Onion is a widely accepted as vegetable as well as spice crop, sharing a 14.31 lakh ha area with 267.3 lakh MT production in 2020. Improved management structure and healthy seedling are important factors in overcoming the cause and even developing effective transplanter. The information of morphological properties is essential before designing modern farming equipment. 
 
Methods: Present study focuses on the properties and age of seedlings for automated transplanting, five majorly cultivated varieties of onion Light red gavran, N-53 Nasik red, AFDR, KSP-117 and Nafed were selected. The morphological (height, weight, diameter) and mechanical (compressive strength and static coefficient of friction) properties were measured under 10 days intervals to compare 30-70 days seedling. 
 
Result: Bulb and stem diameter were in the range from 2.82 to 3.82 mm and 0.86 to 2.12 mm, respectively. The model was found significantly different with concerning days. Plywood and aluminium had less influence on the seedling&rsquo;s outer surface moisture content. The morphological parameters and compressive strength increased while a static coefficient of friction reduced with an increase in the age of the seedling. Regression and ANN (using FFBP method) models were developed for the prediction of compressive strength of seedling stem as well as a bulb with respect to the age and diameter. The ANN model was found best with the coefficient of determination of 0.76. It is concluded that 60 and 70 days, seedling is best suited for mechanical or automated transplanting.</div>

Morphological and Mechanical Characteristics of Onion Seedlings Insight to Mechanized Transplantation

Milk fat globules (MFGs) are a complex compound secreted in the mammary gland, composed of triglycerides; phosphatidylethanolamine (PE) phosphatidylcholine (PC) with unclear mechanism and the fused lipid droplets enclosed by inner layer derived from the endoplasmic reticulum and outer bilayer is directly derived from the apical plasma membrane as the lipid droplets bud out from the cell. The core components of MFGs, triglycerides are synthesized via the de novo fatty acid pathway and LCFA was directly taken from serum. The de novo fatty acid pathway was significantly dependent on the enzymes acetyl-CoA carboxylase (ACACA), fatty acid synthase (FASN) and acyl-CoA synthetase short-chain family member 2 (ACSS2) to synthesize short and medium-chain fatty acids, whereas the bio-hydrogenation pathway is a principal pathway for the synthesis of long-chain fatty acids. Following this, the milk fat globules coated by the membrane are released from the MEC to the lumen with or without other milk components and the membrane that surrounds the fat globule stabilize the milk fat in its dispersed state, prevent flocculation and globule coalescence, and protects against the deleterious effects of lipases. Even though the secretion mechanism of lipid droplets is controversial hormonal and molecular mechanisms are involved. Moreover, the fat globule size and composition are determined by factors such as stage of lactation, physiological state of the animal, Diacylglycerol Acyltransferase1 (DGAT1) activity, and PC/PE ratio along with breed and animal species. While some studies were conducted on milk synthesis and secretion, the molecular mechanism behind lipid droplet fusion, secretion in the apical membrane and how MFGM is formed and the mechanism of MFG synthesis regulation are undiscovered. Therefore, it needs advanced investigation.&nbsp;

Physiology and Mechanism of Milk Fat Globules Secretion in Dairy Animals: A Review&nbsp;

<div>Rice (Oryza sativa L.) is one of the most important cereal crop globally and it is the staple food of more than half of world population. Current average yield is 10 to 15% lower than its potential yield. There are many reasons for this yield gap such as biotic and abiotic stresses, management strategies as well as nutrient deficiencies. Salinity is one of the most serious factors limiting the productivity of rice, with adverse effects on germination, plant vigor and crop yield. This salinity may be natural or induced by agricultural activities such as irrigation or the use of certain types of fertilizer.Salinity induced ionic imbalance and osmotic stress affect water and nutrient uptake, stomatal closure, gas exchange, photosynthesis, transpiration, carbon assimilation and hence decrease in rice yield. Studying the response of rice at physiological, genetic and molecular level is the mandate to develop salt tolerant rice varieties. This review described the impact of salt stress in rice, various types of salt tolerance mechanisms in rice, including the ion homeostasis, production of compatible organic solutes, antioxidative genes, salt responsive regulatory elements, role of ion transporters and channel proteins. Further, the future perspective of developing salt-tolerant varieties using landraces via., marker assisted breeding, genome editing tool, utilization of beneficial microorganisms.</div>

Salinity Tolerance Mechanisms in Rice: A Review

This review analyses the use of molecular techniques in rumen microbial identification. The use of regular methods like roll tube and most probable number resulted in under estimation of rumen microbial growth. So molecular biology acts as an advanced tool for rumen microbial culture and identification of various new species. These techniques give complete descriptions of individual ruminal populations. Use of molecular techniques like PCR, DDGE and FISH, which also pave pathway for genetic manipulation of rumen microbes in the field of rumen manipulation. So the combination of traditional and molecular assays gives accurate and satisfactory results.

Molecular techniques in rumen biotechnology: A review

<div style="text-align: justify;">Small cardamom (Elettaria cardamomum), is one of the costliest spices across the globe. It is grown in limited coastal tropical countries. It is widely exported agri-produce with global turnover of &gt; 10 billion USD. It is majorly affected by the mosaic or marble disease and hence warrants the deep study at molecular level. Till now, there is no availability of whole genome sequence along with any genomic resources. Under such cases, RNA seq approach can be a rapid and economical alternative to gather the information at genomic level. De novo transcriptome assembly was carried out using Illumina Hiseq data. Analysis revealed a total of 5317 differentially expressed genes, 2267 transcription factors, &gt;100 pathways and 175,952 genic region putative markers. Gene regulatory network analysis was performed to see the molecular events playing role in marble disease. We report the first transcriptomic results that shows the disease mechanism mediated by perturbation in auxin homeostasis and ethylene signaling. These events lead to senescence. We also developed the web-genomic resource, SCMVTDb which houses putative molecular markers, candidate genes and transcript information. Such web resource can be used in small cardamom germplasm improvement against mosaic disease in endeavour of its increased productivity.&nbsp;</div>

<div style="text-align: justify;">Plant virus interaction mechanisms and joint pathways in mosaic disease of Small Cardamom (Elettaria cardamomum maton) by RNA-Sec</div>

Molecular markers are effective tools used to &lsquo;flag&rsquo; the location of a specific gene or the inheritance of a definite trait. Markers are unique DNA fragments that can be identified inside the entire genome. The development of molecular markers combined with high throughput technologies have paved the way for achieving the desirable traits as well as induced biotic and abiotic stress tolerance in plant, which enhanced the crop breeding. Highly polymorphic molecular markers are developed for gene mapping, estimation of genetic diversity, finding out the evolution and phylogeny of crop, analysis of heterosis, assessment of diploid/haploid crops and genotyping of cultivars along with Marker Assisted Breeding (MAB)/Marker Assisted Selection (MAS). These are the most significant objectives for crop breeding. This review reveals about the role of various recently developed molecular markers in the improvement of crop. Molecular markers act as a &ldquo;milestone&rdquo; for the researchers who aim to enhance crop breeding.

Role of Molecular Markers in Crop Breeding: A Review

<div>Background: Rice is the most important human food crop in the world and its production is affected by various biotic and abiotic stress including low soil fertility. Zinc deficiency is one of the most important micronutrient deficiencies limiting rice yield. The vast reserve of germplasm of rice grown in different eco systems could be screened to exploit the genotypic differences bfor zinc deficiency tolerance. With the advent of molecular markers, association mapping strategy based on non-random associations between causative loci and phenotype could be employed to resolve the complex traits like zinc deficiency tolerance. With this background, the current study is focused to explore the extent of variability for zinc deficiency tolerance using zinc deficiency score and quantitative traits among 44 germplasm accessions and to identify quantitative trait loci associated with zinc deficiency tolerance using Simple Sequence Repeat (SSR) marker-based association mapping. 
 
Methods: A set of 44 accessions consisting of landraces and improved varieties were selected based on their zinc deficiency score in field (Zn=0.64 ppm) screening experiment conducted in Regional Research Station, Paiyur, Tamil Nadu. Eight accessions from each Zn Def score group along with four other genotypes namely Savulu Samba, Kotta Nel, Paiyur 1 and ADT 39 were chosen for the study. Molecular analysis was carried out among the selected accessions using a total of 40 random Simple Sequence Repeat (SSR) primers. 
 
Result: Our study revealed the existence of diversity at molecular level among the selected accessions. Clustering analysis separated the accessions in two major clusters which were in accordance with the population structure analysis which resulted with two sub-populations. Through our study we identified certain accessions namely, Karuppu Nel, Manipur Local and BAM 440 which recorded high yields along with least zinc deficiency scores implying their ability to act as donors for zinc deficiency tolerance under submerged condition. Subsequent association analysis which resulted in putative association of zinc deficiency score with critical plant traits such as plant height and number of productive tillers, revealed that association mapping could be a viable strategy for understanding genetic mechanism of zinc deficiency tolerance in rice.</div>

Investigating the Molecular Mechanisms of Lysine’s Effect on Feed Intake in Chicks Through the Hypothalamus using RNA-seq and Metabolomics

Physiological, Biochemical and Molecular Mechanisms of Seed Priming: A Review

Calcium-boron Interactions in Plant Nutrition: From Molecular Mechanisms to Agricultural Applications: A Review

Morphological and Mechanical Characteristics of Onion Seedlings Insight to Mechanized Transplantation

Physiology and Mechanism of Milk Fat Globules Secretion in Dairy Animals: A Review

Salinity Tolerance Mechanisms in Rice: A Review

Molecular techniques in rumen biotechnology: A review

Plant virus interaction mechanisms and joint pathways in mosaic disease of Small Cardamom (Elettaria cardamomum maton) by RNA-Sec

Role of Molecular Markers in Crop Breeding: A Review

Study on Analysis of Molecular Diversity and Trait Association for Zinc Deficiency Tolerance in Rice under Submerged Conditions