Integrative Pre-Breeding for Biotic Resistance in Forest Trees.

Climate change is unleashing novel biotic antagonistic interactions for forest trees that may jeopardize populations' persistence. Therefore, this review article envisions highlighting major opportunities from ecological evolutionary genomics to assist the identification, conservation, and breeding of biotic resistance in forest tree species. Specifically, we first discuss how assessing the genomic architecture of biotic stress resistance enables us to recognize a more polygenic nature for a trait typically regarded Mendelian, an expectation from the Fisherian runaway pathogen-host concerted arms-race evolutionary model. Secondly, we outline innovative pipelines to capture and harness natural tree pre-adaptations to biotic stresses by merging tools from the ecology, phylo-geography, and omnigenetics fields within a predictive breeding platform. Promoting integrative ecological genomic studies promises a better understanding of antagonistic co-evolutionary interactions, as well as more efficient breeding utilization of resistant phenotypes.

Screening of autochthonous vaginal beneficial lactobacilli strains by their growth at high temperatures for technological applications.

The pharmaceutical industry shows an emerging interest in formulas that contain live and beneficial microorganisms, also known as probiotics or pharmabiotics, which in many cases, are host-specific. The resistance to higher temperature is an essential feature of these microorganisms when working on the design of products for vaginal formula. In order to obtain a high number of viable cells and a prolonged shelf life in the designed product, it is required to apply technological procedures using high temperatures or abrupt changes of them, which result in conditions that are different from the optimal growth temperature and can affect the metabolic capabilities of the bacteria when administered to the host in order to reestablish the ecological mucosa. The aim of this work was to evaluate the behavior of 30 different species and strains of autochthonous beneficial vaginal lactobacilli (BVL) when exposed to high temperatures, determine their survival capabilities and analyze their pre-adaptation to those temperatures, in order that they still maintain their viability after technological processes and further conservation. BVL were exhibited to temperatures higher than optimal, with the purpose of evaluating their growth kinetics and parameters. Later, they were exposed to higher temperatures, and then, returned to their optimal, to determine if they were able to grow again. The strains that showed higher resistance were selected, and their viability and beneficial properties studied further. The growth kinetics of strains exposed to higher temperatures showed different patterns, which provided evidence that the thermal adaptation is strain-dependent and is not related to any particular species and/or metabolic group in which the strains were taxonomically classified. The pre-adaptive step allowed the growth of some of the strains, preserving their viability and probiotic properties after the high temperatures were applied. The results shows that BVL can be exposed to high temperatures used in different technological processes that are applied for pharmabiotic formulations, such as spray dried or vacuum rotary evaporation, and/or during the conservation period. The results obtained indicate that some specific BVL strains resist high temperatures and grow afterwards at optimal conditions.

Corrigendum to: The establishment of Central American migratory corridors and the biogeographic origins of seasonally dry tropical forests in Mexico.

[This corrects the article on p. 433 in vol. 5, PMID: 25566320.].

The establishment of Central American migratory corridors and the biogeographic origins of seasonally dry tropical forests in Mexico.

Biogeography and community ecology can mutually illuminate the formation of a regional species pool or biome. Here, we apply phylogenetic methods to a large and diverse plant clade, Malpighiaceae, to characterize the formation of its species pool in Mexico, and its occupancy of the seasonally dry tropical forest (SDTF) biome that occurs there. We find that the ~162 species of Mexican Malpighiaceae represent ~33 dispersals from South America beginning in the Eocene and continuing until the Pliocene (~46.4-3.8 Myr). Furthermore, dispersal rates between South America and Mexico show a significant six-fold increase during the mid-Miocene (~23.9 Myr). We hypothesize that this increase marked the availability of Central America as an important corridor for Neotropical plant migration. We additionally demonstrate that this high rate of dispersal contributed substantially more to the phylogenetic diversity of Malpighiaceae in Mexico than in situ diversification. Finally, we show that most lineages arrived in Mexico pre-adapted with regard to one key SDTF trait, total annual precipitation. In contrast, these lineages adapted to a second key trait, precipitation seasonality, in situ as mountain building in the region gave rise to the abiotic parameters of extant SDTF. The timing of this in situ adaptation to seasonal precipitation suggests that SDTF likely originated its modern characteristics by the late Oligocene, but was geographically more restricted until its expansion in the mid-Miocene. These results highlight the complex interplay of dispersal, adaptation, and in situ diversification in the formation of tropical biomes. Our results additionally demonstrate that these processes are not static, and their relevance can change markedly over evolutionary time. This has important implications for understanding the origin of SDTF in Mexico, but also for understanding the temporal and spatial origin of biomes and regional species pools more broadly.