Water-deficit or dehydration impairs almost all physiological processes and greatly influences the geographical distribution of many crop species. It has been postulated that higher plants rely mostly on induction mechanisms to maintain cellular integrity during stress conditions. Plant cell wall or extracellular matrix (ECM) forms an important conduit for signal transduction between the apoplast and symplast and acts as front-line defense, thereby playing a key role in cell fate decision under various stress conditions. To better understand the molecular mechanism of dehydration response in plants, four-week-old rice seedlings were subjected to progressive dehydration by withdrawing water and the changes in the ECM proteome were examined using two-dimensional gel electrophoresis. Dehydration-responsive temporal changes revealed 192 proteins that change their intensities by more than 2.5-fold, at one or more time points during dehydration. The proteomic analysis led to the identification of about 100 differentially regulated proteins presumably involved in a variety of functions, including carbohydrate metabolism, cell defense and rescue, cell wall modification, cell signaling and molecular chaperones, among others. The differential rice proteome was compared with the dehydration-responsive proteome data of chickpea and maize. The results revealed an evolutionary divergence in the dehydration response as well as organ specificity, with few conserved proteins. The differential expression of the candidate proteins, in conjunction with previously reported results, may provide new insight into the underlying mechanisms of the dehydration response in plants. This may also facilitate the targeted alteration of metabolic routes in the cell wall for agricultural and industrial exploitation.

Verbindungen der Alkalimetalle mit Kupfer existieren nicht; nur Li löst sich etwas im Cu‐Metall. Silber bildet nach Literaturangaben mit Li mehrere intermetallische Phasen; im System Na/Ag wurde die bisher übersehene Phase NaAg2 gefunden. Gold bildet mit allen Alkalimetallen Verbindungen. Durch thermische Analyse wurden folgende Phasen nachgewiesen: Li15Au4, Li3Au, δ1 und δ2 (∼35 At.‐% Au), β′, β′1, und β′2 (zwischen 44,5 und 51%), Li4Au5, α (60–100%), α1 (63–83%), α2 (60%).  Na2Au, NaAu, NaAu2  K2Au, KAu, KAu2, KAu4  RbAu, RbAu2, RbAu4,  CsAu. Die Strukturen von NaAg2, im System Li/Au von Li15Au4, β′, β′1, β′2, α und α1, ferner von RbAu und CsAu konnten aufgeklärt werden. Die untersuchten Systeme zeigen übersichtliche Verhältnisse; die Tendenz zur Verbindungsbildung steigt vom Kupfer zum Gold und vom Caesium zum Lithium. Breitere Homogenitätsgebiete treten nur bei den Li‐haltigen Systemen auf. Die Raumchemie der Legierungen wird besprochen. Bei allen festen Lösungen und Legierungen sind die Alkalimetalle stark kontrahiert; bei nicht zu kleinem Gehalt an Edelmetall finden sich für die Alkalimetalle die „Volumeninkremente in intermetallischen Verbindungen”︁ nach W. Biltz.

Architectural proteins play key roles in genome construction and regulate the expression of many genes, albeit the modulation of genome plasticity by these proteins is largely unknown. A critical screening of the architectural proteins in five crop species, viz., Oryza sativa, Zea mays, Sorghum bicolor, Cicer arietinum, and Vitis vinifera, and in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana along with evolutionary relevant species such as Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, Physcomitrella patens, and Amborella trichopoda, revealed 9, 20, 10, 7, 7, 6, 1, 4, and 4 Alba (acetylation lowers binding affinity) genes, respectively. A phylogenetic analysis of the genes and of their counterparts in other plant species indicated evolutionary conservation and diversification. In each group, the structural components of the genes and motifs showed significant conservation. The chromosomal location of the Alba genes of rice (OsAlba), showed an unequal distribution on 8 of its 12 chromosomes. The expression profiles of the OsAlba genes indicated a distinct tissue-specific expression in the seedling, vegetative, and reproductive stages. The quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) analysis of the OsAlba genes confirmed their stress-inducible expression under multivariate environmental conditions and phytohormone treatments. The evaluation of the regulatory elements in 68 Alba genes from the 9 species studied led to the identification of conserved motifs and overlapping microRNA (miRNA) target sites, suggesting the conservation of their function in related proteins and a divergence in their biological roles across species. The 3D structure and the prediction of putative ligands and their binding sites for OsAlba proteins offered a key insight into the structure–function relationship. These results provide a comprehensive overview of the subtle genetic diversification of the OsAlba genes, which will help in elucidating their functional role in plants.