Commons Attribution (CC BY) license, which allows users to download, copy and build upon published articles, as long as the author and publisher are properly credited, which ensures maximum dissemination and a wider impact of our publications. Preface to "Responses of Plants to Environmental Stresses"Plants are constantly exposed to unfavorable environmental conditions, which play a major role in determining the productivity of crops worldwide. Abiotic factors also determine the geographical distribution of plant species across Earth's different zones. Among the abiotic stresses with which plants must cope, we distinguish: water availability, extreme temperatures, nutrient deficiency, excess light, heavy metals, and salinity. The plant's success depends on the adaptation and acclimation mechanisms, which are directly or indirectly related to photosynthesis as well as growth and development processes.The plant response to environmental stresses involves multiple processes, which include complex mechanisms on all organismal levels: whole-plant, physiological, cellular, biochemical, and molecular. The abiotic stress response activates multidirectional interactions and crosstalk between these levels. One of the greatest challenges in modern plant biology is identifying these complex interactions underlying abiotic stress responses using all available tools (e.g., genetic engineering and bioinformatics) and experimental approaches (e.g., physiological, biochemical, molecular, and omics studies).Today, a large amount of new information is available in the dynamic and expanding field of knowledge on plants' environmental stress responses. The data provided in this book fill a large gap in our understanding of these processes and integrate a large part of the scientific knowledge spectrum of plants' abiotic-stress-related mechanisms. The present book encompasses 15 articles: 1 review, 1 brief report and communication, as well as 13 original papers. Together, they demonstrate the complexity of the plant response to environmental factors, which engages different mechanisms on all organism levels. All original reports provide a methodological approaches for studying the plant stress response. Research was conducted on different species, including model plant Arabidopsis, crops (i.e., crabapple, bottle gourd, cotton, wheat, moso bamboo, rice, barley, eggplant, and ramie), ornamental plants (Portulaca ad Dendrobium), as well as species growing in severe conditions (Elymus sibiericus and Colobanthus quitensis). Eleven articles present information concerning changes in physiological parameters in plants exposed to heat, drought, salinity, or nitrogen, and CO 2 deficiency. The emphasis is placed, amongst others, on phenotypic, biochemical, and molecular traits, such as: photosynthetic activity and chlorophyll fluorescence (Wang et al.; Gomez-Espinoza et al.), root system architecture (Rafael et al.), rhizome integration (Jing et al.), antioxidants activity (Borsai et al.; Toth et al.; Huang et al.; Lei et al.), cellulose fiber q...

The MalaCards human disease database (http://www.malacards.org/) is an integrated compendium of annotated diseases mined from 68 data sources. MalaCards has a web card for each of ∼20 000 disease entries, in six global categories. It portrays a broad array of annotation topics in 15 sections, including Summaries, Symptoms, Anatomical Context, Drugs, Genetic Tests, Variations and Publications. The Aliases and Classifications section reflects an algorithm for disease name integration across often-conflicting sources, providing effective annotation consolidation. A central feature is a balanced Genes section, with scores reflecting the strength of disease-gene associations. This is accompanied by other gene-related disease information such as pathways, mouse phenotypes and GO-terms, stemming from MalaCards’ affiliation with the GeneCards Suite of databases. MalaCards’ capacity to inter-link information from complementary sources, along with its elaborate search function, relational database infrastructure and convenient data dumps, allows it to tackle its rich disease annotation landscape, and facilitates systems analyses and genome sequence interpretation. MalaCards adopts a ‘flat’ disease-card approach, but each card is mapped to popular hierarchical ontologies (e.g. International Classification of Diseases, Human Phenotype Ontology and Unified Medical Language System) and also contains information about multi-level relations among diseases, thereby providing an optimal tool for disease representation and scrutiny.

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

This exploratory study aims to create an evidence-based comprehensive characterization of hyperkalemic periodic paralysis (hyperPP). HyperPP is a rare genetic disorder that causes episodes of flaccid paralysis. Disease descriptions in the literature are based upon isolated clinical encounters and case reports. We describe the experience of a large cohort of genetically diagnosed individuals with hyperPP. We surveyed genetically characterized individuals age 18 and over to assess disease comorbidities, diagnostic testing, management, and quality of life issues relevant to hyperPP. Myotonia was reported by 55.8 % of subjects and paramyotonia by 45.3 %. There is a relative risk of 3.6 (p < 0.0001) for thyroid dysfunction compared to the general population. Twenty-five percent of subjects experienced their sentinel attack in the second decade of life. It took an average of 19.4 years and visits to four physicians to arrive at the diagnosis of hyperPP. In addition to limbs and hands being affected during attacks, 26.1 % of subjects reported their breathing musculature was affected and 62.0 % reported their facial muscles were affected. There was a lifelong trend of increasing attack frequency, which was particularly common during childhood and adolescence. Approximately one-third of individuals experienced progressive myopathy. Permanent muscle weakness was evident and worsened during childhood and after age 40. Those with no chronic treatment regimen have a RR of 2.3 for inadequate disease control compared to those taking long-term medications. This study revealed a multitude of heretofore unidentified characteristics of hyperPP, in addition to providing a different perspective on some previously held notions regarding the condition.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s00415-013-7025-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

The timing of head lice maturation most favorable to their survival in the presence of anti-lice agents is the maximum time as an ovum (12 days) and the shortest possible time of maturing from newly hatched nymph to egg-laying adult (8.5 days). Pediculicides that are not reliably ovicidal (pyrethroids and lindane) require 2 to 3 treatment cycles to eradicate lice. Ovicidal therapies (malathion) require 1 to 2 treatments. Treatment with an agent to which there is genetic resistance is unproductive. In the United States, lice have become increasingly resistant to pyrethroids and lindane but not to malathion. Treatment with malathion has favorable efficacy and safety profiles and enables the immediate, safe return to school. Nit combing can be performed adjunctively. No-nit policies should be rendered obsolete.