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Current trends in genomic technologies are providing insights to understand the
role of coding and noncoding sequences in gene expression and gene regulation.
Study of noncoding RNA molecules and their importance is
being carried out in advanced centers of excellence in genetics, molecular biology and molecular
evolution. Such studies throw some light on gene function and regulation.
On the other hand, marker aided selection (MAS) and biomarker research are
being applied for the improvement of all organisms and their phenotypic stability in
agriculture, animal husbandry, whereas biomarker research is helping in the development of
diagnostics and their application in the detection and management of diseases associating
several traits with known standard markers of DNA, proteins and visible phenotypes. At
this juncture, it is needed to combine information from both the directions and interpret
the findings coming day-to-day.
The first paper, "Variation of Phenylalanine Ammonia Lyase and Phenol Content in
Two Species of Casuarina During Salicylic Acid Signaling", by Suvega Thangavelu,
Vellingiri Hemalatha, Radha Veluthakkal and Modhumita Ghosh reveals that the higher level of
biotic stress tolerance in C. junghuhniana in comparison to C. equisetifolia may be attributed to the sustenance of high level of phenol and phenylalanine ammonia lyase (PAL) in
tissues during stress conditions.
The second paper, "Micropropagation of Tinospora
cordifolia: A Prioritized Medicinal Plant Species of Commercial Importance of NE India", by P J Handique and S S
Choudhury demonstrates the possibility of developing an efficient in vitro propagation system for successful mass propagation of Tinospora cordifolia.
The third paper, "Efficient Genotype Physiology, Growth,
Photosynthesis, Photosynthetic Pigments, Essential Monoterpene Oil(s) Yield and Oil Quality of Ocimum sanctum", by A Misra, S Dwivedi, A K Srivastava, D K Tewari, A Khan and R
Kumar demonstrates an oxido-reducible reaction of peroxidase and high bands of
peroxidase isoenzymes in OSP-6 genotype for the formation of monoterpene essential oil(s)
and possibly the major constituents of eugenol through the high photosynthates.
In the fourth paper, "In Vitro Regeneration and Conservation of Kaempferia galanga", the authors, P E Rajasekharan, S R Ambika and S Ganeshan have made an attempt
to optimize protocols for in vitro regeneration and conservation of Kaempferia galanga where they showed in
vitro plants retained capacity to regrow after storage for duration of
six months without intervening subculture.
The authors, Deepa R and Suriyavathana M of the fifth paper, "Germination Pattern
of Tapioca (Manihot esculenta) Genotypes [CO(TP)4, CO2] by Salt (NaCl) Stress
Induction" show that both CO2 and CO(TP)4 withstood the maximum salt stress induction
with drastic phenotypic changes which emphasizes that they are superior varieties for
salt tolerance.
The authors, Komal Desai, Dhara Patel, Deepmala Lawani and Vijay Kothari of the
sixth paper, "Montmorillonite: A Puissant Catalyst for Prebiotic Formation of
RNA-Like Oligomers" opine that minerals might have played the role of catalyst in the formation
of bio-oligomers and indicated that generation of RNAs with chain length greater than
40 mers would have been sufficient for initiation of first life on Earth.
The last paper, "Principal Component Analysis in Brassica juncea L. Czern and Coss", by Sharad Pandey, M K Tripathi and Rahul Kumar exploits exhaustively the attributes,
viz., days to flowering initiation, siliqua on main shoot, seeds per siliqua, length of
siliqua, seed yield per plant, number of secondary branches per plant and 1000-seed weight
which were proved to be the most important variables for selection and breeding
programs since they had high eigenvalues for different principal components.
-- V Venugopal Rao
Consulting Editor |
