Tritordeum: Promising Cultivars to Improve Health.

Tritordeum is an amphiploides species resulting from the hybridization between durum wheat (T. durum) and wild barley (H. chilense). This new cereal is considered a natural crop as it is obtained by traditional breeding techniques. Given its appreciable organoleptic characteristics, agronomic features, presence of interesting components, and good technological properties, Tritordeum is of promising interest for the development of health-oriented foods. In this study, we evaluated two registered Tritordeum cultivars, Bulel and Aucan. T. durum (Provenzal) was employed as the positive control. The extracted proteins were digested by gastric/pancreatic proteases, and their biological effects on Caco-2 differentiated on transwell inserts were determined. Changes in cell viability, monolayer permeability, organization of F-actin microfilaments, and ER stress triggered by protein-digested samples (DPs) were inspected. Our results showed that exposure to Provenzal-DPs promptly disrupted the tight junction barrier. Conversely, Aucan-DPs did not enhance monolayer permeability, whereas Bulel-DPs exerted only slight effects. Provental-DPs-induced toxicity was also confirmed by changes in cell viability and by the deep reorganization of the enterocyte cytoskeleton. In contrast, Aucan-DPs and Bulel-DPs did not affect monolayer viability and cytoskeleton structure. Overall, our findings suggest that both Tritordeum cultivars could be potential candidates for mitigating the toxicity of wheat flour.

A comparative screening of laccase-mediator systems by white-rot fungi laccases for biocatalytic benzyl alcohol oxidation.

Production of value-added compounds from waste materials is of utmost importance for the development of a sustainable society especially regarding their use as catalysts in industrially relevant synthetic reactions. Herein, we show the production of laccases from four white-rot fungi, which were grown on agricultural residues, specifically Trametes versicolor 11269, Pleurotus ostreatus 1020, Panus tigrinus 707 and Lentinula edodes SC-495. The produced laccases were tested on a laccase-mediator system (LMS) for the biocatalytic oxidation of the model substrate benzyl alcohol into benzaldehyde. The LMS was carried out in the presence both of tetrahydrofuran as co-solvent and of the mediator 2,2,6,6-tetramethyl-1-piperidinyloxyl (TEMPO) due to its high redox potential and its ability to perform the oxidation. Tolerance studies showed that the dialyzed solutions were able to tolerate 1% (99:1 v/v) of co-solvent, whereas a concentration of 10% v/v had a detrimental activity. Performances in the biocatalytic oxidation of laccase solutions from different purification steps were compared. Similar conversion was observed for laccase in dialysis (raw) and gel filtration (GF) product versus commercial T. versicolor laccase. The latter oxidized almost 99% of substrate while the other laccase solutions were able to reach a conversion from 91% for the laccase solution from P. tigrinus 707 after dialysis, to 50% for the laccase solution from P. ostreatus 1020 after gel filtration. This work highlights the potential of unpurified laccase solutions to be used as catalysts in synthetic reactions.

Effectiveness of essential oil extracted from pompia leaves against Penicillium digitatum.

BACKGROUND: In recent years, interest in the use of natural compounds as possible substitutes for chemicals, to prevent microbial food spoilage has grown. The antimicrobial activity of the essential oils (EOs) is well known and nowadays there is renewed interest in their application as natural preservatives in postharvest management. The aims of this study were to characterize the EO extracted from pompia leaves and to evaluate its effectiveness for the control of the postharvest decay agent Penicillium digitatum, when applied as vapor contact in new airtight boxes, supplied with a heating system. RESULTS: Fumigation was performed in vitro and on food using two concentrations of the EO, heated at controlled temperature. The headspace analysis revealed that the heating of the EO favored the evaporation of the volatile compounds, without altering their functionality. The treatments reduced the pathogen growth in vitro and rot on inoculated food by about 50%. CONCLUSION: The chemical analysis of the vapor composition demonstrated that heating the oil did not alter the components and thus the antimicrobial effect of the oil. The treatment by vapor contact with the EO was effective in controlling the pathogen growth in vitro but, above all, it was successful in halving rot in vivo. Due to their bioactivity in the vapor phase, EOs could be delivered as fumigants during postharvest protection; however, the techniques commonly employed are not ideal for simulating real pre-treatment conditions. The new device allows real large-scale conditions to be reproduced. © 2020 Society of Chemical Industry.

Serendipitous In Situ Conservation of Faba Bean Landraces in Tunisia: A Case Study.

Cultivation of faba bean (Vicia faba L.) in Tunisia is largely based on improved varieties of the crop. However, a few farmers continue to produce local cultivars or landraces. The National Gene Bank of Tunisia (NGBT) recently launched a collection project for faba bean landraces, with special focus on the regions of the North West, traditionally devoted to cultivating grain legumes, and where around 80% of the total national faba bean cultivation area is located. The seed phenotypic features of the collected samples were studied, and the genetic diversity and population structure analyzed using simple sequence repeat markers. The genetic constitution of the present samples was compared to that of faba bean samples collected by teams of the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) in the 1970s in the same region, and stored at the ICARDA gene bank. The results of the diversity analysis demonstrate that the recently collected samples and those stored at ICARDA largely overlap, thus demonstrating that over the past 50 years, little genetic change has occurred to the local faba bean populations examined. These findings suggest that farmers serendipitously applied international best practices for in situ conservation of agricultural crops.

Corrigendum: Can High Throughput Phenotyping Help Food Security in the Mediterranean Area?

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.3389/fpls.2019.00015.].

Can High Throughput Phenotyping Help Food Security in the Mediterranean Area?

According to the IPCC 2014 report the Mediterranean region will be affected by strong climatic changes, both in terms of average temperature and of precipitations regime. This area hosts some half a billion people and the impact on food production will be severe. To implement a climate smart agriculture paradigm and a sustainable increase of agricultural productivity different approaches can be deployed. Agriculture alone consumes 70% of the entire water available on the planet, thus the observed reduction of useful rainfall and growing costs for irrigation water may severely constrain food security. In our work we focused on two typical Mediterranean crops: durum wheat, a rainfed crop, and tomato, an irrigated one. In wheat we explored the possibility of identifying genotypes resilient to water stress for future breeding aims, while in tomato we explored the possibility of using biostimulants to increase the plant capacity of using water. In order to achieve these targets, we used high throughput phenotyping (HTP). Two traits were considered: digital biovolume, a measure based on imaging techniques in the RGB domain, and Water Use Efficiency index as calculated semi-automatically on the basis of evaporation measurements resulting in a high throughput, non-destructive, non-invasive approach, as opposed to destructive and time consuming traditional methods. Our results clearly indicate that HTP is able to discriminate genotypes and biostimulant treatments that allow plants to use soil water more efficiently. In addition, these methods based on RGB quality images can easily be scaled to field phenotyping structure USVs or UAVs.

In Vivo Phenotyping for the Early Detection of Drought Stress in Tomato.

Drought stress imposes a major constraint over a crop yield and can be expected to grow in importance if the climate change predicted comes about. Improved methods are needed to facilitate crop management via the prompt detection of the onset of stress. Here, we report the use of an in vivo OECT (organic electrochemical transistor) sensor, termed as bioristor, in the context of the drought response of the tomato plant. The device was integrated within the plant's stem, thereby allowing for the continuous monitoring of the plant's physiological status throughout its life cycle. Bioristor was able to detect changes of ion concentration in the sap upon drought, in particular, those dissolved and transported through the transpiration stream, thus efficiently detecting the occurrence of drought stress immediately after the priming of the defence responses. The bioristor's acquired data were coupled with those obtained in a high-throughput phenotyping platform revealing the extreme complementarity of these methods to investigate the mechanisms triggered by the plant during the drought stress event.

Isolation and Characterization of the Flavonol Regulator CcMYB12 From the Globe Artichoke [Cynara cardunculus var. scolymus (L.) Fiori].

Flavonoids are a well-studied group of secondary metabolites, belonging to the phenylpropanoid pathway. Flavonoids are known to exhibit health promoting effects such as antioxidant capacities, anti-cancer and anti-inflammatory activity. Globe artichoke is an important source of bioactive phenolic compounds, including flavonoids. To study the regulation of their biosynthesis, a R2R3-MYB transcription factor, CcMYB12, was isolated from artichoke leaves. Phylogenetic analysis showed that this protein belongs to the MYB subgroup 7 (flavonol-specific MYB), which includes Arabidopsis AtMYB12, grapevine VvMYBF1, and tomato SlMYB12. CcMYB12 transcripts were detected specifically in artichoke immature inflorescence and young leaves and overlapped with the profiles of flavonol biosynthetic genes. Electrophoretic mobility shift assays (EMSAs) revealed that recombinant CcMYB12 protein is able to bind to ACII element, a DNA binding site ubiquitously present in the promoters of genes encoding flavonol biosynthetic enzymes. In transgenic Arabidopsis plants, the overexpression of CcMYB12 activated the expression of endogenous flavonol biosynthesis genes, leading to an increase of flavonol accumulation and a decrease of anthocyanins in leaves. Likewise, in transgenic tobacco petals and leaves, the overexpression of CcMYB12 decreased anthocyanin levels and increased flavonols.

Complete chloroplast genome of the multifunctional crop globe artichoke and comparison with other Asteraceae.

With over 20,000 species, Asteraceae is the second largest plant family. High-throughput sequencing of nuclear and chloroplast genomes has allowed for a better understanding of the evolutionary relationships within large plant families. Here, the globe artichoke chloroplast (cp) genome was obtained by a combination of whole-genome and BAC clone high-throughput sequencing. The artichoke cp genome is 152,529 bp in length, consisting of two single-copy regions separated by a pair of inverted repeats (IRs) of 25,155 bp, representing the longest IRs found in the Asteraceae family so far. The large (LSC) and the small (SSC) single-copy regions span 83,578 bp and 18,641 bp, respectively. The artichoke cp sequence was compared to the other eight Asteraceae complete cp genomes available, revealing an IR expansion at the SSC/IR boundary. This expansion consists of 17 bp of the ndhF gene generating an overlap between the ndhF and ycf1 genes. A total of 127 cp simple sequence repeats (cpSSRs) were identified in the artichoke cp genome, potentially suitable for future population studies in the Cynara genus. Parsimony-informative regions were evaluated and allowed to place a Cynara species within the Asteraceae family tree. The eight most informative coding regions were also considered and tested for "specific barcode" purpose in the Asteraceae family. Our results highlight the usefulness of cp genome sequencing in exploring plant genome diversity and retrieving reliable molecular resources for phylogenetic and evolutionary studies, as well as for specific barcodes in plants.