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Exclusion netting in some European and North American apple (Malus domestica Borkhausen, Rosaceae, Rosales) orchards has been documented to be an effective method of control for multiple insect pest species. By minimizing reliance on insecticides, these orchards have reduced costs, risks to the environment and nontarget species, and reduced the risk of insecticide resistance. This study examined the use of commercially available hail netting (DrapeNet®; Prosser, WA) as a pest exclusion strategy under conditions in Minnesota, USA. In 2021 and 2022, we assessed the efficacy of hail netting as a tool for pest suppression in orchards by monitoring pest species in netted and open plots crossed with and without insecticide applications. Our findings show that both of the major pest species in Minnesota, the codling moth (Cydia pomonella L.; Lepidoptera:Tortricidae) and the apple maggot (Rhagoletis pomonellaWalsh; Diptera:Tephritidae), were significantly reduced inside the netting compared to open plots by 94% and 96%, respectively. For a secondary pest, the red-banded leafroller (Argyrotaenia velutinana Walker; Lepidoptera: Tortricidae), moth populations were reduced by 56%. We also found that insecticide application alone did not significantly reduce pest pressure in these species. Additionally, we investigated the subsequent effects of hail netting on fruit quality and yield. The use of hail netting and insecticide application resulted in significantly higher proportions of high-quality fruit at harvest. However, netting did not significantly influence yield.These findings suggest that hail netting can be used to control Midwest apple insect pests with limited insecticide applications while maintaining high fruit quality.

Significance Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is a rare and devastating muscle disease caused by mutations in the X-linked DMD gene (which encodes the dystrophin protein). Serum biomarkers hold significant potential as objective phenotypic measures of DMD disease state, as well as potential measures of pharmacological effects of and response to therapeutic interventions. Here we describe a proteomics approach to determine serum levels of 1,125 proteins in 93 DMD patients and 45 controls. The study identified 44 biomarkers that differed significantly between patients and controls. These data are being made available to DMD researchers and clinicians to accelerate the search for new diagnostic, prognostic, and therapeutic approaches. Serum biomarkers in Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) may provide deeper insights into disease pathogenesis, suggest new therapeutic approaches, serve as acute read-outs of drug effects, and be useful as surrogate outcome measures to predict later clinical benefit. In this study a large-scale biomarker discovery was performed on serum samples from patients with DMD and age-matched healthy volunteers using a modified aptamer-based proteomics technology. Levels of 1,125 proteins were quantified in serum samples from two independent DMD cohorts: cohort 1 (The Parent Project Muscular Dystrophy–Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center), 42 patients with DMD and 28 age-matched normal volunteers; and cohort 2 (The Cooperative International Neuromuscular Research Group, Duchenne Natural History Study), 51 patients with DMD and 17 age-matched normal volunteers. Forty-four proteins showed significant differences that were consistent in both cohorts when comparing DMD patients and healthy volunteers at a 1% false-discovery rate, a large number of significant protein changes for such a small study. These biomarkers can be classified by known cellular processes and by age-dependent changes in protein concentration. Our findings demonstrate both the utility of this unbiased biomarker discovery approach and suggest potential new diagnostic and therapeutic avenues for ameliorating the burden of DMD and, we hope, other rare and devastating diseases.

Apple orchards are highly managed agricultural ecosystems where growers typically rely on insecticides to minimize the risk of pest-related fruit losses. Apple growers practicing integrated pest management require cost-effective alternatives to conventional insecticides for control of major pests such as codling moth ( Cydia pomonella L.) and apple maggot ( Rhagoletis pomonella Walsh). Exclusion netting has been shown to effectively control multiple insect pest species, limit fruit damage and reduce the use of insecticides while also conferring consumer and environmental benefits. In this study, partial budgeting was applied to explore the financial efficacy of using a hail netting (DrapeNet ® ) system as a sustainable pest management strategy for Midwest U.S. apple ( Malus x domestica ). The cost of the hail netting was compared to a common Midwest insecticide spray regimen for apples using yield and quality data from a field study at two Minnesota apple orchards in 2021-2022. The PB analysis indicated that the netting system was an economically competitive alternative to conventional insecticide applications. The economic results were robust across a range of apple prices and yields suggesting that Minnesota apple growers can benefit economically from the application of hail netting for sustainable pest management.

Tools for quantifying nontarget pesticide risks have long been used for documenting the benefits of Integrated Pest Management (IPM) programs. One resource receiving little attention is the Pesticide Risk Tool (PRT), developed by the IPM Institute in Madison, WI. The PRT includes 15 indices and uses a probabilistic approach to assess the risk for the environmental and human health effects of insecticides, fungicides, and herbicides. In this article, we compare the PRT to the Environmental Impact Quotient (EIQ) to highlight the PRT’s approach to characterizing risk and several improvements over the EIQ. Comparing the calculated risk scores between the EIQ and PRT shows a similar trend with organophosphate insecticides, usually reflecting the highest toxicity risks, with more pronounced differences for pyrethroids and neonicotinoids, but exact toxicity rankings differ. Advantages of the PRT over the EIQ include the probabilistic approach to quantify risk and reliance on field impact data where available, the use of raw data for inputs versus a scoring system, correction of known issues with the EIQ, and its greater diversity of risk indices. Some disadvantages of the PRT include its lack of data on discontinued products, the absence of a total risk score, use of different scoring scales between indices, and its cost. However, given the pros and cons of each method, we believe the PRT to be a useful tool for researchers, extension professionals, and growers who wish to account for environmental and human health risks when building IPM programs.

The cecidomyiid fly, soybean gall midge, Resseliella maxima Gagné, is a recently discovered insect that feeds on soybean plants in the Midwestern United States. R. maxima larvae feed on soybean stems that may induce plant death and can cause considerable yield losses, making it an important agricultural pest. From three pools of 50 adults each, we used long-read nanopore sequencing to assemble a R. maxima reference genome. The final genome assembly is 206 Mb with 64.88× coverage, consisting of 1,009 contigs with an N50 size of 714 kb. The assembly is high quality with a Benchmarking Universal Single-Copy Ortholog (BUSCO) score of 87.8%. Genome-wide GC level is 31.60%, and DNA methylation was measured at 1.07%. The R. maxima genome is comprised of 21.73% repetitive DNA, which is in line with other cecidomyiids. Protein prediction annotated 14,798 coding genes with 89.9% protein BUSCO score. Mitogenome analysis indicated that R. maxima assembly is a single circular contig of 15,301 bp and shares highest identity to the mitogenome of the Asian rice gall midge, Orseolia oryzae Wood-Mason. The R. maxima genome has one of the highest completeness levels for a cecidomyiid and will provide a resource for research focused on the biology, genetics, and evolution of cecidomyiids, as well as plant–insect interactions in this important agricultural pest.

Ischemia/reperfusion (I/R) injury is a serious potential threat to outcomes in organ transplantation and other clinical arenas in which there is temporary interruption of blood flow. I/R is a frequent cause of primary failure in organ transplantation. We hypothesized that the antioxidant bucillamine, a potent sulfhydryl donor, would protect against I/R injury in high-risk organ transplants. Because livers subjected to prolonged ischemia and very fatty livers are highly susceptible to severe I/R injury, we studied the effect of bucillamine in three animal models of liver transplantation: two ex vivo models of isolated perfused livers, either normal or fatty rat livers, and an in vivo model of syngenic orthotopic liver transplants in rats. In all models, livers were deprived of oxygen for 24 h before either ex vivo reperfusion or transplantation. In the ex vivo models, bucillamine treatment significantly improved portal vein blood flow and bile production, preserved normal liver architecture, and significantly reduced liver enzyme release and indices of oxidative stress. Moreover, bucillamine treatment significantly increased levels of reduced glutathione in the liver and lowered levels of oxidized glutathione in both liver and blood. In rats subjected to liver transplants, bucillamine significantly enhanced survival and protected against hepatic injury. Possible mechanisms of this protection include prevention of excessive accumulation of toxic oxygen species, interruption of redox signaling in hepatocytes, and inhibition of macrophage activation. This study demonstrates the potential utility of bucillamine or other cysteine-derived thiol donors for improving outcomes in organ transplantation and other clinical settings involving I/R injury.

The interrogation of proteomes (\"proteomics\") in a highly multiplexed and efficient manner remains a coveted and challenging goal in biology and medicine. We present a new aptamer-based proteomic technology for biomarker discovery capable of simultaneously measuring thousands of proteins from small sample volumes (15 µL of serum or plasma). Our current assay measures 813 proteins with low limits of detection (1 pM median), 7 logs of overall dynamic range (~100 fM-1 µM), and 5% median coefficient of variation. This technology is enabled by a new generation of aptamers that contain chemically modified nucleotides, which greatly expand the physicochemical diversity of the large randomized nucleic acid libraries from which the aptamers are selected. Proteins in complex matrices such as plasma are measured with a process that transforms a signature of protein concentrations into a corresponding signature of DNA aptamer concentrations, which is quantified on a DNA microarray. Our assay takes advantage of the dual nature of aptamers as both folded protein-binding entities with defined shapes and unique nucleotide sequences recognizable by specific hybridization probes. To demonstrate the utility of our proteomics biomarker discovery technology, we applied it to a clinical study of chronic kidney disease (CKD). We identified two well known CKD biomarkers as well as an additional 58 potential CKD biomarkers. These results demonstrate the potential utility of our technology to rapidly discover unique protein signatures characteristic of various disease states. We describe a versatile and powerful tool that allows large-scale comparison of proteome profiles among discrete populations. This unbiased and highly multiplexed search engine will enable the discovery of novel biomarkers in a manner that is unencumbered by our incomplete knowledge of biology, thereby helping to advance the next generation of evidence-based medicine.

The management of apple insect pests in orchards in the United States has historically depended upon broad-spectrum insecticides. Exclusion netting has begun to be adopted by fruit growers across the world to assist with the management of insect pests and to reduce chemical input. In apple, the first exclusion netting system was developed in the early 2000s, and new developments in color, mesh size, and material continue to be made. Hail netting, originally developed to protect pome fruit from hail damage, has begun to be adopted by growers in Minnesota, USA. The potential for hail netting to be used as a dual-purpose management tool, both to protect from hail and exclude key insect pests in Minnesota, is investigated in this study. This research examined the efficacy of hail netting as a pest exclusion tactic and the non-target effects of hail netting on fruit production and the natural enemy community.First, the efficacy of hail netting in reducing pest populations was compared to a commercial grower’s spray schedule in Minnesota. The insecticides used by the grower in 2021 and 2022 were clothianidin, abamectin, novaluron, and acetamiprid. The three insect pests that we monitored for were the codling moth (Cydia pomonella Linnaeus; Lepidoptera: Tortricidae), the apple maggot (Rhagoletis pomonella Walsh; Diptera: Tephritidae), and the red-banded leafroller (Argyrotaenia velutinana Walker; Lepidoptera: Tortricidae). This work was conducted as a two-year field study, with both years showing a significant reduction in pest pressure under the netting. Insecticide application did not significantly reduce pest pressure from any of the three pests. The interaction of netting and insecticide application was found to significantly improve fruit quality at harvest time. Neither netting nor insecticide was found to significantly influence apple yield. Second, hail netting significantly reduced predator family richness and the number of individuals that were caught. The most abundant predator family observed was Anthocoridae, along with Coccinellidae, Formicidae, and Empididae. All of these families were significantly reduced in number inside the netting. The diversity of predator families, evaluated using Simpson’s and Shannon’s diversity indices, was not significantly influenced by the netting or spray treatments. Spray treatments did not significantly reduce the family richness or the number of individual predators caught in any family. The environmental risk of the insecticides used in this study was evaluated using the Environmental Impact Quotient and the Pesticide Risk Tool. The tools had slightly different findings, but overall there was a higher risk to non-target arthropods caused by the neonicotinoids clothianidin and acetamiprid.

Toxocara canis and Toxocara cati are common nematode parasites of dogs and cats, and are capable of causing a variety of pathologies in humans. Human toxocariasis is a ubiquitous and likely under-diagnosed public health concern across the globe. Examination of soils in numerous public spaces worldwide readily detect Toxocara eggs and serological studies indicate a substantial exposure to this parasitic roundworm in human populations. This study sought to determine whether genetic evidence of pathogenic Toxocara species could be found in soils from local public spaces in a Minnesota community. Total genomic DNA was purified from soil samples obtained from public parks and PCR was performed using primers specific to either T. canis or T. cati. Genetic evidence for both species of Toxocara was found in soils surveyed. T. canis was identified in five of 12 public spaces surveyed and T. cati was present in two of the same 12 public spaces. Although the infectious potential of the Toxocara identified was not determined, the presence of this parasite in locations amenable to transmission to humans indicates the need for proper veterinary care of domestic dogs and cats as well as a greater emphasis on public health education and actions to prevent human infection.

Toxocara canis and Toxocara cati are common nematode parasites of dogs and cats, and are capable of causing a variety of pathologies in humans. Human toxocariasis is a ubiquitous and likely under-diagnosed public health concern across the globe. Examination of soils in numerous public spaces worldwide readily detect Toxocara eggs and serological studies indicate a substantial exposure to this parasitic roundworm in human populations. This study sought to determine whether genetic evidence of pathogenic Toxocara species could be found in soils from local public spaces in a Minnesota community. Total genomic DNA was purified from soil samples obtained from public parks and PCR was performed using primers specific to either T. canis or T. cati. Genetic evidence for both species of Toxocara was found in soils surveyed. T. canis was identified in five of 12 public spaces surveyed and T. cati was present in two of the same 12 public spaces. Although the infectious potential of the Toxocara identified was not determined, the presence of this parasite in locations amenable to transmission to humans indicates the need for proper veterinary care of domestic dogs and cats as well as a greater emphasis on public health education and actions to prevent human infection.