Carotenoids in Aquaculture:An Overview

Recent studies on the role of carotenoids in aquaculture have investigated their function in regulating pigmentation, growth, survival, and immune activity of aquatic animals. These carotenoids include astaxanthin, canthaxanthin, lutein, zeaxanthin, and tunaxanthin. Astaxanthin and canthaxanthin are the main synthetic carotenoids used world-wide in the aquaculture industry. They play an important role in protecting cells and organisms against photosensitized oxidations. Direct evidence of carotenoids functioning as antioxidants in vivo has been reported in animal models. In addition to their established biological effects as antioxidants, carotenoids appear to have a great variety of cellular actions that make them remarkable physiological modulators. Consequently, recent attention has been focused on improving our understanding of carotenoids on the physiology and metabolism in aquatic animals with a view to enhance the efficacy of astaxanthin as a carotenoid pigment. This review aims to summarize the function and research progress of carotenoids in aquaculture. We discuss the methods used to study the absorption, transport, metabolic transformation and deposition of carotenoids, and their spatial and temporal expression.

Detection of Favorable Alleles for Quality- and Yield-related Traits in Wheat Using a Backcross Population

Development of wheat varieties with high yield and good quality has been a major objective in wheat breeding.A BC 1 F 2-3 population was used to detect QTLs for wheat quality related traits: SDS-sedimentation value (Ssd),grain protein content (GPC),grain hardness (GH) and 11 mixograph parameters,as well as five agronomic traits: spike length (SL),spikelet number per spike (SPN),grain number per spike (GN),thousand-grain weight (TGW),and plant height (PH).A total of 44 putative QTLs were detected in the present study,31 for quality parameters and 13 for important agronomic traits,including three important major QTLs.One major QTL for Ssd QSsd.saas-1B.1,linked to barc137,explained on average 21.1% of the phenotypic variation in three environments.The allele increasing Ssd at this locus also significantly increased GN.The second locus on chromosome 1B with the linked marker Barc 61 was a major locus for mixograph parameters.It explained 21.3%-32.5%,24.3%-30.6%,30.6%-37% and 20.1%-22.7% of phenotypic variation for mixing tolerance (MT),weakening slope (WS),midline peak time (MPTi) and midline time x =8 value (MTxW),respectively.The third major QTL,explaining above 40% of plant height variation,close to Rht-B 1 on the short arm of chromosome 4BS,co-located with QTL for quality and yield-related traits.

Effects of mycorrhizal fungus Mycena sp. on the growth and poly-saccharide properties of Dendrobium officinale

Dear Editor,Dendrobium officinale Kimura et Migo(Orchidaceae),an endangered species,is a medicinal plant and the sole origin plant of Dendrobii Officinalis Caulis(Tiepishihu),a rare Chinese herbal medicine.Several photosynthetic