The Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) will be a world-class neutrino observatory and nucleon decay detector designed to answer fundamental questions about the nature of elementary particles and their role in the universe.

Miscanthus sacchariflorus is a fast-growing C4 perennial grass that can naturally hybridize with M. sinensis to produce interspecific hybrids, such as the sterile triploid M.× giganteus. The creation of such hybrids is essential for the rapid domestication of this novel bioenergy crop. However, progress has been hindered by poor understanding of the environmental cues promoting floral transition in M. sacchariflorus, which flowers less readily than M. sinensis. The purpose of this work was to identify the flowering requirements of M. sacchariflorus genotypes in order to expedite the introduction of new germplasm optimized to different environments. Six M. sacchariflorus accessions collected from a range of latitudes were grown under controlled photoperiod and temperature conditions, and flowering, biomass, and morphological phenotypic data were captured. Results indicated that M. sacchariflorus, irrespective of origin, is a quantitative short-day plant. Flowering under static long days (15.3h daylength), compared with shorter photoperiods, was delayed by an average 61 d, with an average associated increase of 52% of above-ground biomass (DM plant–1). Timing of floral initiation occurred between photoperiods of 14.2h and 12.1h, and accumulated temperatures of 553–1157 °C above a base temperature of 10 °C. Miscanthus sacchariflorus flowering phenology closely resembles that of Sorghum and Saccharum, indicating potentially similar floral pathways and suggesting that determination of the underlying genetic mechanisms will be facilitated by the syntenic relationships existing between these important C4 grasses.

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Eight strains each of Bacillus subtilis, Bacillus pumilus, Bacillus licheniformis, and Bacillus amyloliquefaciens were analyzed by using pyrolysis gas-liquid chromatography. Statistical analysis with canonical variates gave four well-separated groups, which represented the four species. Further analysis of the same strains by deoxyribonucleic acid-deoxyribonucleic acid hybridization and API identification systems confirmed the discrimination obtained with pyrolysis gasliquid chromatography. However, analysis by biochemical tests performed in the classical way gave only three groups since it was not possible to achieve separation of the strains representing B. subtilis from those of B. amyloliquefaciens when these tests were used.Pyrolysis, a process whereby molecules are thermally degraded in an inert gas atmosphere, has enhanced the use of conventional gas-liquid chromatography by enabling nonvolatile compounds to be analyzed. Pyrolysis gas-liquid chromatography (PGLC) was fmt proposed as an approach to microbial differentiation by Oyama (15) during the development of a system aimed at detecting life on Mars. However, its potential in microbiology was not appreciated until Reiner (17) was able to distinguish different species of Mycobacterium and different serotypes of Escherichia coti in a reproducible manner. Since then, PGLC has been used in the differentiation of numerous types of bacteria (10, 18, 22) and fungi (5,231. The recent application of PGLC to aerobic sporeformers by Oxborrow et al. (12)(13)(14) indicates that, providing the cultural and chromatographic conditions remain constant, PGLC can be applied usefully to the characterization of bacilli.The variation between pyrograms of the same strain and the high level of redundancy found in PGLC data require the application of data processing techniques capable of highlighting significant variations in the heights of specific peaks. Several methods for handling data in this t Present address: School of Chemistry, The University, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, NE1 7RU, United Kingdom.way have been described (10, 16), but as yet there is no agreement on the best statistical approach, and much work remains to be done in this field. This paper reports on the usefulness of lowresolution PGLC when coupled to multivariate data analysis for differentiating closely related groups of bacteria and provides evidence for the separation of Bacillus antyloliquefaciens from Bacillus subtilis. MATERIALS AND METHODS

Miscanthus, a C4 perennial grass native to Eastern Asia, is being bred to provide biomass for bioenergy and biorenewable products. Commercial expansion with the clonal hybrid M. × giganteus is limited by low multiplication rates, high establishment costs and drought sensitivity. These limitations can be overcome by breeding more resilient Miscanthus hybrids propagated by seed. Naturally occurring fast growing indigenous Miscanthus species are found in diverse environments across Eastern Asia. The natural diversity provides for plant breeders, the genetic resources to improve yield, quality, and resilience for a wide range of climates and adverse abiotic stresses. The challenge for Miscanthus breeding is to harness the diversity through selections of outstanding wild types, parents, and progenies over a short time frame to deploy hybrids that make a significant contribution to a world less dependent on fossil resources. Here are described the strategies taken by the Miscanthus breeding programme at Aberystwyth, UK and its partners. The programme built up one of the largest Miscanthus germplasm collections outside Asia. We describe the initial strategies to exploit the available genetic diversity to develop varieties. We illustrate the success of combining diverse Miscanthus germplasm and the selection criteria applied across different environments to identify promising hybrids and to develop these into commercial varieties. We discuss the potential for molecular selections to streamline the breeding process.