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Genomic and functional analyses reveal Pseudomonas granadensis CT364 is a plant growth-promoting endophyte
Get PDFBackground: Plant-associated endophytes offer promising agricultural, environmental, and biotechnological applications. Despite their potential utility, difficulties in culturing these microorganisms under laboratory conditions have limited both their isolation and a comprehensive understanding of their biology, function, and ecological role. Against this background, Pseudomonas granadensis strain CT364—isolated from the olive tree rhizosphere—emerged as a potential endophyte of interest due to its cultivability and its ability to promote rooting across diverse species, including olive trees, rapeseed, mung bean and cowpea. Results: Genome Annotation and in silico predictions identified 564 genes linked to rhizosphere competence, plant colonisation and plant growth-promoting traits. Experimental findings confirmed the strain’s motility, capacity for biofilm formation, and ability to sense and respond to plant-derived signals. P. granadensis CT364 effectively colonises the rhizosphere, rhizoplane, and internal tissues of Arabidopsis, confirming its endophytic nature without exhibiting any pathogenic traits. Inoculation experiments demonstrated significant effects on root architecture and increases in plant biomass and rosette area. Notably, these benefits were retained under salinity and osmotic stress, underscoring its plant growth-promoting ability. Finally, both genome analysis and experimental tests confirmed its resistance to osmotic stress and heavy metal toxicity, highlighting the strain’s ability to survive in difficult environments. Conclusions: The integration of genomic insights and experimental validation supports the conclusion that P. granadensis CT364 is a plant growth-promoting endophytic bacterium. Its ability to enhance plant development under both optimal and stressful conditions, combined with its ability to colonise Arabidopsis and non-pathogenic nature, positions this strain as a potential bioinoculant for sustainable agriculture. Furthermore, the identification of specific genes related to plant sensing and colonisation, and its genetic tractability, open avenues for exploring underlying mechanisms of plant–microbe interactions. In summary, P. granadensis CT364 therefore not only holds potential for improving crop performance under challenging environmental conditions but also offers a valuable model for the study of beneficial plant–bacterial symbiosis
Comment on “Revealing the Cape Verde Hotspot Track Across the Great Lakes” by Tao et al.
Get PDFTao et al. (2025, https://doi.org/10.1029/2024gl110777) propose that the Cape Verde hotspot influenced lithospheric structures and the geological evolution of the Great Lakes region, ultimately shaping the modern‐day Great Lakes. However, their interpretation conflicts with other observations. Pre‐Mesozoic tectonic features including the Palaeozoic Michigan Basin and major structural zones predate any proposed Mesozoic hotspot and likely controlled basin formation. Tao et al. (2025, https://doi.org/10.1029/2024gl110777)'s interpretation of a seismic anisotropy anomaly as the remnants of a hotspot track is non‐unique, and inconsistent with a linear hotspot track. Different Atlantic hotspot reconstructions predict widespread plume tracks across North America, making the approach unreliable for constraining regional geodynamics. Prior studies that conclude glacial erosion exploiting pre‐existing tectonic structures offer a more robust and testable explanation for Great Lakes formation
Practical atmospheric photochemical kinetics for undergraduate teaching and research
Get PDFIncluding practical atmospheric chemistry in the undergraduate syllabus presents numerous challenges: most research grade equipment is too complex and expensive, and can require extensive safety training for students to use independently and efficiently. Herein we report an undergraduate analytical project that can be effectively performed in teaching laboratories equipped with standard UV-vis spectrometers, centred around an important application of photochemical kinetics in atmospheric research. Carbonyl containing compounds in dilute cyclohexane solutions may be considered as in a “quasi-gas-phase” environment. Measurements of absorption spectra in such solutions can therefore provide useful information into the atmospheric photochemistry of carbonyl compounds – a critically understudied aspect of atmospheric kinetics. We have delivered this course for two years and found that a project centred around collecting, processing, and understanding the atmospheric implications of these spectra is accessible to a range of student abilities and is an excellent tool for introducing the wider concepts and impacts of atmospheric chemistry
Surrogate model-based multi-objective Bayesian optimisation of porous acoustic barriers
Get PDFMany engineering challenges involve optimising multiple criteria that often represent conflicting targets, posing significant difficulties for standard methods like gradient-based algorithms. This complexity is especially important in the context of acoustic wave propagation, where noise barriers are designed to attenuate sound pressure level (SPL). Achieving optimal performance requires carefully balancing design factors such as shape and material selection with economic constraints, making the optimisation process both technically demanding and computationally intensive. This paper proposes the development of a noise prediction surrogate model for the multi-objective optimisation of acoustic barriers. This model is developed based on data set generated employing a two-dimensional singular boundary method. The optimisation process is conducted using a multi-objective Bayesian optimisation algorithm, which is applied to the problem of acoustic line source diffraction in the presence of a porous noise barrier. Two distinct barrier configurations are considered: a straight-walled barrier and a T-shaped barrier. With a view to reduce the SPL behind the noise barrier, the set of spanned parameters includes the SPL on the side of the barrier opposite to the source, barrier’s height, cap length of T-shaped barrier, porosity, tortuosity, and airflow resistivity of the material, integrating both microstructural and macrostructural aspects into the optimisation. Surface impedance boundary condition is used in the model to represent the dissipation at the surface of the noise barrier. The results demonstrate that the proposed optimisation framework enables efficient exploration of trade-offs to achieve an optimal barrier design that balances acoustic performance, material cost, and shape constraints
‘You wouldn’t want to get rid of criminal justice processes’: tensions involved with criminalising family abuse based on identities of gender and sexuality in England and Wales
Get PDFIn this article we engage with debates about the usefulness of the law in England and Wales in addressing family abuse perpetration drawing on qualitative empirical data. Initially, we provide our conceptual framework for making sense of family abuse as a form of ’honour’-based abuse, which starts with a consideration of its definition. Subsequently, we provide an overview of the debates about whether and what role the law might have in addressing family abuse. This includes drawing from our work that understands family abuse as being the product of individual, community and societal factors each of which, depending on the context and individual family, might act as a push towards family abuse, or a pull away from it. In the methodology we explain our approach to collecting data through interviews with practitioners and faith leaders, case studies and data from existing data sets. Our findings indicate a separation of what is meant by the law into legislation and the criminal justice system (CJS). Participants evidence a contingent consensus that legislation is crucial to promote prevention and early intervention by defining criminal behaviour. However, most also show little faith in the CJS because of its systemic underfunding, inefficiency and the systemic discrimination leads to minoritised groups being wary of using i
Chemical characterisation of small substructures in the local stellar halo
Get PDFContext. The local stellar halo of the Milky Way is known to contain the debris from accreted dwarf galaxies and globular clusters in the form of stellar streams and over-densities in the space of orbital properties (e.g. integrals of motion).Aims. While several over-densities have been uncovered and characterised dynamically using Gaia data, their nature is not always clear. Especially for a complete understanding of the smaller halo substructures, the kinematic information from Gaia needs to be coupled with chemical information.Methods. In this work, we combine Gaia data with targeted high-resolution UVES spectroscopy of five small substructures that were recently discovered in the local halo, namely ED-2, -3, -4, -5, and -6 (the ED streams). We present the chemical abundances measured from our newly obtained UVES spectra (20 stars) and from archival UVES spectra (nine stars). We compared these with homogeneously derived abundances from archive spectra of 12 Gaia Enceladus (GE) stars.Results. The chemical abundances of all five substructures suggest that they are of accreted origin, except for two stars that present a high [α/Fe] at high [Fe/H] more in line with an in situ origin. All but ED-2 present a significant spread in [Fe/H] suggestive of a dwarf galaxy origin. ED-3 and ED-4 tend to exhibit a lower [α/Fe] compared to GE stars. As for ED-5 and ED-6, they are consistent with the GE chemical track and could be high-energy tails of GE that were lost earlier in the accretion process. We present new elemental abundances for five ED-2 stars, including more elements for the Gaia BH3 companion star. Our findings are in line with the picture that ED-2 is a disrupted ancient star cluster
2025 Political Geography Plenary: On the bad timeline: Dissociative geo-politics in the time of Trump
No full textDistortion, unreality, a confusion of perspective: it is hard to shake the feeling of “time out of joint” in the period since Trump’s re-election to the White House in November 2024. This Plenary argues that Trump’s re-mapping of the United States’ global role is both cause and symptom of a broader phenomenon of dissociative geopolitics, in which the geo- is at once destroyed and preserved beyond its catastrophe. Drawing on the clinic of dissociation, I propose a way to unsettle two interlinked fantasies that structure this moment. The first is the fantasy of the world as a totalized whole – an object of mastery whose coherence can be produced through division and cutting. Yet climate breakdown, toxicity, genocide, and dehumanization cannot be contained or hived off. The second is the multiversal fantasy, in which infinite alternate realities promise escape from contradiction, turning crisis into consumable content. The article unfolds through three modes of splitting from reality – the unreal event, the de-realization of the world, and multiversal fantasy – each linked to dissociation as an unconscious process. Against fantasies of totality or endless substitution, the clinic of dissociation offers a politics of staying with fracture, insisting that what is at stake is not another world elsewhere but this one, in its damaged, shared, and unmasterable present
‘A Voice Amidst Mine Ears’: Silent Angels on the Early Modern Stage
Get PDFUnlike the carts that crawled with angels in the medieval pageant plays, angels of the early modern stage were a rare breed. Eventually they disappeared from the stage altogether; they did not, however, disappear all at once in a puff of celestial smoke. This article reveals a pattern of suppression in the representation of angels on the English stage, ranging from Christopher Marlowe's Doctor Faustus in 1592 until 1645, three years after the closure of the theatres in England. This study examines plays that present angels as characters who contribute to the play's action and denouement; however, by noting plays that include allegorical and decorative angels too, it comprises the most comprehensive survey of angels within plays from the period to date. Angels do not appear in many plays performed at the commercial playhouses of Elizabethan and Jacobean England; but when they do, it becomes clear that early modern playwrights gradually developed more calculated ways of staging these controversial creatures. As stage angels assume more silent roles, but before angels leave the stage entirely, human characters begin to communicate with these celestial figures differently and encounters with angels become a far more intimate experience
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