Publications
NIBIOs employees contribute to several hundred scientific articles and research reports every year. You can browse or search in our collection which contains references and links to these publications as well as other research and dissemination activities. The collection is continously updated with new and historical material.
2020
Authors
Inger Sundheim FløistadAbstract
No abstract has been registered
Abstract
Blue light (BL) affects different growth parameters, but information about the physiological effects of BL on conifer seedlings is limited. In northern areas, conifer seedlings are commonly produced in heated nursery greenhouses. Compared with Norway spruce, subalpine fir seedlings commonly show poor growth in nurseries due to early growth cessation. This study aimed to examine the effect of the BL proportion on the growth and development of such conifer seedlings in growth chambers, using similar photosynthetic active radiation, with 5% or 30% BL (400–500 nm) from high pressure sodium (HPS) lamps (300 μmol m−2 s−1) or a combination of HPS (225 μmol m−2 s−1) and BL-emitting diodes (75 μmol m−2 s−1), respectively. Additional BL increased transpiration and improved the growth of the Norway spruce seedlings, which developed thicker stems, more branches, and a higher dry matter (DM) of roots and needles, with an increased DM percentage in the roots compared with the shoots. In contrast, under additional BL, subalpine fir showed reduced transpiration and an increased terminal bud formation and lower DM in the stems and needles but no change in the DM distribution. Since these conifers respond differently to BL, the proportion of BL during the day should be considered when designing light spectra for tree seedling production.
Abstract
No abstract has been registered
Authors
Tore SkrøppaAbstract
No abstract has been registered
Abstract
Controlled crosses were made on clones in a seed orchard and the pollination bags were kept on the branches until the cones were harvested. Cones after open pollination were collected at the same time. Seedlings from the controlled pollinations, from open pollination of the same maternal parent and from commercial provenances were grown in growth chambers and terminal bud set was recorded after short day treatments. The seedlings from the seeds of cones that were kept in the pollination bags had a significantly later bud set then expected based on comparisons with their half-sibs from open pollination. The difference corresponds to a decrease in altitude of 100 m at provenance level. It can be caused by epigenetic effects due to temperature differences inside and outside the bags during seed maturation.
Abstract
Skog er viktig i Norge. Det er uttalt politisk vilje til å styrke skogens bidrag for økonomisk verdiskaping i landbruket og for å nå viktige mål knyttet til energi, klima, miljøverdier og økosystemtjenester. Skogressursene er viktige for å opprettholde et bærekraftig landbruk og matproduksjon over hele landet, ettersom inntekt fra skogen bidrar til den totale inntekten for mange aktive bønder. Skogene er også viktige for rekreasjon og for folkehelsa. Skogtregenetiske ressurser i Norge brukes i produksjonsskogbruk, til skogplanting etter hogst og på annet areal, eller til treslagsskifte. De brukes også til juletreproduksjon, til landskapsformål eller i parker og hager....
Authors
Baiba Krivmane Ilze Šņepste Vilnis Šķipars Igor A. Yakovlev Carl Gunnar Fossdal Adam Vivian-Smith Dainis RuņģisAbstract
MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are non-protein coding RNAs of ~20–24 nucleotides in length that play an important role in many biological and metabolic processes, including the regulation of gene expression, plant growth and developmental processes, as well as responses to stress and pathogens. The aim of this study was to identify and characterize novel and conserved microRNAs expressed in methyl jasmonate-treated Scots pine needles. In addition, potential precursor sequences and target genes of the identified miRNAs were determined by alignment to the Pinus unigene set. Potential precursor sequences were identified using the miRAtool, conserved miRNA precursors were also tested for the ability to form the required stem-loop structure, and the minimal folding free energy indexes were calculated. By comparison with miRBase, 4975 annotated sequences were identified and assigned to 173 miRNA groups, belonging to a total of 60 conserved miRNA families. A total of 1029 potential novel miRNAs, grouped into 34 families were found, and 46 predicted precursor sequences were identified. A total of 136 potential target genes targeted by 28 families were identified. The majority of previously reported highly conserved plant miRNAs were identified in this study, as well as some conserved miRNAs previously reported to be monocot specific. No conserved dicot-specific miRNAs were identified. A number of potential gymnosperm or conifer specific miRNAs were found, shared among a range of conifer species.
Authors
Olalla Díaz-Yáñez Blas Mola-Yudego Volkmar Timmermann Mari Mette Tollefsrud Ari Hietala Jonas OlivaAbstract
Determining the impacts of invasive pathogens on tree mortality and growth is a difficult task, in particular in the case of species occurring naturally at low frequencies in mixed stands. In this study, we quantify such effects by comparing national forest inventory data collected before and after pathogen invasion. In Norway, Fraxinus excelsior is a minor species representing less than 1% of the trees in the forests and being attacked by the invasive pathogen Hymenoscyphus fraxineus since 2006. By studying deviations between inventories, we estimated a 74% higher-than-expected average ash mortality and a 13% slower-than-expected growth of the surviving ash trees, indicating a lack of compensation by the remaining ash. We could confidently assign mortality and growth losses to ash dieback as no mortality or growth shifts were observed for co-occurring tree species in the same plots. The mortality comparisons also show regional patterns with higher mortality in areas with the longest disease history in Norway. Considering that ash is currently mostly growing in mixed forests and that no signs of compensation were observed by the surviving ash trees, a significant habitat loss and niche replacement could be anticipated in the mid-term.
Authors
Simo Maduna Adam Vivian-Smith Ólöf Dóra Bartels Jónsdóttir Albert Imsland Cornelya Klutsch Tommi Nyman Hans Geir Eiken Snorre HagenAbstract
The lumpfish Cyclopterus lumpus is commercially exploited in numerous areas of its range in the North Atlantic Ocean, and is important in salmonid aquaculture as a biological agent for controlling sea lice. Despite the economic importance, few genetic resources for downstream applications, such as linkage mapping, parentage analysis, marker-assisted selection (MAS), quantitative trait loci (QTL) analysis, and assessing adaptive genetic diversity are currently available for the species. Here, we identify both genome- and transcriptome-derived microsatellites loci from C. lumpus to facilitate such applications. Across 2,346 genomic contigs, we detected a total of 3,067 microsatellite loci, of which 723 were the most suitable ones for primer design. From 116,555 transcriptomic unigenes, we identified a total of 231,556 microsatellite loci, which may indicate a high coverage of the available STRs. Out of these, primer pairs could only be designed for 6,203 loci. Dinucleotide repeats accounted for 89 percent and 52 percent of the genome- and transcriptome-derived microsatellites, respectively. The genetic composition of the dominant repeat motif types showed differences from other investigated fish species. In the genome-derived microsatellites AC/GT (67.8 percent), followed by AG/CT (15.1 percent) and AT/AT (5.6 percent) were the major motifs. Transcriptome-derived microsatellites showed also most dominantly the AC/GT repeat motif (33 percent), followed by A/T (26.6 percent) and AG/CT (11 percent). Functional annotation of microsatellite-containing transcriptomic sequences showed that the majority of the expressed sequence tags encode proteins involved in cellular and metabolic processes, binding activity and catalytic reactions. Importantly, STRs linked to genes involved in immune system process, growth, locomotion and reproduction were discovered in the present study. The extensive genomic marker information reported here will facilitate molecular ecology studies, conservation initiatives and will benefit many aspects of the breeding programmes of C. lumpus.
Authors
Melissa Magerøy Samuel W. Wilkinson Torstein Tengs Hugh Cross Marit Almvik Pierre Petriacq Adam Vivian-Smith Tao Zhao Carl Gunnar Fossdal Paal KrokeneAbstract
In response to various stimuli, plants acquire resistance against pests and/or pathogens. Such acquired or induced resistance allows plants to rapidly adapt to their environment. Spraying the bark of mature Norway spruce (Picea abies) trees with the phytohormone methyl jasmonate (MeJA) enhances resistance to tree‐killing bark beetles and their associated phytopathogenic fungi. Analysis of spruce chemical defenses and beetle colonization success suggests that MeJA treatment both directly induces immune responses and primes inducible defenses for a faster and stronger response to subsequent beetle attack. We used metabolite and transcriptome profiling to explore the mechanisms underlying MeJA‐induced resistance in Norway spruce. We demonstrated that MeJA treatment caused substantial changes in the bark transcriptional response to a triggering stress (mechanical wounding). Profiling of mRNA expression showed a suite of spruce inducible defenses are primed following MeJA treatment. Although monoterpenes and diterpene resin acids increased more rapidly after wounding in MeJA‐treated than control bark, expression of their biosynthesis genes did not. We suggest that priming of inducible defenses is part of a complex mixture of defense responses that underpins the increased resistance against bark beetle colonization observed in Norway spruce. This study provides the most detailed insights yet into the mechanisms underlying induced resistance in a long‐lived gymnosperm.