Digital Commons Network^™

Parp Inhibitor Response Is Enhanced In Prostate Cancer When Xrcc1 Expression Is Reduced, Kaveri Goel, Vani Venkatappa, Kimiko L Krieger, Dongquan Chen, Arun Sreekumar, Natalie R Gassman

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Prostate cancer (PCa) is the second most common cancer worldwide and the fifth leading cause of cancer-related deaths among men. The emergence of metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) after androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) exemplifies the complex disease management for PCa. PARP inhibitors (PARPis) are being tested to treat mCRPC in tumors with defective homologous recombination repair (HRR) to address this complexity. However, increasing resistance towards PARPi in HRR-deficient patients and the low percentage of HRR-defective mCRPC patients requires the identification of new genes whose deficiency can be exploited for PARPi treatment. XRCC1 is a DNA repair protein critical in the …

Stress, Employment Changes, And Psychological Distress Among Caregivers Of Patients With Head And Neck Cancer, Lama Abdurrahman, Vlad C Sandulache, Cielito Reyes-Gibby, Erich M Sturgis, Pavan Jhaveri, Hoda Badr

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Importance: Patients undergoing external beam radiation therapy (EBRT) for head and neck cancer (HNC) often experience adverse effects that require substantial caregiving. The burdens of caregiving can impact caregiver employment and mental health over time, yet this topic remains underexplored.

Objective: To examine the associations between caregiving for patients with HNC who undergo EBRT and caregiver stress, employment status, and psychological distress.

Design, setting, and participants: This was a secondary analysis of data from a longitudinal survey study that surveyed caregivers at baseline (ie, at initiation of EBRT) and at 4-month and 12-month follow-ups. The study was conducted at 2 …

The Aging Ovary Stands On The Shoulders Of Giant Multinucleated Cells, Avery A Ahmed, Stephanie A Pangas

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Reproductive aging is associated with declining fertility and increasing inflammation, though these events are not well understood. An exciting new study in PLOS Biology utilizes cutting-edge technologies to characterize the role of multinucleated giant cells in ovarian aging.

Sci – U: Validation Of An Updated Self-Care Inventory For Contemporary Diabetes Management In Adolescents With Type 1 Diabetes, Sarah S Jaser, Tamim A Hamdan, Marisa E Hilliard, Joyce P Yi-Frazier, Randi Streisand, Faisal S Malik, Daniel J Desalvo, Maeve B O'Donnell, Annette M La Greca

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Aims: The Self-Care Inventory is a widely used measure to assess diabetes self-management behaviors. We sought to adapt and streamline the measure to reflect advances in diabetes management, including increased use of continuous glucose monitor and automated insulin delivery systems.

Methods: Through an expert-driven, iterative process, the updated Self-Care Inventory (SCI-U) was created by modifying items to reflect modern diabetes management and reducing the measure to 8 items. The measure was administered to 369 adolescents with type 1 diabetes in 4 regions of the United States, at baseline of two separate intervention trials (mean age = 15.5 ± 1.5, 56 …

Clinical Characteristics And Longitudinal Associations With Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder In Youth Exposed To Trauma, Caitlin M Pinciotti, Paul J Rathouz, Andrew G Guzick, Jeffrey D Shahidullah, Emily J Bivins, David B Riddle, Ogechi Cynthia Onyeka, Eric A Storch, Wayne K Goodman, Kelli Franco, Justin F Rousseau, D Jeffrey Newport, Karen Dineen Wagner, Charles B Nemeroff

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Childhood trauma exposure is associated with posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) and suicidality, however it is also a risk factor for obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) in adults. Research examining the relationship between childhood trauma and OCD in youth is mixed, and there is a dearth of research examining the associations among OCD, PTSS, and suicidality. As a result, conclusions have been drawn from primarily cross-sectional adult samples. No study has examined the clinical characteristics associated with OCD in trauma-exposed youth, nor its associations with PTSS and suicidality over time. To address this gap, the present study used logistic regressions and generalized estimating …

"Touch&Play" Wood Typification By The Masspec Pen, Adriano Reis, Caroline Pais Carvalho, Iasmim Lopes De Lima, Felipe R P Mansoldo, Alane Beatriz Vermelho, Rosineide Costa Simas, Livia S Eberlin, Marcos N Eberlin

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

We have investigated the ability of a MasSpec Pen (MSPen) "three-in-one" (extraction, transfer, and ionization) device coupled to a mass spectrometer to provide instantaneous chemical profiles that could promptly characterize wood samples from the mahogany (Meliaceae) family. For that, we selected a set of five representative wood species, that is, Brazilian mahogany (Swietenia macrophylla, also known as Honduran mahogany), two African mahoganies (Khaya ivorensis and Khaya senegalensis), and two "nongenuine" ("fake") mahogany woods: cedar (Cedrela odorata) and andiroba (Carapa guianensis). By simply touching the superficially polished wood surface and after 3 s of automatic extraction, profiles of highly characteristic markers …

Corrigendum To “Neuro-Ophthalmic Complications Following Eighth Cranial Nerve Microvascular Decompression” [Am J Ophthalmol Case Rep (2025) Ecollection 1–3 102258], Stanley M Saju, Patrick J Hunt, Pamela Davila-Siliezar, Noor Laylani, Andrew G Lee

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

This corrects the article "Neuro-ophthalmic complications following eighth cranial nerve microvascularx decompression" in volume 37, 102258.

Graphage: Unleashing The Power Of Graph Neural Network To Decode Epigenetic Aging, Saleh Sakib Ahmed, Nahian Shabab, Abul Hassan Samee, M Sohel Rahman

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

DNA methylation is a crucial epigenetic marker used in various clocks to predict epigenetic age. However, many existing clocks fail to account for crucial information about CpG sites and their interrelationships, such as co-methylation patterns. We present a novel approach to represent methylation data as a graph, using methylation values and relevant information about CpG sites as nodes, and relationships like co-methylation, same gene, and same chromosome as edges. We then use a graph neural network (GNN) to predict age. Thus our model, GraphAge leverages both the structural and positional information for prediction as well as better interpretation. Although, we …

Is Less More? Maximizing Outcomes By Tailoring Treatments To Patients: Oncofertility And Oncomenopause, Janice S Kwon, Marie Plante, Martha Hickey, Annabelle Huguenin, Sarah Hmaidan, Terri Lynn Woodard

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Notable advances have been made in improving survival outcomes in various cancers, but some have incurred undesirable costs and effects to patients with respect to fertility and menopause. Patients are living longer with cancer, and patient reported outcomes are influencing decision-making by individuals and their health care providers. It is essential to evaluate existing standards of care on an ongoing basis and prioritize quality of life and long-term survivorship, particularly for interventions in early-stage cancers and risk-reducing strategies that often yield long-term life expectancy.

The Need To Integrate Mental Health Treatment Into The Care Of Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser, Teni Davoudian, Emily Hills

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

This mini review examines the psychological burdens of Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser (MRKH) and encourages collaborations between medical and mental health providers who treat this condition. The psychological comorbidities of MRKH emerge in adolescence and persist into adulthood. For several years, The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and researchers in this field have called for the provision of psychological counseling for individuals with MRKH. However, referrals to qualified mental health professionals remain sparse leaving many to confront the emotional complexities of MRKH with little to no support.

An Electronic, Preclinic, Social Determinants Survey Shows Pediatric Atherosclerotic Risk Factor Referral Identifies At-Risk Families, Justin R Rahman, Bethany S Zachariah, Christina Y Miyake, Deidra Ansah, Justin P Zachariah

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Objective: Atherosclerotic risk factors are prevalent in childhood. Risk factors are associated with social determinants of health (SDoH), but have never been demonstrated in a clinical pediatric cardiology cohort. This report details the first use of a remotely deployed, previsit, self-administered electronic survey for the ascertainment of SDoH in youth referred to pediatric cardiology. We hypothesized that patients referred for atherosclerotic risk factors would have higher risk of SDoH factors.

Study design: SDoH were assessed using validated instruments from the PRAPARE toolkit and the Accountable Health Communities Health-Related Social Needs Screening Tool automatically deployed days before a scheduled visit in …

Twenty-Five Years Of Palivizumab: A Global Historic Review Of Its Impact On The Burden Of Respiratory Syncytial Virus Disease In Children, Xavier Carbonell-Estrany, Eric A F Simões, Louis Bont, Paolo Manzoni, Heather J Zar, Anne Greenough, Octavio Ramilo, Renato Stein, Barbara Law, Asuncion Mejias, Manuel Sanchez Luna, Paul A Checchia, Leonard Krilov, Marcello Lanari, Ron Dagan, Brigitte Fauroux, Bernhard Resch, Terho Heikkinen, Joseph B Domachowske, Joanne G Wildenbeest, Federico Martinon-Torres, Richard Thwaites, Merih Cetinkaya, Adel S Alharbi, Carlos E Rodriguez-Martinez, Daniel E Noyola, Asiah Kassim, Satoshi Kusuda, Ji-Man Kang, Barry Rodgers-Gray, Anna Platonova, Fungwe Jah, Bosco Paes

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Introduction: Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) causes significant morbidity and mortality in young children. For 25 years, palivizumab has been the only effective pharmaceutical RSV preventive.

Areas covered: We summarize the development and a quarter-century of real-world evidence with palivizumab. We highlight its positive impact on the burden of RSV in high-risk children. Based on lessons learnt from its implementation, we suggest strategies for effective and equitable deployment of newer RSV preventives.

Expert opinion: Following failure of the formalin-inactivated RSV vaccine in 1967, RSV intravenous immunoglobulin was approved in 1996 after three decades' research. Subsequently, palivizumab emerged as the most effective …

Are Education, Socioeconomic Status, And Household Size Dependent Variables Influencing The Developmental Origins Of Inflammatory Bowel Disease?, Richard Kellermayer

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

No abstract provided.

Core Domain Set For Studies Of Acute Calcium Pyrophosphate Crystal Arthritis: Omeract Delphi Survey To Establish Consensus, Yiling Zhang, Sara K Tedeschi, Abhishek Abhishek, Owen Hensey, David Grossberg, Ken Cai, Beverley Shea, Jasvinder A Singh, Robin Christensen, Teodora Serban, Edoardo Cipolletta, Konstantinos Parperis, Cesar Diaz-Torne, Geraldine M Mccarthy, Fabio Becce, Tamer A Gheita, Silvia Sirotti, Sara Nysom Christiansen, Luis Coronel, Lisa K Stamp, Yousra H Abdel-Fattah, Tristan Pascart, Georgios Filippou, Lih En Hong, John Fitzgerald, Nicola Dalbeth

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Objective: To identify potential domains for the Outcome Measures in Rheumatology (OMERACT) core domain set for studies of an individual flare of acute calcium pyrophosphate (CPP) crystal arthritis.

Methods: Patient research partners (PRPs) and other participants (mainly clinicians and researchers) completed three rounds of survey using Delphi methodology. Consensus was defined as ≥ 70 % of both PRP and other participants groups rated the domain as a 'critically important domain to include'. In a subsequent ranking exercise, all participants were asked to rank and comment on up to 10 domains to include as core domains.

Results: Fourteen domains reached consensus …

Polyclonal Plasma Cell (Polypc) Signature As A Key Indicator For Predicting The Progression Of Mgus To Multiple Myeloma, Fumou Sun, Yan Cheng, Catherine Ma, Hongwei Xu, Clyde Bailey, David Mery, Timothy Cody Ashby, Daisy Alapat, Yong Li, Ken H Young, Samer Al Hadidi, Sharmilan Thanendrarajan, Carolina Schinke, Maurizio Zangari, Frits Van Rhee, Guido Tricot, John D Shaughnessy, Fenghuang Zhan

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Background

Multiple myeloma (MM) is virtually always preceded by monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS). Elevated serum markers are used to classify MGUS patients into clinical risk categories. Previous research has indicated that the absence of a normal plasma cell signature in MGUS is linked to early progression.

Objective

To confirm that the presence of a “polyclonal plasma cell (PolyPC) signature” serves as a robust negative predictor of MGUS progression.

Methods

374 MGUS patients were enrolled, including 334 patients with stable disease and 40 patients who progressed to MM within 10 years. An oligonucleotide microarray analysis was performed on mRNA …

All Genetic Subtypes Of B-Cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia Exhibit Increased Incidence Rates In Children With Down Syndrome, Ching-Ju Hsu, Jeremy M Schraw, Tania A Desrosiers, Amanda E Janitz, Russell S Kirby, Eirini Nestoridi, Wendy N Nembhard, Jason L Salemi, Charles Shumate, Jean Paul Tanner, Mahsa M Yazdy, Michael E Scheurer, Karen R Rabin, Philip J Lupo

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

No abstract provided.

A Phenotypic Screen Identifies Xanthohumol And Other Flavonoids As Killers Of Bladder Cancer, Michael J Bolt, Jessica Oceguera, Alejandra Rivera Tostado, Christopher D Candler, Elina Mosa, Kazem Safari, Maureen G Mancini, Michael A Mancini

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Bladder cancer accounts for 4 % of cancer diagnoses in the US. Current treatments primarily involve trans-urethral resection of bladder tumors (TURBT) and immunotherapy with Bacille Calmette-Guerin (BCG). Despite the efficacy of TURBT, issues with residual tumors persist. We chose to utilize Cell Painting to screen a set of 244 flavonoid compounds for bladder cancer cell toxicity. Using multiparametric high content analysis termed SPACe, we discover promising candidates underscoring the potential of flavonoids in targeting bladder cancer cells and elucidating their mechanisms of action. Notably, compounds such as xanthohumol show promise in reducing cancer cell viability by altering lipid metabolism. …

Linking Symptom Inventories Using Semantic Textual Similarity, Eamonn Kennedy, Shashank Vadlamani, Hannah M Lindsey, Kelly S Peterson, Kristen Dams O'Connor, Ronak Agarwal, Houshang H Amiri, Raeda K Andersen, Talin Babikian, David A Baron, Erin D Bigler, Karen Caeyenberghs, Lisa Delano-Wood, Seth G Disner, Ekaterina Dobryakova, Blessen C Eapen, Rachel M Edelstein, Carrie Esopenko, Helen M Genova, Elbert Geuze, Naomi J Goodrich-Hunsaker, Jordan Grafman, Asta K Håberg, Cooper B Hodges, Kristen R Hoskinson, Elizabeth S Hovenden, Andrei Irimia, Neda Jahanshad, Ruchira M Jha, Finian Keleher, Kimbra Kenney, Inga K Koerte, Spencer W Liebel, Abigail Livny, Marianne Løvstad, Sarah L Martindale, Jeffrey E Max, Andrew R Mayer, Timothy B Meier, Deleene S Menefee, Abdalla Z Mohamed, Stefania Mondello, Martin M Monti, Rajendra A Morey, Virginia Newcombe, Mary R Newsome, Alexander Olsen, Nicholas J Pastorek, Mary Jo Pugh, Adeel Razi, Jacob E Resch, Jared A Rowland, Kelly Russell, Nicholas P Ryan, Randall S Scheibel, Adam T Schmidt, Gershon Spitz, Jaclyn A Stephens, Assaf Tal, Leah D Talbert, Maria Carmela Tartaglia, Brian A Taylor, Sophia I Thomopoulos, Maya Troyanskaya, Eve M Valera, Harm Jan Van Der Horn, John D Van Horn, Ragini Verma, Benjamin S C Wade, Willian C Walker, Ashley L Ware, J Kent Werner, Keith Owen Yeates, Ross D Zafonte, Michael M Zeineh, Brandon Zielinski, Paul M Thompson, Frank G Hillary, David F Tate, Elisabeth A Wilde, Emily L Dennis

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

An extensive library of symptom inventories has been developed over time to measure clinical symptoms of traumatic brain injury (TBI), but this variety has led to several long-standing issues. Most notably, results drawn from different settings and studies are not comparable. This creates a fundamental problem in TBI diagnostics and outcome prediction, namely that it is not possible to equate results drawn from distinct tools and symptom inventories. Here, we present an approach using semantic textual similarity (STS) to link symptoms and scores across previously incongruous symptom inventories by ranking item text similarities according to their conceptual likeness. We tested …

Characteristic Profiling Of Cho-Cell Expressed Mers-Cov Rbd-Fc, Mashal M Almutairi, Yi-Lin Chen, Jungsoon Lee, Zhuyun Liu, Ulrich Strych, Peter J Hotez, Maria Elena Bottazzi, Wen-Hsiang Chen

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

The ongoing circulation of the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) in camels across Asia, the Middle East, and Africa, along with its occasional transmission to humans, demonstrates a need for a MERS vaccine. Previously, we have reported a receptor binding domain (RBD) of MERS-CoV fused with human Fc as a promising vaccine antigen (MERS-CoV RBD-Fc). We generated a stable recombinant CHO cell line expressing such a protein and developed a basic production process suitable for future technological transfer to pilot-scale manufacture. In this study, we employed various in-house analytical assays to examine the characteristics of purified RBD-Fc protein and …

Dosing Recommendations For Ampicillin And Ceftriaxone In The Treatment Of Pediatric Community-Acquired Pneumonia Using Monte Carlo- And Physiologic-Based Pharmacokinetic Simulations, Norint Tung, Dustin Huynh, Quang Dam, Tri Tran, Kristina G Hulten, Christopher J Harrison, Sheldon L Kaplan, Tyler H Do, Amartya Setty, Lana Hoang, John S Bradley, Jennifer Le

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Objective: Since 2011, Ampicillin (AMP) has been recommended as the parenteral antibiotic of choice for pediatric community-acquired pneumonia (CAP), but ceftriaxone (CRO) is recommended for unvaccinated children and those with complicated CAP. Using penicillin and CRO susceptibility data for pneumococcus, we evaluated the adequacy of currently recommended doses of AMP and CRO.

Methods: With nonlinear mixed-effects modeling v7.3, Monte Carlo simulations (MCS, N = 10,000) for AMP and CRO were conducted for 6 virtual patients aged 3 months, 1, 2, 5, 10, and 15 years. PK-Sim v9.0 was used to develop physiologic-based pharmacokinetic (PBPK) models for AMP (N = 4000) …

Interactions Between Adgrf1 (Gpr110) And Extracellular Matrix Proteins Govern Its Effects On Tumorigenesis In Her2-Positive Breast Cancer, Noor Mazin Abdulkareem, Raksha Bhat, Micah Castillo, Sung Yun Jung, Suhas Vasaikar, Sarmistha Nanda, Alexis Ruiz, Martin Shea, Wangjia Cao, Jamunarani Veeraraghavan, Hee-Yong Kim, Tasneem Bawa-Khalfe, Tahir Hussain, Xinli Liu, Preethi Gunaratne, Rachel Schiff, Meghana V Trivedi

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Background and purpose: We and others have previously shown that ADGRF1, an adhesion G protein-coupled receptor, is overexpressed and associated with poor survival in many cancers, including human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 (HER2) breast cancer (BC). Also, we have reported the tumour-promoting function of ADGRF1 using preclinical models of HER2+ BC. In this study, we investigated the effect of ADGRF1 overexpression in an orthotopic in vivo model as well as downstream signalling of ADGRF1 in HER2+ BC.

Experimental approach: We utilized a doxycycline (Dox)-induced ADGRF1 overexpression system in HER2+ BC cell lines and performed various in vitro and in vivo …

Core Domain Set For Chronic And/Or Recurrent Manifestations Of Calcium Pyrophosphate Deposition Disease: Omeract Delphi Survey To Establish Consensus, Yiling Zhang, Sara K Tedeschi, Abhishek Abhishek, Owen Hensey, David Grossberg, Ken Cai, Beverley Shea, Jasvinder A Singh, Robin Christensen, Teodora Serban, Edoardo Cipolletta, Konstantinos Parperis, Cesar Diaz-Torne, Geraldine M Mccarthy, Fabio Becce, Tamer A Gheita, Silvia Sirotti, Sara Nysom Christiansen, Luis Coronel, Lisa K Stamp, Yousra H Abdel-Fattah, Tristan Pascart, Georgios Filippou, Lih En Hong, John Fitzgerald, Nicola Dalbeth

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Objective: To agree on important domains for the Outcome Measures in Rheumatology (OMERACT) core domain set for chronic and/or recurrent manifestations of calcium pyrophosphate deposition (CPPD) disease.

Methods: Patient research partners (PRPs) and other participants (mainly clinicians and researchers) contributed to three rounds of a consensus survey using Delphi methodology. Consensus was defined if ≥70% of both patients and other participants scored the domain as 'critically important domain to include'. In a subsequent ranking exercise, all participants were asked to select and rank up to 10 of the domains reaching consensus.

Results: Fifteen domains reached consensus as critically important. Within …

Clinical Manifestations, Disease Penetrance, And Treatment In Individuals With Socs1 Insufficiency: A Registry-Based And Population-Based Study, Jerome Hadjadj, Anna Wolfers, Oleg Borisov, Derek Hazard, Ronan Leahy, Marie Jeanpierre, Alexandre Belot, Shahrzad Bakhtiar, Fabian Hauck, Pui Y Lee, Stefano Volpi, Serena Palmeri, Vincent Barlogis, Nathalie Aladjidi, Georg Ebetsberger-Dachs, Jerome Avouac, Fabienne Charbit-Henrion, Morgane Cheminant, Jean Donadieu, Sujal Ghosh, David P Hoytema Van Konijnenburg, Julia Körholz, Jacinta Bustamante, Jeremie Rosain, Lisa Forbes Satter, Ingrid Selmeryd, Georgios Sogkas, Benedicte Neven, Frederic Rieux-Laucat, Stephan Ehl

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Background: Suppressor of cytokine signalling 1 (SOCS1) insufficiency is an inborn error of immunity affecting the negative regulation of cytokine and growth factor signalling. We aimed to enhance the understanding of clinical manifestations, disease trajectories, disease penetrance, and the effect of Janus kinase (JAK) inhibition in individuals with SOCS1 insufficiency.

Methods: This study used data from two independent cohorts: the European Society for Immunodeficiencies (ESID) registry and the UK Biobank. Participants from the ESID registry were from nine European countries (Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Sweden, and Ukraine), China, Taiwan, and the USA. Participants from the ESID registry …

Multicenter Evaluation Of A New Strip-Based Blood Glucose System For Point-Of-Care Testing In Critical And Non-Critical Care Settings, Michael Goodman, Sven Bercker, Nancy Breitenbeck, Cristina Canada-Vilalta, Daisy D Canepa, William A Clarke, Christopher W Farnsworth, Edward O Ganser, Nienke Geerts, Barbara Goldsmith, Gary Headden, Debra Hoppensteadt, Birgit Klapperich, Ryan Matika, Gabrielle Miles, Sagori Mukhopadhyay, James H Nichols, Rebecca M O'Dell, Zubaid Rafique, Andre Schuetzenmeister, Robbert Slingerland, Ann F Stankiewicz, Jonathan R Swanson, Nam K Tran, Alan H B Wu, Brad S Karon

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Background: Evaluation of the performance of Cobas® Pulse (Roche Diagnostics GmbH, Mannheim, Germany), a new blood glucose (BG) monitoring system (BGMS; referred to here as BGMSA) intended for point-of-care testing using samples from patients in diverse clinical settings by intended point-of-care test operators.

Methods: Arterial, capillary, venous, or heel stick whole blood (WB) samples from patients in non-critical and critical care settings were collected and analyzed using BGMSA and the Nova StatStrip® BGMS (Nova Biomedical, Waltham, MA; referred to here as BGMSB), and a hexokinase comparator (Cobas 6000 Analyzer Series; Roche Diagnostics GmbH). The blood glucose measurement accuracy was assessed …

Secreted Phosphoprotein 1 In Lung Diseases, Hongli Liu, Cristian Coarfa, Arzoo N Charania, Jennifer L Larson-Casey, Ivan O Rosas, Chao He

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Secreted phosphoprotein 1 (SPP1), also known as osteopontin (OPN) or early T lymphocyte activation protein 1 (ETA-1), is a multifunctional protein involved in numerous biological processes, including immune modulation, stress response, and tissue remodeling. The role of SPP1 in interstitial lung diseases (ILDs) has become an area of increasing interest, given its elevated expression in various ILDs such as idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), connective tissue disease-associated ILD (CTD-ILD), and pneumoconiosis, especially with recent data derived from single-cell RNA sequencing. In addition to ILDs, SPP1 has been implicated in infectious granulomatous lung diseases, lung and pleural malignancies, airway diseases, and COVID-19. …

Biallelic Loss-Of-Function Variant In Minpp1 Causes Pontocerebellar Hypoplasia With Characteristic Severe Neurodevelopmental Disorder, Aljazi Al-Maraghi, Rulan Shaath, Katherine Ford, Waleed Aamer, Jehan Alrayahi, Sura Hussein, Elbay Aliyev, Nourhen Agrebi, Muhammad Kohailan, Satanay Z Hubrack, Sasirekha Palaniswamy, Adam D Kennedy, Karen L Debalsi, Sarah H Elsea, Ruba Benini, Tawfeg Ben-Omran, Bernice Lo, Ammira S A Akil, Khalid A Fakhro

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Pontocerebellar hypoplasia (PCH) encompasses a group of autosomal recessive neurodegenerative disorders marked by cerebellar and pontine atrophy. Multiple subtypes of PCH have been identified, among which the rare subtype PCH type 16 is caused by MINPP1 genetic variants. MINPPI encodes an enzyme essential for inositol polyphosphate dephosphorylation, regulating calcium and iron homeostasis. We conducted genome sequencing on a proband from the consanguineous family, who presented with a severe neurodegenerative disorder, to identify the underlying cause of disease. A comprehensive clinical assessment in addition to neuroradiological findings are described. We performed the functional validation of the identified variant and conducted untargeted …

Advanced Age Worsens Phenotypes Of Ocular Hypertension In Mice, Priyamvada M Pitale, Solomon E Gibson, Caroline C Keehn, Arman T Yazdian, Guofu Shen, Benjamin J Frankfort

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Glaucoma is a neurodegenerative disorder of the optic nerve and retinal ganglion cells (RGCs) and a major cause of blindness. The two most important risk factors for glaucoma are ocular hypertension (OHT) and advanced age. In this study, we explored the combined impact of aging and OHT on retinal neuronal and microvasculature health. We induced OHT using the bead-injection model in 12 week old (young) and 1.5 year old (old) mice and monitored intraocular pressure (IOP) for 2 weeks. We then explored vascular phenotypes, blood retinal barrier components, RGC counts, and electroretinogram (ERG) changes. Aged mice displayed reduced retinal microvasculature …

Antibiofilm Properties Of 4-Hydroxy-3-Methyl-2-Alkenylquinoline, A Novel Burkholderia-Derived Alkaloid, Mckinley D Williams, Taylor R Sweeney, Sabrina Trieu, Ravi Orugunty, Abdelahhad Barbour, Fereshteh Younesi, Michael Glogauer, Nopakorn Hansanant, Ronald Shin, Shi-En Lu, Kevin Cao, Abraham Tenorio, Sigmund J Haidacher, Anthony M Haag, Thomas D Horvath, Leif Smith

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Biofilms are an important colonization mechanism employed by several microbial species to better establish themselves and monopolize the acquisition of resources across different environs. Some bacteria have evolved specialized metabolites that, when secreted, disrupt the formation and stability of biofilms generated by competing heterospecies, providing the producing organism with an ecological advantage. Soil-derived species are probable candidates for the identification of such compounds, given the intense level of competition that occurs within the terrestrial ecosystem. The MS14 strain of Burkholderia contaminans isolated from soil in Mississippi has previously been shown to produce antimicrobial compounds like occidiofungin and ornibactin. In this …

Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation For Systemic Lupus Erythematosus: An Elso Registry Analysis, Maria Pereira, Danielle Guffey, Katherine Doane, Eyal Muscal, Carla Levin, Peter Rycus, Marc Anders, Andrea Ontaneda

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

The success of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) in treating Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (SLE) and the risk factors associated with mortality remain uncertain. Methods: We describe the survival outcomes at discharge of the largest SLE cohort on ECMO support. We performed a retrospective cohort study of the Extracorporeal Life Support Organization registry database from 2012 to 2022. Pediatric and adult survivor groups were analyzed using descriptive statistics for the primary study outcome of survival to hospital discharge. Risk predictors for survival were determined by logistic regression.Results: We included 48 children and 368 adults with SLE. Overall, 198 patients (54%) survived …

Hand Hygiene Roles, Challenges, And Intervention Feedback From School Staff: A Qualitative Analysis, Belize, 2022-2023, Anh N Ly, Christina Craig, Dian Maheia, Yolanda Gongora, Vickie Romero, Rosalva Blanco, Allison Lino, Kelsey Mcdavid, Allison Stewart, Victoria Trinies, Alexandra Medley, Francis Morey, Russell Manzanero, Matthew Lozier, Kristy O Murray

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Hand hygiene (HH) in school settings can reduce the spread of infectious diseases and student absenteeism due to illness. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the World Health Organization recommended HH as a public health measure to prevent disease transmission. Understanding school staff's experiences with school-based programs is important for future program development and improvement. As part of a mixed-methods study, we conducted in-depth interviews in March 2022 with school administrators and teachers at 12 primary schools in Belize, selected based on high gaps in HH resources, to understand HH responsibilities, supplies, and challenges. An intervention was implemented to increase HH knowledge …