Digital Commons Network^™

Reversing Dysdynamism To Interrupt Mitochondrial Degeneration In Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, Gerald W Dorn Ii

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis is one of several chronic neurodegenerative conditions in which mitochondrial abnormalities are posited to contribute to disease progression. Therapeutic options targeting mitochondria include enhancing metabolism, suppressing reactive oxygen production and disrupting mitochondria-mediated programmed cell death pathways. Herein is reviewed mechanistic evidence supporting a meaningful pathophysiological role for the constellation of abnormal mitochondrial fusion, fission and transport, collectively designated mitochondrial dysdynamism, in ALS. Following this is a discussion on preclinical studies in ALS mice that seemingly validate the idea that normalizing mitochondrial dynamism can delay ALS by interrupting a vicious cycle of mitochondrial degeneration, leading to neuronal die-back …

Exogenous Exposures Shape Genetic Predisposition To Lipids, Alzheimer's, And Coronary Heart Disease In The Mlxipl Gene Locus, Yury Loika, Elena Loiko, Fan Feng, Eric Stallard, Anatoliy I Yashin, Konstantin Arbeev, Allison L Kuipers, Mary F Feitosa, Michael A Province, Alexander M Kulminski

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Associations of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) of the

Dendritic Cells And Cryptosporidium: From Recognition To Restriction, Iti Saraav, L David Sibley

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Host immune responses are required for the efficient control of cryptosporidiosis. Immunity against

Structure Of Anhydrotetracycline-Bound Tet(X6) Reveals The Mechanism For Inhibition Of Type 1 Tetracycline Destructases, Hirdesh Kumar, Emily E Williford, Kevin S Blake, Brett Virgin-Downey, Gautam Dantas, Timothy A Wencewicz, Niraj H Tolia

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Inactivation of tetracycline antibiotics by tetracycline destructases (TDases) remains a clinical and agricultural threat. TDases can be classified as type 1 Tet(X)-like TDases and type 2 soil-derived TDases. Type 1 TDases are widely identified in clinical pathogens. A combination therapy of tetracycline and a TDase inhibitor is much needed to rescue the clinical efficacy of tetracyclines. Anhydrotetracycline is a pan-TDase inhibitor that inhibits both type 1 and type 2 TDases. Here, we present structural, biochemical, and phenotypic evidence that anhydrotetracycline binds in a substrate-like orientation and competitively inhibits the type 1 TDase Tet(X6) to rescue tetracycline antibiotic activity as a …

Motixafortide And G-Csf To Mobilize Hematopoietic Stem Cells For Autologous Transplantation In Multiple Myeloma: A Randomized Phase 3 Trial, Zachary D Crees, Michael P Rettig, Reyka G Jayasinghe, Keith Stockerl-Goldstein, Feng Gao, Mark A Schroeder, Ravi Vij, John F Dipersio, Et Al.

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (ASCT) improves survival in multiple myeloma (MM). However, many individuals are unable to collect optimal CD34

Spike-Phase Coupling Patterns Reveal Laminar Identity In Primate Cortex, Zachary W Davis, Nicholas M Dotson, Tom P Franken, Lyle Muller, John H Reynolds

2020-Current year OA Pubs

The cortical column is one of the fundamental computational circuits in the brain. In order to understand the role neurons in different layers of this circuit play in cortical function it is necessary to identify the boundaries that separate the laminar compartments. While histological approaches can reveal ground truth they are not a practical means of identifying cortical layers in vivo. The gold standard for identifying laminar compartments in electrophysiological recordings is current-source density (CSD) analysis. However, laminar CSD analysis requires averaging across reliably evoked responses that target the input layer in cortex, which may be difficult to generate in …

Symptom Management Care Pathway Adaptation Process And Specific Adaptation Decisions, Emily Vettese, Allison A King, Lisa M Klesges, Et Al.

2020-Current year OA Pubs

BACKGROUND: There is substantial heterogeneity in symptom management provided to pediatric patients with cancer. The primary objective was to describe the adaptation process and specific adaptation decisions related to symptom management care pathways based on clinical practice guidelines. The secondary objective evaluated if institutional factors were associated with adaptation decisions.

METHODS: Fourteen previously developed symptom management care pathway templates were reviewed by an institutional adaptation team composed of two clinicians at each of 10 institutions. They worked through each statement for all care pathway templates sequentially. The institutional adaptation team made the decision to adopt, adapt or reject each statement, …

Feasibility Pilot Trial For The Trajectories Of Recovery After Intravenous Propofol Versus Inhaled Volatile Anesthesia (Thrive) Pragmatic Randomised Controlled Trial, Bethany R Tellor Pennington, Douglas A. Colquhoun, Mark D. Neuman, Mary C. Politi, Allison M. Janda, Cathie Spino, Steven Thelen-Perry, Zhenke Wu, Sathish S. Kumar, Stephen H. Gregory, Michael S. Avidan, Sachin Kheterpal, Thrive Research Group

2020-Current year OA Pubs

INTRODUCTION: Millions of patients receive general anaesthesia for surgery annually. Crucial gaps in evidence exist regarding which technique, propofol total intravenous anaesthesia (TIVA) or inhaled volatile anaesthesia (INVA), yields superior patient experience, safety and outcomes. The aim of this pilot study is to assess the feasibility of conducting a large comparative effectiveness trial assessing patient experiences and outcomes after receiving propofol TIVA or INVA.

METHODS AND ANALYSIS: This protocol was cocreated by a diverse team, including patient partners with personal experience of TIVA or INVA. The design is a 300-patient, two-centre, randomised, feasibility pilot trial. Patients 18 years of age …

Brain Deficit Patterns Of Metabolic Illnesses Overlap With Those For Major Depressive Disorder: A New Metric Of Brain Metabolic Disease, Kathryn S Hatch, Si Gao, Yizhou Ma, Alessandro Russo, Neda Jahanshad, Paul M Thompson, Bhim M Adhikari, Heather Bruce, Andrew Van Der Vaart, Aristeidis Sotiras, Mark D Kvarta, Thomas E Nichols, Lianne Schmaal, L Elliot Hong, Peter Kochunov

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Metabolic illnesses (MET) are detrimental to brain integrity and are common comorbidities in patients with mental illnesses, including major depressive disorder (MDD). We quantified effects of MET on standard regional brain morphometric measures from 3D brain MRI as well as diffusion MRI in a large sample of UK BioBank participants. The pattern of regional effect sizes of MET in non-psychiatric UKBB subjects was significantly correlated with the spatial profile of regional effects reported by the largest meta-analyses in MDD but not in bipolar disorder, schizophrenia or Alzheimer's disease. We used a regional vulnerability index (RVI) for MET (RVI-MET) to measure …

Simultaneous Inhibition Of Thrombosis And Inflammation Is Beneficial In Treating Acute Myocardial Infarction, Ian Vargas, Ryan P Grabau, Junjie Chen, Carla Weinheimer, Attila Kovacs, William Dominguez-Viqueira, Adam Mitchell, Samuel A Wickline, Hua Pan

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Myocardial ischemia reperfusion injury (IRI) in acute coronary syndromes is a condition in which ischemic/hypoxic injury to cells subtended by the occluded vessel continues despite successful resolution of the thrombotic obstruction. For decades, most efforts to attenuate IRI have focused on interdicting singular molecular targets or pathways, but none have successfully transitioned to clinical use. In this work, we investigate a nanoparticle-based therapeutic strategy for profound but local thrombin inhibition that may simultaneously mitigate both thrombosis and inflammatory signaling pathways to limit myocardial IRI. Perfluorocarbon nanoparticles (PFC NP) were covalently coupled with an irreversible thrombin inhibitor, PPACK (Phe[D]-Pro-Arg-Chloromethylketone), and delivered …

A Peptide-Centric Quantitative Proteomics Dataset For The Phenotypic Assessment Of Alzheimer's Disease, Gennifer E Merrihew, Randall Bateman, Richard J Perrin, Et Al.

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a looming public health disaster with limited interventions. Alzheimer's is a complex disease that can present with or without causative mutations and can be accompanied by a range of age-related comorbidities. This diverse presentation makes it difficult to study molecular changes specific to AD. To better understand the molecular signatures of disease we constructed a unique human brain sample cohort inclusive of autosomal dominant AD dementia (ADD), sporadic ADD, and those without dementia but with high AD histopathologic burden, and cognitively normal individuals with no/minimal AD histopathologic burden. All samples are clinically well characterized, and brain …

A Systematic Review Of Multimodal Brain Age Studies: Uncovering A Divergence Between Model Accuracy And Utility, Robert J Jirsaraie, Aaron J Gorelik, Martins M Gatavins, Denis A Engemann, Ryan Bogdan, Deanna M Barch, Aristeidis Sotiras

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Brain aging is a complex, multifaceted process that can be challenging to model in ways that are accurate and clinically useful. One of the most common approaches has been to apply machine learning to neuroimaging data with the goal of predicting age in a data-driven manner. Building on initial brain age studies that were derived solely from T1-weighted scans (i.e., unimodal), recent studies have incorporated features across multiple imaging modalities (i.e., "multimodal"). In this systematic review, we show that unimodal and multimodal models have distinct advantages. Multimodal models are the most accurate and sensitive to differences in chronic brain disorders. …

Single-Cell Discovery And Multiomic Characterization Of Therapeutic Targets In Multiple Myeloma, Lijun Yao, Julia T Wang, Reyka G Jayasinghe, Julie O'Neal, Chia-Feng Tsai, Michael P Rettig, Yizhe Song, Ruiyang Liu, Yanyan Zhao, Omar M Ibrahim, Mark A Fiala, Julie M Fortier, Siqi Chen, Leah Gehrs, Fernanda Martins Rodrigues, Michael C Wendl, Daniel Kohnen, Andrew Shinkle, Song Cao, Steven M Foltz, Daniel Cui Zhou, Erik Storrs, Matthew A Wyczalkowski, Smrithi Mani, Scott R Goldsmith, Feng Chen, Ravi Vij, Li Ding, John F Dipersio, Et Al.

2020-Current year OA Pubs

UNLABELLED: Multiple myeloma (MM) is a highly refractory hematologic cancer. Targeted immunotherapy has shown promise in MM but remains hindered by the challenge of identifying specific yet broadly representative tumor markers. We analyzed 53 bone marrow (BM) aspirates from 41 MM patients using an unbiased, high-throughput pipeline for therapeutic target discovery via single-cell transcriptomic profiling, yielding 38 MM marker genes encoding cell-surface proteins and 15 encoding intracellular proteins. Of these, 20 candidate genes were highlighted that are not yet under clinical study, 11 of which were previously uncharacterized as therapeutic targets. The findings were cross-validated using bulk RNA sequencing, flow …

Mek Inhibition Synergizes With Tyk2 Inhibitors In Nf1-Associated Malignant Peripheral Nerve Sheath Tumors, Dana C Borcherding, Neha V Amin, Kevin He, Xiaochun Zhang, Yang Lyu, Carina Dehner, Himanshi Bhatia, Angad Gothra, Layla Daud, Peter Ruminski, Christine A Pratilas, Kai Pollard, Taylor Sundby, Brigitte C Widemann, Angela C Hirbe

2020-Current year OA Pubs

PURPOSE: Malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumors (MPNST) are aggressive sarcomas with limited treatment options and poor survival rates. About half of MPNST cases are associated with the neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1) cancer predisposition syndrome. Overexpression of TYK2 occurs in the majority of MPNST, implicating TYK2 as a therapeutic target.

EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN: The effects of pharmacologic TYK2 inhibition on MPNST cell proliferation and survival were examined using IncuCyte live cell assays in vitro, and downstream actions were analyzed using RNA-sequencing (RNA-seq), qPCR arrays, and validation of protein changes with the WES automated Western system. Inhibition of TYK2 alone and in combination …

Integrated Model Of The Vertebrate Augmin Complex, Sophie M Travis, Brian P Mahon, Wei Huang, Meisheng Ma, Michael J Rale, Jodi Kraus, Derek J Taylor, Rui Zhang, Sabine Petry

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Accurate segregation of chromosomes is required to maintain genome integrity during cell division. This feat is accomplished by the microtubule-based spindle. To build a spindle rapidly and with high fidelity, cells take advantage of branching microtubule nucleation, which rapidly amplifies microtubules during cell division. Branching microtubule nucleation relies on the hetero-octameric augmin complex, but lack of structure information about augmin has hindered understanding how it promotes branching. In this work, we combine cryo-electron microscopy, protein structural prediction, and visualization of fused bulky tags via negative stain electron microscopy to identify the location and orientation of each subunit within the augmin …

Cancer Neuroscience: State Of The Field, Emerging Directions, Frank Winkler, David H Gutmann, Et Al.

2020-Current year OA Pubs

The nervous system governs both ontogeny and oncology. Regulating organogenesis during development, maintaining homeostasis, and promoting plasticity throughout life, the nervous system plays parallel roles in the regulation of cancers. Foundational discoveries have elucidated direct paracrine and electrochemical communication between neurons and cancer cells, as well as indirect interactions through neural effects on the immune system and stromal cells in the tumor microenvironment in a wide range of malignancies. Nervous system-cancer interactions can regulate oncogenesis, growth, invasion and metastatic spread, treatment resistance, stimulation of tumor-promoting inflammation, and impairment of anti-cancer immunity. Progress in cancer neuroscience may create an important new …

Cultivating Anti-Racism Allies In Academic Medicine, Cassandra D L Fritz, Shirlene Obuobi, Monica E Peek, Monica B Vela

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Racial microaggressions, racially based remarks, or actions that negatively impact marginalized physicians of color (Black, Latino/a/x, and American Indian/Alaskan Natives) often go unaddressed. This article provides four strategies for how individuals and institutions can engage in anti-racism allyship: (1) be an upstander during microaggressions, (2) be a sponsor and advocate for physicians of color, (3) acknowledge academic titles and accomplishments, and (4) challenge the idea of a "standard fit" for academic faculty and research. Skills in academic allyship should be taught to

Sleep-Wake Patterns Are Altered With Age, Prdm13 Signaling In The Dmh, And Diet Restriction In Mice, Shogo Tsuji, Cynthia S Brace, Nicholas Rensing, Michael Wong, Shin-Ichiro Imai, Et Al.

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Old animals display significant alterations in sleep-wake patterns such as increases in sleep fragmentation and sleep propensity. Here, we demonstrated that PR-domain containing protein 13 (Prdm13)+ neurons in the dorsomedial hypothalamus (DMH) are activated during sleep deprivation (SD) in young mice but not in old mice. Chemogenetic inhibition of Prdm13+ neurons in the DMH in young mice promotes increase in sleep attempts during SD, suggesting its involvement in sleep control. Furthermore, DMH-specific

Isoflurane Conditioning Provides Protection Against Subarachnoid Hemorrhage Induced Delayed Cerebral Ischemia Through Nf-Kb Inhibition, Meizi Liu, Keshav Jayaraman, Jogender Mehla, Deepti Diwan, James W Nelson, Ahmed E Hussein, Ananth K Vellimana, Yousef Abu-Amer, Gregory J Zipfel, Umeshkumar Athiraman

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Delayed cerebral ischemia (DCI) is the largest treatable cause of poor outcome after aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH). Nuclear Factor Kappa-light-chain-enhancer of Activated B cells (NF-kB), a transcription factor known to function as a pivotal mediator of inflammation, is upregulated in SAH and is pathologically associated with vasospasm. We previously showed that a brief exposure to isoflurane, an inhalational anesthetic, provided multifaceted protection against DCI after SAH. The aim of our current study is to investigate the role of NF-kB in isoflurane-conditioning-induced neurovascular protection against SAH-induced DCI. Twelve-week-old wild type male mice (C57BL/6) were divided into five groups: sham, SAH, SAH …

Changing Trends In Demographics, Risk Factors, And Clinical Features Of Patients With Infective Endocarditis-Related Stroke, 2005-2015, Mohamed Ridha, Opeolu Adeoye, Et Al.

2020-Current year OA Pubs

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: There is a rising incidence of infective endocarditis-related stroke (IERS) in the United States attributed to the opioid epidemic. A contemporary epidemiologic description is necessary to understand the impact of the opioid epidemic on clinical characteristics of IERS. We describe and analyze trends in the demographics, risk factors, and clinical features of IERS.

METHODS: This is a retrospective cohort study within a biracial population of 1.3 million in the Greater Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky region. All hospitalized patients with hemorrhagic or ischemic stroke were identified and physician verified from the 2005, 2010, and 2015 calendar years using ICD-9 and …

"Helicase" Activity Promoted Through Dynamic Interactions Between A Ssdna Translocase And A Diffusing Ssb Protein, Kacey N Mersch, Joshua E Sokoloski, Binh Nguyen, Roberto Galletto, Timothy M Lohman

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Replication protein A (RPA) is a eukaryotic single-stranded (ss) DNA-binding (SSB) protein that is essential for all aspects of genome maintenance. RPA binds ssDNA with high affinity but can also diffuse along ssDNA. By itself, RPA is capable of transiently disrupting short regions of duplex DNA by diffusing from a ssDNA that flanks the duplex DNA. Using single-molecule total internal reflection fluorescence and optical trapping combined with fluorescence approaches, we show that

Sting-Dependent Interferon Signatures Restrict Osteoclast Differentiation And Bone Loss In Mice, Susan Maclauchlan, Priyanka Kushwaha, Albert Tai, Sijia Chen, Catherine Manning, Gaurav Swarnkar, Yousef Abu-Amer, Katherine A Fitzgerald, Shruti Sharma, Ellen M Gravallese

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Stimulator of interferon genes (STING) is a key mediator of type-I interferon (IFN-I) signaling in response to a variety of stimuli, but the contribution of STING to homeostatic processes is not fully characterized. Previous studies showed that ligand activation of STING limits osteoclast differentiation in vitro through the induction of IFNβ and IFN-I interferon-stimulated genes (ISGs). In a disease model (SAVI) driven by the V154M gain-of-function mutation in STING, fewer osteoclasts form from SAVI precursors in response to receptor activator of NF-kappaB ligand (RANKL) in an IFN-I-dependent manner. Due to the described role of STING-mediated regulation of osteoclastogenesis in activation …

Uropathogenic Escherichia Coli Infection-Induced Epithelial Trained Immunity Impacts Urinary Tract Disease Outcome, Seongmi K Russell, Jessica K Harrison, Benjamin S Olson, Hyung Joo Lee, Valerie P O'Brien, Xiaoyun Xing, Lu Yu, Elisha D O Roberson, Rajdeep Bomjan, Changxu Fan, Marina Sha, Marco Colonna, Ting Wang, Thomas J Hannan, Scott J Hultgren, Et Al.

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Previous urinary tract infections (UTIs) can predispose one to future infections; however, the underlying mechanisms affecting recurrence are poorly understood. We previously found that UTIs in mice cause differential bladder epithelial (urothelial) remodelling, depending on disease outcome, that impacts susceptibility to recurrent UTI. Here we compared urothelial stem cell (USC) lines isolated from mice with a history of either resolved or chronic uropathogenic Escherichia coli (UPEC) infection, elucidating evidence of molecular imprinting that involved epigenetic changes, including differences in chromatin accessibility, DNA methylation and histone modification. Epigenetic marks in USCs from chronically infected mice enhanced caspase-1-mediated cell death upon UPEC …

Il-15 Enhances Hiv-1 Infection By Promoting Survival And Proliferation Of Ccr5+Cd4+ T Cells, Yuhao Li, Hongbo Gao, Kolin M. Clark, Liang Shan

2020-Current year OA Pubs

HIV-1 usually utilizes CCR5 as its coreceptor and rarely switches to a CXCR4-tropic virus until the late stage of infection. CCR5+CD4+ T cells are the major virus-producing cells in viremic individuals as well as SIV-infected nonhuman primates. The differentiation of CCR5+CD4+ T cells is associated with the availability of IL-15, which increases during acute HIV-1 infection. Here, we report that CCR5 was expressed by CD4+ T cells exhibiting effector or effector memory phenotypes with high expression levels of the IL-2/IL-15 receptor common β and γ chains. IL-15, but not IL-7, improved the survival of CCR5+CD4+ T cells, drove their expansion, …

Increased Clonal Hematopoiesis Involving Dna Damage Response Genes In Patients Undergoing Lung Transplantation, Laneshia K Tague, Karolyn A. Oetjen, Anirudh Mahadev, Matthew J. Walter, Hephzibah Anthony, Daniel Kreisel, Daniel C. Link, Andrew E Gelman

2020-Current year OA Pubs

BACKGROUNDCellular stressors influence the development of clonal hematopoiesis (CH). We hypothesized that environmental, inflammatory, and genotoxic stresses drive the emergence of CH in lung transplant recipients. METHODSWe performed a cross-sectional cohort study of 85 lung transplant recipients to characterize CH prevalence. We evaluated somatic variants using duplex error-corrected sequencing and germline variants using whole exome sequencing. We evaluated CH frequency and burden using χ2 and Poisson regression, and we evaluated associations with clinical and demographic variables and clinical outcomes using χ2, logistic regression, and Cox regression. RESULTSCH in DNA damage response (DDR) genes TP53, PPM1D, and ATM was increased in …

Neuronal Birthdate Reveals Topography In A Vestibular Brainstem Circuit For Gaze Stabilization, Dena Goldblatt, Stephanie Huang, Marie R Greaney, Kyla R Hamling, Venkatakaushik Voleti, Citlali Perez-Campos, Kripa B Patel, Wenze Li, Elizabeth M C Hillman, Martha W Bagnall, David Schoppik

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Across the nervous system, neurons with similar attributes are topographically organized. This topography reflects developmental pressures. Oddly, vestibular (balance) nuclei are thought to be disorganized. By measuring activity in birthdated neurons, we revealed a functional map within the central vestibular projection nucleus that stabilizes gaze in the larval zebrafish. We first discovered that both somatic position and stimulus selectivity follow projection neuron birthdate. Next, with electron microscopy and loss-of-function assays, we found that patterns of peripheral innervation to projection neurons were similarly organized by birthdate. Finally, birthdate revealed spatial patterns of axonal arborization and synapse formation to projection neuron outputs. …

The Co-Morbidity Of Dsm-V Gambling With Dsm-V Mental Disorders And Substance Abuse In A Kenyan Context Of High Risk Schizophrenia, David M Ndetei, Victoria Mutiso, Reinpeter Momanyi, Pascalyne Nyamai, Christine Musyimi, Daniel Mamah

2020-Current year OA Pubs

INTRODUCTION: There is evidence that gambling disorder shares similarities with other types of addictive behavior, such as occurs in substance abuse. In addition, co-morbidity of gambling with mental disorders has been established in school-going students.

AIM: This study aimed at determining the comorbidity of DSM-V gambling disorder with DSM-V mental disorders and substance abuse in high school, college and university students in Kenya.

METHODS: This was a cross-sectional study among 536 high school, college and university students. We collected data on socio-demographic characteristics, economic indicators, DSM-V diagnosis including DSM-V gambling disorder and substance use disorders using the WHO ASSIST tool. …

Automatic Detection Of Circulating Tumor Cells And Cancer Associated Fibroblasts Using Deep Learning, Cheng Shen, Siddarth Rawal, Rebecca Brown, Haowen Zhou, Ashutosh Agarwal, Mark A Watson, Richard J Cote, Changhuei Yang

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) and cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) from whole blood are emerging as important biomarkers that potentially aid in cancer diagnosis and prognosis. The microfilter technology provides an efficient capture platform for them but is confounded by two challenges. First, uneven microfilter surfaces makes it hard for commercial scanners to obtain images with all cells in-focus. Second, current analysis is labor-intensive with long turnaround time and user-to-user variability. Here we addressed the first challenge through developing a customized imaging system and data pre-processing algorithms. Utilizing cultured cancer and CAF cells captured by microfilters, we showed that images from our …

Factor Xa Cleaves Sars-Cov-2 Spike Protein To Block Viral Entry And Infection, Wenjuan Dong, Sean P J Whelan, Et Al.

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Serine proteases (SP), including furin, trypsin, and TMPRSS2 cleave the SARS-CoV-2 spike (S) protein, enabling the virus to enter cells. Here, we show that factor (F) Xa, an SP involved in blood coagulation, is upregulated in COVID-19 patients. In contrast to other SPs, FXa exerts antiviral activity. Mechanistically, FXa cleaves S protein, preventing its binding to ACE2, and thus blocking viral entry and infection. However, FXa is less effective against variants carrying the D614G mutation common in all pandemic variants. The anticoagulant rivaroxaban, a direct FXa inhibitor, inhibits FXa-mediated S protein cleavage and facilitates viral entry, whereas the indirect FXa …

Sphingomyelin 16:0 Is A Therapeutic Target For Neuronal Death In Acid Sphingomyelinase Deficiency, Ángel Gaudioso, Xuntian Jiang, Josefina Casas, Edward H Schuchman, María Dolores Ledesma

2020-Current year OA Pubs

Acid sphingomyelinase deficiency (ASMD) is a lysosomal storage disorder caused by mutations in the SMPD1 gene encoding for the acid sphingomyelinase (ASM). While intravenous infusion of recombinant ASM is an effective treatment for the peripheral disease, the neurological complications of ASMD remain unaddressed. It has been shown that aberrantly high level of total brain sphingomyelin (SM) is a key pathological event leading to neurodegeneration. Using mice lacking ASM (ASMko), which mimic the disease, we here demonstrate that among the SM species, SM16:0 shows the highest accumulation and toxicity in ASMko neurons. By targeting lysosomes, SM16:0 causes permeabilization and exocytosis of …