Life Sciences Commons^™

Spatiotemporal Dynamics Of Clonal Selection And Diversification In Normal Endometrial Epithelium., Manako Yamaguchi, Hirofumi Nakaoka, Kazuaki Suda, Kosuke Yoshihara, Tatsuya Ishiguro, Nozomi Yachida, Kyota Saito, Haruka Ueda, Kentaro Sugino, Yutaro Mori, Kaoru Yamawaki, Ryo Tamura, Sundaramoorthy Revathidevi, Teiichi Motoyama, Kazuki Tainaka, Roel G W Verhaak, Ituro Inoue, Takayuki Enomoto

Faculty Research 2022

It has become evident that somatic mutations in cancer-associated genes accumulate in the normal endometrium, but spatiotemporal understanding of the evolution and expansion of mutant clones is limited. To elucidate the timing and mechanism of the clonal expansion of somatic mutations in cancer-associated genes in the normal endometrium, we sequence 1311 endometrial glands from 37 women. By collecting endometrial glands from different parts of the endometrium, we show that multiple glands with the same somatic mutations occupy substantial areas of the endometrium. We demonstrate that "rhizome structures", in which the basal glands run horizontally along the muscular layer and multiple …

Murine Model For Measuring Effects Of Humanized-Dosing Of Antibiotics On The Gut Microbiome., Shana Leopold, Kamilia Abdelraouf, David P Nicolau, Hanako Agresta, Jethro Johnson, Kathleen Teter, Wm Michael Dunne, David Broadwell, Alex Van Belkum, Lisa M Schechter, Erica J Sodergren, George M. Weinstock

Faculty Research 2022

There is a current need for enhancing our insight in the effects of antimicrobial treatment on the composition of human microbiota. Also, the spontaneous restoration of the microbiota after antimicrobial treatment requires better understanding. This is best addressed in well-defined animal models. We here present a model in which immune-competent or neutropenic mice were administered piperacillin-tazobactam (TZP) according to human treatment schedules. Before, during and after the TZP treatment, fecal specimens were longitudinally collected at established intervals over several weeks. Gut microbial taxonomic distribution and abundance were assessed through culture and molecular means during all periods. Non-targeted metabolomics analyses of …

Comprehensive Analysis Of Alternative Splicing In Gastric Cancer Identifies Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transition Subtypes Associated With Survival., Yukyung Jun, Yun-Suhk Suh, Sunghee Park, Jieun Lee, Jong-Il Kim, Sanghyuk Lee, Wan-Ping Lee, Olga Anczuków, Han-Kwang Yang, Charles Lee

Faculty Research 2022

Alternatively spliced RNA isoforms are a hallmark of tumors, but their nature, prevalence, and clinical implications in gastric cancer have not been comprehensively characterized. We systematically profiled the splicing landscape of 83 gastric tumors and matched normal mucosa, identifying and experimentally validating eight splicing events that can classify all gastric cancers into three subtypes: epithelial-splicing (EpiS), mesenchymal-splicing (MesS), and hybrid-splicing. These subtypes were associated with distinct molecular signatures and epithelial-mesenchymal transition markers. Subtype-specific splicing events were enriched in motifs for splicing factors RBM24 and ESRP1, which were upregulated in MesS and EpiS tumors, respectively. A simple classifier based only on …

Single-Cell Analysis Of Human Glioma And Immune Cells Identifies S100a4 As An Immunotherapy Target., Nourhan Abdelfattah, Parveen Kumar, Caiyi Wang, Jia-Shiun Leu, William F Flynn, Ruli Gao, David S Baskin, Kumar Pichumani, Omkar B Ijare, Stephanie L Wood, Suzanne Z Powell, David L Haviland, Brittany C Parker Kerrigan, Frederick F Lang, Sujit S Prabhu, Kristin M Huntoon, Wen Jiang, Betty Y S Kim, Joshy George, Kyuson Yun

Faculty Research 2022

A major rate-limiting step in developing more effective immunotherapies for GBM is our inadequate understanding of the cellular complexity and the molecular heterogeneity of immune infiltrates in gliomas. Here, we report an integrated analysis of 201,986 human glioma, immune, and other stromal cells at the single cell level. In doing so, we discover extensive spatial and molecular heterogeneity in immune infiltrates. We identify molecular signatures for nine distinct myeloid cell subtypes, of which five are independent prognostic indicators of glioma patient survival. Furthermore, we identify S100A4 as a regulator of immune suppressive T and myeloid cells in GBM and demonstrate …

Mako: A Graph-Based Pattern Growth Approach To Detect Complex Structural Variants., Jiadong Lin, Xiaofei Yang, Walter Kosters, Tun Xu, Yanyan Jia, Songbo Wang, Qihui Zhu, Mallory Ryan, Li Guo, Chengsheng Zhang, The Human Genome Structural Variation Consortium, Charles Lee, Scott E Devine, Evan E Eichler, Kai Ye

Faculty Research 2022

Complex structural variants (CSVs) are genomic alterations that have more than two breakpoints and are considered as the simultaneous occurrence of simple structural variants. However, detecting the compounded mutational signals of CSVs is challenging through a commonly used model-match strategy. As a result, there has been limited progress for CSV discovery compared with simple structural variants. Here, we systematically analyzed the multi-breakpoint connection feature of CSVs, and proposed Mako, utilizing a bottom-up guided model-free strategy, to detect CSVs from paired-end short-read sequencing. Specifically, we implemented a graph-based pattern growth approach, where the graph depicts potential breakpoint connections, and pattern growth …

A Need For More Molecular Profiling In Brain Metastases., Erica Shen, Amanda E D Van Swearingen, Meghan J Price, Ketan Bulsara, Roel G W Verhaak, César Baëta, Brice D Painter, Zachary J Reitman, April K S Salama, Jeffrey M Clarke, Carey K Anders, Peter E Fecci, C Rory Goodwin, Kyle M Walsh

Faculty Research 2022

As local disease control improves, the public health impact of brain metastases (BrM) continues to grow. Molecular features are frequently different between primary and metastatic tumors as a result of clonal evolution during neoplasm migration, selective pressures imposed by systemic treatments, and differences in the local microenvironment. However, biomarker information in BrM is not routinely obtained despite emerging evidence of its clinical value. We review evidence of discordance in clinically actionable biomarkers between primary tumors, extracranial metastases, and BrM. Although BrM biopsy/resection imposes clinical risks, these risks must be weighed against the potential benefits of assessing biomarkers in BrM. First, …

Single-Cell Multi-Omics Reveals Dyssynchrony Of The Innate And Adaptive Immune System In Progressive Covid-19., Avraham Unterman, Tomokazu S Sumida, Nima Nouri, Xiting Yan, Amy Y Zhao, Victor Gasque, Jonas C Schupp, Hiromitsu Asashima, Yunqing Liu, Carlos Cosme, Wenxuan Deng, Ming Chen, Micha Sam Brickman Raredon, Kenneth B Hoehn, Guilin Wang, Zuoheng Wang, Giuseppe Deiuliis, Neal G Ravindra, Ningshan Li, Christopher Castaldi, Patrick Wong, John Fournier, Santos Bermejo, Lokesh Sharma, Arnau Casanovas-Massana, Chantal B F Vogels, Anne L Wyllie, Nathan D Grubaugh, Anthony Melillo, Hailong Meng, Yan Stein, Maksym Minasyan, Subhasis Mohanty, William E Ruff, Inessa Cohen, Khadir Raddassi, Laura E Niklason, Albert I Ko, Ruth R Montgomery, Shelli F Farhadian, Akiko Iwasaki, Albert C Shaw, David Van Dijk, Hongyu Zhao, Steven H Kleinstein, David A Hafler, Naftali Kaminski, Charles S Dela Cruz

Faculty Research 2022

Dysregulated immune responses against the SARS-CoV-2 virus are instrumental in severe COVID-19. However, the immune signatures associated with immunopathology are poorly understood. Here we use multi-omics single-cell analysis to probe the dynamic immune responses in hospitalized patients with stable or progressive course of COVID-19, explore V(D)J repertoires, and assess the cellular effects of tocilizumab. Coordinated profiling of gene expression and cell lineage protein markers shows that S100A

Voluntary Workplace Genomic Testing: Wellness Benefit Or Pandora's Box?, Kunal Sanghavi, Betty Cohn, Anya E R Prince, W Gregory Feero, Kerry A Ryan, Kayte Spector-Bagdady, Wendy R Uhlmann, Charles Lee, J Scott Roberts, Debra J H Mathews

Faculty Research 2022

Consumer interest in genetic and genomic testing is growing rapidly, with more than 26 million Americans having purchased direct-to-consumer genetic testing services. Capitalizing on the increasing comfort of consumers with genetic testing outside the clinical environment, commercial vendors are expanding their customer base by marketing genetic and genomic testing services, including testing for pharmacogenomic and pathogenic variants, to employers for inclusion in workplace wellness programs. We describe the appeal of voluntary workplace genomic testing (wGT) to employers and employees, how the ethical, legal, and social implications literature has approached the issue of genetic testing in the workplace in the past, …

Open Problems In Extracellular Rna Data Analysis: Insights From An Ercc Online Workshop., Roger P Alexander, Robert R Kitchen, Juan Pablo Tosar, Matthew Roth, Pieter Mestdagh, Klaas E A Max, Joel Rozowsky, Karolina Elżbieta Kaczor-Urbanowicz, Justin Chang, Leonora Balaj, Bojan Losic, Eric L Van Nostrand, Emily Laplante, Bogdan Mateescu, Brian S White, Rongshan Yu, Aleksander Milosavljevic, Gustavo Stolovitzky, Ryan M Spengler

Faculty Research 2022

We now know RNA can survive the harsh environment of biofluids when encapsulated in vesicles or by associating with lipoproteins or RNA binding proteins. These extracellular RNA (exRNA) play a role in intercellular signaling, serve as biomarkers of disease, and form the basis of new strategies for disease treatment. The Extracellular RNA Communication Consortium (ERCC) hosted a two-day online workshop (April 19-20, 2021) on the unique challenges of exRNA data analysis. The goal was to foster an open dialog about best practices and discuss open problems in the field, focusing initially on small exRNA sequencing data. Video recordings of workshop …

Genomic Heterogeneity Underlies Multidrug Resistance In Pseudomonas Aeruginosa: A Population-Level Analysis Beyond Susceptibility Testing., Laura J Rojas, Mohamad Yasmin, Jacquelynn Benjamino, Steven M Marshall, Kailynn J Deronde, Nikhil P Krishnan, Federico Perez, Andrew A Colin, Monica Cardenas, Octavio Martinez, Armando Pérez-Cardona, Daniel D Rhoads, Michael R Jacobs, John J Lipuma, Michael W Konstan, Alejandro J Vila, Andrea Smania, Andrew R Mack, Jacob G Scott, Mark D Adams, Lilian M Abbo, Robert A Bonomo

Faculty Research 2022

BACKGROUND: Pseudomonas aeruginosa is a persistent and difficult-to-treat pathogen in many patients, especially those with Cystic Fibrosis (CF). Herein, we describe a longitudinal analysis of a series of multidrug resistant (MDR) P. aeruginosa isolates recovered in a 17-month period, from a young female CF patient who underwent double lung transplantation. Our goal was to understand the genetic basis of the observed resistance phenotypes, establish the genomic population diversity, and define the nature of sequence evolution over time.

METHODS: Twenty-two sequential P. aeruginosa isolates were obtained within a 17-month period, before and after a double-lung transplant. At the end of the …

Genome-Wide Variant Calling In Reanalysis Of Exome Sequencing Data Uncovered A Pathogenic Tubb3 Variant., Elke De Boer, Burcu Yaldiz, Anne-Sophie Denommé-Pichon, Leslie Matalonga, Steve Laurie, Solve-Rd Snv-Indel Working Group, Daniel Danis, Peter N Robinson, Solve-Rd-Ditf Ithaca

Faculty Research 2022

Almost half of all individuals affected by intellectual disability (ID) remain undiagnosed. In the Solve-RD project, exome sequencing (ES) datasets from unresolved individuals with (syndromic) ID (n = 1,472 probands) are systematically reanalyzed, starting from raw sequencing files, followed by genome-wide variant calling and new data interpretation. This strategy led to the identification of a disease-causing de novo missense variant in TUBB3 in a girl with severe developmental delay, secondary microcephaly, brain imaging abnormalities, high hypermetropia, strabismus and short stature. Interestingly, the TUBB3 variant could only be identified through reanalysis of ES data using a genome-wide variant calling approach, despite …

Curation And Expansion Of Human Phenotype Ontology For Defined Groups Of Inborn Errors Of Immunity., Matthias Haimel, Julia Pazmandi, Raúl Jiménez Heredia, Jasmin Dmytrus, Sevgi Köstel Bal, Samaneh Zoghi, Paul Van Daele, Tracy A Briggs, Carine Wouters, Brigitte Bader-Meunier, Florence A Aeschlimann, Roberta Caorsi, Despina Eleftheriou, Esther Hoppenreijs, Elisabeth Salzer, Shahrzad Bakhtiar, Beata Derfalvi, Francesco Saettini, Maaike A A Kusters, Reem Elfeky, Johannes Trück, Jacques G Rivière, Mirjam Van Der Burg, Marco Gattorno, Markus G Seidel, Siobhan Burns, Klaus Warnatz, Fabian Hauck, Paul Brogan, Kimberly C Gilmour, Catharina Schuetz, Anna Simon, Christoph Bock, Sophie Hambleton, Esther De Vries, Peter N Robinson, Marielle Van Gijn, Kaan Boztug

Faculty Research 2022

BACKGROUND: Accurate, detailed, and standardized phenotypic descriptions are essential to support diagnostic interpretation of genetic variants and to discover new diseases. The Human Phenotype Ontology (HPO), extensively used in rare disease research, provides a rich collection of vocabulary with standardized phenotypic descriptions in a hierarchical structure. However, to date, the use of HPO has not yet been widely implemented in the field of inborn errors of immunity (IEIs), mainly due to a lack of comprehensive IEI-related terms.

OBJECTIVES: We sought to systematically review available terms in HPO for the depiction of IEIs, to expand HPO, yielding more comprehensive sets of …

The Th1/Tfh-Like Biased Responses Elicited By The Rasp-1 Innate Adjuvant Are Dependent On Trif And Type I Ifn Receptor Pathways., Parakkal Jovvian George, Radu Marches, Djamel Nehar-Belaid, Jacques Banchereau, Sara Lustigman

Faculty Research 2022

No abstract provided.

At-Home Blood Collection And Stabilization In High Temperature Climates Using, Lauren G Brown, Amanda J Haack, Dakota S Kennedy, Karen N Adams, Jennifer E Stolarczuk, Meg G Takezawa, Erwin Berthier, Sanitta Thongpang, Fang Yun Lim, Damien Chaussabel, Mathieu Garand, Ashleigh B Theberge

Faculty Research 2022

Expanding whole blood sample collection for transcriptome analysis beyond traditional phlebotomy clinics will open new frontiers for remote immune research and telemedicine. Determining the stability of RNA in blood samples exposed to high ambient temperatures (>30°C) is necessary for deploying home-sampling in settings with elevated temperatures (e.g., studying physiological response to natural disasters that occur in warm locations or in the summer). Recently, we have developed

Single-Cell Transcriptome Analysis Defines Expression Of Kabuki Syndrome-Associated Kmt2d Targets And Interacting Partners., Badam Enkhmandakh, Paul Robson, Pujan Joshi, Anushree Vijaykumar, Dong-Guk Shin, Mina Mina, Dashzeveg Bayarsaihan

Faculty Research 2022

No abstract provided.

Targeting Sars-Cov-2 Infection Through Car-T-Like Bispecific T Cell Engagers Incorporating Ace2., Mikail Dogan, Lina Kozhaya, Lindsey Placek, Fatih Karabacak, Mesut Yigit, Derya Unutmaz

Faculty Research 2022

OBJECTIVES: Despite advances in antibody treatments and vaccines, COVID-19 caused by SARS-CoV-2 infection remains a major health problem resulting in excessive morbidity and mortality and the emergence of new variants has reduced the effectiveness of current vaccines.

METHODS: Here, as a proof-of-concept, we engineered primary CD8 T cells to express SARS-CoV-2 Spike protein-specific CARs, using the extracellular region of ACE2 and demonstrated their highly specific and potent cytotoxicity towards Spike-expressing target cells. To improve on this concept as a potential therapeutic, we developed a bispecific T cell engager combining ACE2 with an anti-CD3 scFv (ACE2-Bite) to target infected cells and …

Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor Inhibition Is Protective In Hyperoxia-Induced Lung Injury., Zachary M Harris, Ying Sun, John Joerns, Brian Clark, Buqu Hu, Asawari Korde, Lokesh Sharma, Hyeon Jun Shin, Edward P Manning, Lindsey Placek, Derya Unutmaz, Gail Stanley, Hyung Chun, Maor Sauler, Govindarajan Rajagopalan, Xuchen Zhang, Min-Jong Kang, Jonathan L Koff

Faculty Research 2022

AIMS: Studies have linked severe hyperoxia, or prolonged exposure to very high oxygen levels, with worse clinical outcomes. This study investigated the role of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) in hyperoxia-induced lung injury at very high oxygen levels (>95%).

RESULTS: Effects of severe hyperoxia (100% oxygen) were studied in mice with genetically inhibited EGFR and wild-type littermates. Despite the established role of EGFR in lung repair, EGFR inhibition led to improved survival and reduced acute lung injury, which prompted an investigation into this protective mechanism. Endothelial EGFR genetic knockout did not confer protection. EGFR inhibition led to decreased levels …

Exploratory Studies Of Oral And Fecal Microbiome In Healthy Human Aging., Xin Zhou, Baohong Wang, Patrick C Demkowicz, Jethro Johnson, Yanfei Chen, Daniel Spakowicz, Yanjiao Zhou, Yair Dorsett, Lei Chen, Erica Sodergren, George A Kuchel, George M. Weinstock

Faculty Research 2022

Growing evidence has linked an altered host fecal microbiome composition with health status, common chronic diseases, and institutionalization in vulnerable older adults. However, fewer studies have described microbiome changes in healthy older adults without major confounding diseases or conditions, and the impact of aging on the microbiome across different body sites remains unknown. Using 16S ribosomal RNA gene sequencing, we reconstructed the composition of oral and fecal microbiomes in young (23-32; mean = 25 years old) and older (69-94; mean = 77 years old) healthy community-dwelling research subjects. In both body sites, we identified changes in minor bacterial operational taxonomic …

Engineering A "Detect And Destroy" Skin Probiotic To Combat Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus., Changhui Guan, Peter J Larson, Elizabeth Fleming, Alexander P Tikhonov, Sara Mootien, Trudy H Grossman, Caroline Golino, Julia Oh

Faculty Research 2022

The prevalence and virulence of pathogens such as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus (S.) aureus (MRSA), which can cause recurrent skin infections, are of significant clinical concern. Prolonged antibiotic exposure to treat or decolonize S. aureus contributes to development of antibiotic resistance, as well as depletion of the microbiome, and its numerous beneficial functions. We hypothesized an engineered skin probiotic with the ability to selectively deliver antimicrobials only in the presence of the target organism could provide local bioremediation of pathogen colonization. We constructed a biosensing S. epidermidis capable of detecting the presence of S. aureus quorum sensing autoinducer peptide and producing lysostaphin …