University of Maine

About: University of Maine is a education organization based out in Orono, Maine, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Ice sheet. The organization has 8637 authors who have published 16932 publications receiving 590124 citations. The organization is also known as: University of Maine at Orono.

The rhizosphere microbiota of plant invaders: an overview of recent advances in the microbiomics of invasive plants.

Abstract: Plants in terrestrial systems have evolved in direct association with microbes functioning as both agonists and antagonists of plant fitness and adaptability. As such, investigations that segregate plants and microbes provide only a limited scope of the biotic interactions that dictate plant community structure and composition in natural systems. Invasive plants provide an excellent working model to compare and contrast the effects of microbial communities associated with natural plant populations on plant fitness, adaptation, and fecundity. The last decade of DNA sequencing technology advancements opened the door to microbial community analysis, which has led to an increased awareness of the importance of an organism's microbiome and the disease states associated with microbiome shifts. Employing microbiome analysis to study the symbiotic networks associated with invasive plants will help us to understand what microorganisms contribute to plant fitness in natural systems, how different soil microbial communities impact plant fitness and adaptability, specificity of host-microbe interactions in natural plant populations, and the selective pressures that dictate the structure of above-ground and below-ground biotic communities. This review discusses recent advances in invasive plant biology that have resulted from microbiome analyses as well as the microbial factors that direct plant fitness and adaptability in natural systems.

An independently dated 2000-yr volcanic record from Law Dome, East Antarctica, including a new perspective on the dating of the 1450s CE eruption of Kuwae, Vanuatu

Abstract: Volcanic eruptions are an important cause of nat- ural climate variability. In order to improve the accuracy of climate models, precise dating and magnitude of the climatic effects of past volcanism are necessary. Here we present a 2000-yr record of Southern Hemisphere volcanism recorded in ice cores from the high accumulation Law Dome site, East Antarctica. The ice cores were analysed for a suite of chemistry signals and are independently dated via annual layer counting, with 11 ambiguous years at 23 BCE, which has presently the lowest error of all published long Antarc- tic ice cores. Independently dated records are important to avoid circular dating where volcanic signatures are assigned a date from some external information rather than using the date it is found in the ice core. Forty-five volcanic events have been identified using the sulphate chemistry of the Law Dome record. The low dating error and comparison with the NGRIP (North Greenland Ice Core Project) volcanic records (on the GICC05 timescale) suggest Law Dome is the most accurately dated Antarctic volcanic dataset, which will im- prove the dating of individual volcanic events and potentially allow better correlation between ice core records, leading to improvements in global volcanic forcing datasets. One of the most important volcanic events of the last two millennia is the large 1450s CE event, usually assigned to the eruption of Kuwae, Vanuatu. In this study, we review the evidence sur- rounding the presently accepted date for this event, and make the case that two separate eruptions have caused confusion in the assignment of this event. Volcanic sulphate deposition es- timates are important for modelling the climatic response to eruptions. The largest volcanic sulphate events in our record are dated at 1458 CE (Kuwae?, Vanuatu), 1257 and 422 CE (unidentified).

Protein functionality modification by extrusion cooking

Abstract: Cooking extruders process high-protein materials into palatable foods. New applications have been developed for protein extrusion during the past decade. Improvements in functional characteristics of proteins may be achieved through modification of temperature, screw speed, moisture content, and other extrusion parameters. Flavors and odors may be removed during expansion at the extruder die. Extrusion can improve the digestibility of proteins, while reducing gossypol, proteinase inhibitors, allergens, aflatoxins, and other undesirable compounds. In the future the use of extruders as chemical reactors for both animal and plant proteins will provide new food ingredients as well as novel, nutritious foods.