No abstract

We dissected barley chromosomes 1H and 6H added to common wheat by the gametocidal system and identified structural changes of the chromosomes by fluorescence in situ hybridization and genomic in situ hybridization. We found five aberrations of chromosome 1H, all of which lacked the long arm: one small fragment with the subtelomeric HvT01 sequence, one terminal deletion, and three telocentric chromosomes of the short arm. We established 33 dissection lines carrying single aberrant 6H chromosomes, of which 15 were deletions, 16 were translocations and two were isochromosomes. We conducted PCR analysis of the aberrant barley chromosomes using 75 and 81 EST markers specific to chromosomes 1H and 6H, respectively. This enabled us to construct a cytological map of chromosome 6H and to compare it to the previously reported genetic map and also to the physical map, which were released by the International Barley Genome Sequencing Consortium. The marker orders on the three maps were largely in agreement. The cytological map had better resolution in the proximal region of chromosome 6H than the corresponding genetic map. We discuss some of the discrepancies in marker order between the three maps that might be due to intraspecific polymorphism and gene duplication, as well as to technical problems inherent in the physical mapping process.

Meningitis caused by the zoonotic pathogen Campylobacter fetus in immunocompetent adults is rare. We report a 48-year-old Japanese woman with no underlying disease who was found to have meningitis caused by C. fetus. Both C. fetus subsp. fetus and C. fetus subsp. venerealis were isolated from the cerebrospinal fluid culture. The mode of infection in our patient was considered to be associated with the consumption of raw beef and raw cattle liver on a regular basis. Public awareness and education to avoid the consumption of raw or undercooked meat might help prevent C. fetus meningitis.