Immunopathology Commons^™

Spatial Profiling Of The Prostate Cancer Tumor Microenvironment Reveals Multiple Differences In Gene Expression And Correlation With Recurrence Risk, Vinay Kumar, Pavneet Randhawa, Robert Bilodeau, Dan Mercola, Michael Mcclelland, Anshu Agrawal, James Nguyen, Patricia Castro, Michael M Ittmann, Farah Rahmatpanah

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

The tumor microenvironment plays a crucial role in both the development and progression of prostate cancer. Furthermore, identifying protein and gene expression differences between different regions is valuable for treatment development. We applied Digital Spatial Profiling multiplex analysis to formalin-fixed paraffin embedded prostatectomy tissue blocks to investigate protein and transcriptome differences between tumor, tumor-adjacent stroma (TAS), CD45+ tumor, and CD45+ TAS tissue. Differential expression of an immunology/oncology protein panel (n = 58) was measured. OX40L and CTLA4 were expressed at higher levels while 22 other proteins, including CD11c, were expressed at lower levels (FDR < 0.2 and p-value < 0.05) in TAS as compared to tumor epithelia. A tissue microarray analysis of 97 patients with 1547 cores found positive correlations between high expression of CD11c and increased time to recurrence in tumor and TAS, and inverse relationships for CTLA4 and OX40L, where higher expression in tumor correlated with lower time to recurrence, but higher time to recurrence in TAS. Spatial transcriptomic analysis using a Cancer Transcriptome Atlas panel (n = 1825 genes) identified 162 genes downregulated and 69 upregulated in TAS versus tumor, 26 downregulated and 6 upregulated in CD45+ TAS versus CD45+ tumor. We utilized CIBERSORTx to estimate the relative immune cell fractions using CD45+ gene expression and found higher average fractions for memory B, naïve B, and T cells in TAS. In summary, the combination of protein expression differences, immune cell fractions, and correlations of protein expression with time to recurrence suggest that closely examining the tumor microenvironment provides valuable data that can improve prognostication and treatment techniques.

Rolling Stones: An Instructive Case Of Neonatal Cholestasis, Paige Killelea, Shruti Sakhuja, Jose Hernandez, M John Hicks, Sanjiv Harpavat

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

BACKGROUND: Jaundice within the first 1-2 weeks of a neonate's life will generally self-resolve; however, if it lasts longer than this time frame it warrants further work up. Direct or conjugated hyperbilirubinemia can suggest neonatal cholestasis, which in turn reflects marked reduction in bile secretion and flow. The differential diagnosis for neonatal cholestasis is broad. Neonatal choledocholithiasis is a rare cause of neonatal cholestasis, but should be considered on the differential diagnosis for patients presenting with elevated conjugated bilirubin.

CASE PRESENTATION: We describe an infant who presented with neonatal cholestasis. He subsequently underwent work up for biliary atresia, as this …

Effectiveness And Safety Of Immunosuppressants And Biological Therapy For Chronic Spontaneous Urticaria: A Network Meta-Analysis, Wen-Kuang Lin, Shwu-Jiuan Lin, Woan-Ruoh Lee, Chia-Chieh Lin, Weei-Chin Lin, Hua-Ching Chang, Chi-Tsun Cheng, Jason C Hsu

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Chronic spontaneous urticaria (CSU) is the most common phenotype of chronic urticaria. We compared treatment effects and safety profiles of the medications in patients with CSU. We searched PubMed, MEDLINE, and Web of Science for randomized control trials (RCTs), from 1 January 2000 to 31 July 2021, which evaluated omalizumab and immunosuppressants. Network meta-analyses (NMAs) were performed with a frequentist approach. Outcome assessments considered the efficacy (Dermatology Life Quality Index (DLQI) and weekly urticaria activity score (UAS7)) and tolerability profiles with evaluations of study quality, inconsistencies, and heterogeneity. We identified 14 studies which we included in our direct and indirect …

Mrnip Interacts With Sex Body Chromatin To Support Meiotic Progression, Spermatogenesis, And Male Fertility In Mice, Samina Kazi, Julio M Castañeda, Audrey Savolainen, Yiding Xu, Ning Liu, Huanyu Qiao, Ramiro Ramirez-Solis, Kaori Nozawa, Zhifeng Yu, Martin M Matzuk, Renata Prunskaite-Hyyryläinen

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Meiosis has a principal role in sexual reproduction to generate haploid gametes in both sexes. During meiosis, the cell nucleus hosts a dynamic environment where some genes are transcriptionally activated, and some are inactivated at the same time. This becomes possible through subnuclear compartmentalization. The sex body, sequestering X and Y chromosomes during male meiosis and creating an environment for the meiotic sex chromosome inactivation (MSCI) is one of the best known and studied subnuclear compartments. Herein, we show that MRNIP forms droplet‐like accumulations that fuse together to create a distinct subnuclear compartment that partially overlaps with the sex body …

Factors Associated With Severe Illness In Patients Aged <21 Years Hospitalized For Covid-19, Rewa Choudhary, Bryant J Webber, Lindsay S Womack, Hannah K Dupont, Sophia K Chiu, Valentine Wanga, Megan E Gerdes, Sophia Hsu, Dallas S Shi, Theresa M Dulski, Osatohamwen I Idubor, Arthur M Wendel, Nickolas T Agathis, Kristi Anderson, Tricia Boyles, Eleanor S Click, Juliana Da Silva, Mary E Evans, Jeremy A W Gold, Julia C Haston, Pamela Logan, Susan A Maloney, Marisol Martinez, Pavithra Natarajan, Kevin B Spicer, Mark Swancutt, Valerie A Stevens, Jessica Rogers-Brown, Gyan Chandra, Megan Light, Frederick E Barr, Jessica Snowden, Larry K Kociolek, Matthew Mchugh, David L Wessel, Joelle N Simpson, Kathleen C Gorman, Kristen A Breslin, Roberta L Debiasi, Aaron Thompson, Mark W Kline, Julie A Boom, Ila R Singh, Michael Dowlin, Mark Wietecha, Beth Schweitzer, Sapna Bamrah Morris, Emilia H Koumans, Jean Y Ko, David A Siegel, Anne A Kimball

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

OBJECTIVES: To describe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)-related pediatric hospitalizations during a period of B.1.617.2 (Δ) variant predominance and to determine age-specific factors associated with severe illness.

METHODS: We abstracted data from medical charts to conduct a cross-sectional study of patients agedchildren's hospitals from July to August 2021 for COVID-19 or with an incidental positive severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 test. Among patients with COVID-19, we assessed factors associated with severe illness by calculating age-stratified prevalence ratios (PR). We defined severe illness as receiving high-flow nasal cannula, positive airway pressure, or invasive mechanical ventilation.

RESULTS: Of 947 hospitalized patients, 759 …

Conventional And Advanced Mr Imaging Findings In A Cohort Of Pathology-Proven Dermoid Cysts Of The Pediatric Scalp And Skull, Bettina L Serrallach, Gunes Orman, M John Hicks, Nilesh Desai, Stephen Kralik, Thierry Agm Huisman

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

BACKGROUND: In the pediatric population, dermoid cysts are among the most frequent lesions of the scalp and skull. Imaging plays a key role in characterizing scalp and skull lesions in order to narrow the differential diagnoses. In general, dermoids are described as heterogeneous T1-/T2-hypo- to hyperintense lesions on magnetic resonance imaging.

METHODS: The goal of this retrospective study is to evaluate the diffusion weighted imaging findings while reviewing the conventional T1-/T2-/T1+C-weighted MR characteristics in a pathology-proven series of 14 dermoids of the pediatric scalp and skull.

RESULTS: In our pediatric cohort (eight boys, six girls, age range 3-95 months), half …

Performance Evaluation Of The Xt Microslide Assay Pairs On The Vitros Xt 7600 Compared To Vitros Single Microslide Assays On Vitros 5600, Lily Olayinka, Estella Tam, Sridevi Devaraj

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

OBJECTIVES: Pediatric hospitals are always challenged by specimen volumes and thus any innovation in this realm is very welcome. With the introduction of Microslide assay pairs, we aimed to evaluate the analytical performance of the Vitros XT MicroSlide assay pairs on the Vitros XT 7600 compared to single MicroSlides.

DESIGN: Performance characteristics included within-run precision, analytical measurable range, method comparison, and interference verification. We compared six XT MicroSlide pairs on the Vitros XT 7600 with twelve corresponding single slide assays on the Vitros 5600 system.

RESULTS: The XT MicroSlides on Vitros XT 7600 demonstrated excellent precision, equivalent analytical measurable range, …

The Testis-Specific E3 Ubiquitin Ligase Rnf133 Is Required For Fecundity In Mice, Kaori Nozawa, Yoshitaka Fujihara, Darius J Devlin, Ricardo E Deras, Katarzyna Kent, Irina V Larina, Kohei Umezu, Zhifeng Yu, Courtney M Sutton, Qiuji Ye, Laura K Dean, Chihiro Emori, Masahito Ikawa, Thomas X Garcia, Martin M Matzuk

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

BACKGROUND: Ubiquitination is a post-translational modification required for a number of physiological functions regulating protein homeostasis, such as protein degradation. The endoplasmic reticulum (ER) quality control system recognizes and degrades proteins no longer needed in the ER through the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway. E2 and E3 enzymes containing a transmembrane domain have been shown to function in ER quality control. The ER transmembrane protein UBE2J1 is a E2 ubiquitin-conjugating enzyme reported to be essential for spermiogenesis at the elongating spermatid stage. Spermatids from Ube2j1 KO male mice are believed to have defects in the dislocation step of ER quality control. However, associated …

Systemic Ablation Of Camkk2 Impairs Metastatic Colonization And Improves Insulin Sensitivity In Tramp Mice: Evidence For Cancer Cell-Extrinsic Camkk2 Functions In Prostate Cancer, Thomas L Pulliam, Dominik Awad, Jenny J Han, Mollianne M Murray, Jeffrey J Ackroyd, Pavithr Goli, Jonathan S Oakhill, John W Scott, Michael M Ittmann, Daniel E Frigo

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Despite early studies linking calcium-calmodulin protein kinase kinase 2 (CAMKK2) to prostate cancer cell migration and invasion, the role of CAMKK2 in metastasis in vivo remains unclear. Moreover, while CAMKK2 is known to regulate systemic metabolism, whether CAMKK2's effects on whole-body metabolism would impact prostate cancer progression and/or related comorbidities is not known. Here, we demonstrate that germline ablation of

Psychological Trauma Alters T-Lymphocyte Inflammation And Redox Through Sympathetic Mechanisms, Safwan K. Elkhatib

Theses & Dissertations

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a devastating psychiatric disorder characterized by distinctive symptom clusters, including intrusive memories (i.e., flashbacks), avoidance of related stimuli, affective changes, and hyperarousal. Strikingly, patients with PTSD face a significantly increased risk for a number of inflammation-driven pathologies, ranging from cardiovascular to autoimmune disease. Yet, the exact etiology of this increased risk remains unknown. The immune system is known to be strongly influenced by the sympathetic nervous system, and sympathetic overactivity is a hallmark of PTSD. Lymphoid organs, such as the spleen, are richly innervated by sympathetic nerve fibers which terminate near adaptive immune …

Peppermint Oil Effects On The Gut Microbiome In Children With Functional Abdominal Pain, Santosh Thapa, Ruth Ann Luna, Bruno P Chumpitazi, Numan Oezguen, Susan M Abdel-Rahman, Uttam Garg, Salma Musaad, James Versalovic, Gregory L Kearns, Robert J Shulman

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Peppermint oil (PMO) is effective in the treatment of functional abdominal pain disorders, but its mechanism of action is unclear. Evidence suggests PMO has microbicidal activity. We investigated the effect of three different doses of PMO on gut microbiome composition. Thirty children (7-12 years of age) with functional abdominal pain provided a baseline stool sample prior to randomization to 180, 360, or 540 mg of enteric coated PMO (10 participants per dose). They took their respective dose of PMO (180 mg once, 180 mg twice, or 180 mg thrice daily) for 1 week, after which the stool collection was repeated. …

Repair-Assisted Damage Detection Reveals Biological Disparities In Prostate Cancer Between African Americans And European Americans, Kimiko L Krieger, Jie H Gohlke, Kevin J Lee, Danthasinghe Waduge Badrajee Piyarathna, Patricia D Castro, Jeffrey A Jones, Michael M Ittmann, Natalie R Gassman, Arun Sreekumar

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

African Americans (AA) are two times more likely to be diagnosed with and succumb to prostate cancer (PCa) compared to European Americans (EA). There is mounting evidence that biological differences in these tumors contribute to disparities in patient outcomes. Our goal was to examine the differences in DNA damage in AA and EA prostate tissues. Tissue microarrays with matched tumor-benign adjacent pairs from 77 AA and EA PCa patients were analyzed for abasic sites, oxidative lesions, crosslinks, and uracil content using the Repair Assisted Damage Detection (RADD) assay. Our analysis revealed that AA PCa, overall, have more DNA damage than …

Novel Role Of Ghrelin Receptor In Gut Dysbiosis And Experimental Colitis In Aging, Ji Yeon Noh, Chia-Shan Wu, Jennifer A A Deluca, Sridevi Devaraj, Arul Jayaraman, Robert C Alaniz, Xiao-Di Tan, Clinton D Allred, Yuxiang Sun

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Chronic low-grade inflammation is a hallmark of aging, which is now coined as inflamm-aging. Inflamm-aging contributes to many age-associated diseases such as obesity, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). We have shown that gut hormone ghrelin, via its receptor growth hormone secretagogue receptor (GHS-R), regulates energy metabolism and inflammation in aging. Emerging evidence suggests that gut microbiome has a critical role in intestinal immunity of the host. To determine whether microbiome is an integral driving force of GHS-R mediated immune-metabolic homeostasis in aging, we assessed the gut microbiome profiles of young and old GHS-R global knockout …

Sars-Cov-2 Anti-Spike Antibodies After Vaccination In Pediatric Heart Transplantation: A First Report, Joseph A Spinner, Christopher L Julien, Lily Olayinka, William J Dreyer, Claire E Bocchini, Flor M Munoz, Sridevi Devaraj

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

BACKGROUND: BACKGROUND: There is a paucity of data regarding the antibody response to SARS-CoV-2 vaccination in children after solid organ transplant.

METHODS: We retrospectively reviewed the SARS-CoV-2 Anti-Spike IgG antibodies measured following SARS-CoV-2 vaccination at our pediatric heart transplant (HTx) center.

RESULTS: Among patients (median age 17.1 years) in whom antibody testing was performed (median 118 days post-vaccine completion), a SARS-CoV-2 Anti-Spike IgG antibody was detected in 28 of 40 (70%) post-HTx recipients (median antibody level 10.9 AU/ml). Neutropenia, diabetes mellitus, and previous use of rituximab were associated with absence of a detectable antibody. All 7 post-HTx patients with a …

Maternal Lactobacillus Reuteri Supplementation Shifts The Intestinal Microbiome In Mice And Provides Protection From Experimental Colitis In Female Offspring, Mahesh Krishna, Melinda Engevik, Karen Queliza, Savini Britto, Rajesh Shah, Wenly Ruan, Hongtao Wang, James Versalovic, Richard Kellermayer

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

The purpose of our experiment was to explore how stochastic (inter-individual variation) gut microbiome composition may link to inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) susceptibility and guide the development of a perinatal preventative probiotic. Dextran sodium sulfate (DSS) was introduced to C57BL/BJ mice to induce acute colitis as a model of IBD. Potentially protective bacteria were identified using a discovery-validation cohort approach toward stochastic DSS susceptibility.

Fecal Microbiota Transplantation Commonly Failed In Children With Co-Morbidities, Richard Kellermayer, Qinglong Wu, Dorottya Nagy-Szakal, Karen Queliza, Faith D Ihekweazu, Claire E Bocchini, Abria R Magee, Numan Oezguen, Jennifer K Spinler, Emily B Hollister, Robert J Shulman, James Versalovic, Ruth Ann Luna, Tor C Savidge

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

OBJECTIVES: Fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) is arguably the most effective treatment for recurrent Clostridioides difficile infection (rCDI). Clinical reports on pediatric FMT have not systematically evaluated microbiome restoration in patients with co-morbidities. Here, we determined whether FMT recipient age and underlying co-morbidity influenced clinical outcomes and microbiome restoration when treated from shared fecal donor sources.

METHODS: Eighteen rCDI patients participating in a single-center, open-label prospective cohort study received fecal preparation from a self-designated (single case) or two universal donors. Twelve age-matched healthy children and four pediatric ulcerative colitis (UC) cases from an independent serial FMT trial, but with a shared …

Metabolism Of A Selective Serotonin And Norepinephrine Reuptake Inhibitor Duloxetine In Liver Microsomes And Mice, Xuan Qin, John M Hakenjos, Kevin R Mackenzie, Mercedes Barzi, Hemantkumar Chavan, Pranavanand Nyshadham, Jin Wang, Sung Yun Jung, Joie Z Guner, Si Chen, Lei Guo, Partha Krishnamurthy, Karl-Dimiter Bissig, Stephen Palmer, Martin M Matzuk, Feng Li

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Duloxetine (DLX) is a dual serotonin and norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor, widely used for the treatment of major depressive disorder. Although DLX has shown good efficacy and safety, serious adverse effects (e.g., liver injury) have been reported. The mechanisms associated with DLX-induced toxicity remain elusive. Drug metabolism plays critical roles in drug safety and efficacy. However, the metabolic profile of DLX in mice is not available, although mice serve as commonly used animal models for mechanistic studies of drug-induced adverse effects. Our study revealed 39 DLX metabolites in human/mouse liver microsomes and mice. Of note, 13 metabolites are novel, including five …

Crispr/Cas9-Mediated Genome Editing Reveals 12 Testis-Enriched Genes Dispensable For Male Fertility In Mice, Yuki Oyama, Haruhiko Miyata, Keisuke Shimada, Yoshitaka Fujihara, Keizo Tokuhiro, Thomas X Garcia, Martin M Matzuk, Masahito Ikawa

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Gene expression analyses suggest that more than 1000-2000 genes are expressed predominantly in mouse and human testes. Although functional analyses of hundreds of these genes have been performed, there are still many testis-enriched genes whose functions remain unexplored. Analyzing gene function using knockout (KO) mice is a powerful tool to discern if the gene of interest is essential for sperm formation, function, and male fertility in vivo. In this study, we generated KO mice for 12 testis-enriched genes, 1700057G04Rik, 4921539E11Rik, 4930558C23Rik, Cby2, Ldhal6b, Rasef, Slc25a2, Slc25a41, Smim8, Smim9, Tmem210, and Tomm20l, using the clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats /CRISPR-associated …

Sarscov-2 Serostatus Amongst Vaccinated Employees At A Pediatric Hospital System, Sridevi Devaraj, Izmarie Poventud-Fuentes, Matthew Girotto, Jermaine Monroe, Julie Boom, George Delclos, James Versalovic

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

To gain insights on the heterogeneity of immune responses to vaccination against SARS-CoV-2 and to identify factors that could make individuals vulnerable to infection due to lack of response to vaccination, our hospital started offering free voluntary post-antibody testing against the spike protein IgG for all fully vaccinated employees.

Post-vaccination response against SARS-CoV-2 was assessed using the FDA-EUA approved VITROS anti-SARS-CoV-2 IgG immunometric assay specific to the spike protein.

Out of a total of 3266 antibody tests performed in fully vaccinated Texas Children’s, 99.4% had a positive antibody response to the spike protein. From the 21 employees (0.6%) that had …

Urine Alcam, Pf4 And Vcam-1 Surpass Conventional Metrics In Identifying Nephritis Disease Activity In Childhood-Onset Systemic Lupus Erythematosus, Samar A Soliman, Anam Haque, Kamala Vanarsa, Ting Zhang, Faten Ismail, Kyung Hyun Lee, Claudia Pedroza, Larry A Greenbaum, Sherene Mason, M John Hicks, Scott E Wenderfer, Chandra Mohan

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

OBJECTIVES: Serial kidney biopsy for repeat evaluation and monitoring of lupus nephritis (LN) in childhood-onset Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (cSLE) remains challenging, thus non-invasive biomarkers are needed. Here, we evaluate the performance of ten urine protein markers of diverse nature including cytokines, chemokines, and adhesion molecules in distinguishing disease activity in cSLE.

METHODS: Eighty-four pediatric patients meeting ≥4 ACR criteria for SLE were prospectively enrolled for urine assay of 10 protein markers normalized to urine creatinine, namely ALCAM, cystatin-C, hemopexin, KIM-1, MCP-1, NGAL, PF-4, Timp-1, TWEAK, and VCAM-1 by ELISA. Samples from active renal (LN) and active non-renal SLE patients were …

Loss Of H2r Signaling Disrupts Neutrophil Homeostasis And Promotes Inflammation-Associated Colonic Tumorigenesis In Mice, Zhongcheng Shi, Yuko Mori-Akiyama, Wa Du, Robert Fultz, Yanling Zhao, Wenly Ruan, Susan Venable, Melinda A Engevik, James Versalovic

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

BACKGROUND & AIMS: We previously showed that histamine suppressed inflammation-associated colonic tumorigenesis through histamine type 2 receptor (H2R) signaling in mice. This study aimed to precisely elucidate the downstream effects of H2R activation in innate immune cells.

METHODS: Analyses using online databases of single-cell RNA sequencing of intestinal epithelial cells in mice and RNA sequencing of mouse immune cells were performed to determine the relative abundances of 4 histamine receptors among different cell types. Mouse neutrophils, which expressed greater amounts of H2R, were collected from the peritoneum of wild-type and H2R-deficient mice, of which low-density and high-density neutrophils were extracted …

Reduced Pro-Inflammatory Dendritic Cell Phenotypes Are A Potential Indicator Of Successful Peanut Oral Immunotherapy, Sara Anvari, Levi B Watkin, Charles G Minard, Kimberly Schuster, Oluwatomi Hassan, Aikaterini Anagnostou, Jordan S Orange, David B Corry, Carla M Davis

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Dendritic cells are important mediators in the early presentation of antigen and regulation of the differentiation of T cells. Peanut oral immunotherapy (POIT) results in desensitization in most peanut allergic individuals (responders), but not in others due to allergic reactions (non-responders). Delineation of early immunologic changes contributing to desensitization would help clarify the POIT mechanism of action. We analyzed dendritic cells in 15 pediatric subjects (5-12 years) undergoing a phase 1 single-center POIT study. We examined dendritic cells at baseline, 6-, 12-, 18- and 24-weeks after initiation of POIT and responders of therapy were compared to non-responders and healthy controls. …

Role Of Gut Microbiome In Covid-19: An Insight Into Pathogenesis And Therapeutic Potential, Ikram Hussain, Gabriel Liu Yuan Cher, Muhammad Abbas Abid, Muhammad Bilal Abid

Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), resulted in an unprecedented global crisis. Although primarily a respiratory illness, dysregulated immune responses may lead to multi-organ dysfunction. Prior data showed that the resident microbial communities of gastrointestinal and respiratory tracts act as modulators of local and systemic inflammatory activity (the gut-lung axis). Evolving evidence now signals an alteration in the gut microbiome, brought upon either by cytokines from the infected respiratory tract or from direct infection of the gut, or both. Dysbiosis leads to a "leaky gut". The intestinal permeability then allows access to …

Development Of Vaccines And Antivirals Against Zika Virus, Aryamav Pattnaik

School of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The re-emergence of Zika virus (ZIKV), an arbovirus, poses a major global human health concern because of its ability to cause congenital abnormalities and neurological diseases. While many candidate vaccines and antiviral drugs are in the developmental pipeline, none have been approved for use against ZIKV infection. This dissertation describes the characterization of one vaccine and two antiviral drug candidates against ZIKV infection. A bacterial ferritin-based nanoparticle vaccine, termed zDIII-F, is designed to display multiple copies of ZIKV E protein domain III on its surface. These stable nanoparticles are shown to induce robust antibody-mediated protection against lethal ZIKV infection in …

An Investigation Of Healthcare Supports For Those With Food Allergy In Ireland, Joseph Bolger, Nicola Blake, Sneha Vinod

International Undergraduate Journal of Health Sciences

Introduction: In Ireland, around 5% of children and 3% adults have food allergy (134,000 people). This current paper describes a survey that was carried out on a subset of service-users with the aim of identifying whether there is a need for increased specialist medical services and/or for a funded charity such as Anaphylaxis Ireland, defunct since 2015.

Materials & Methods: These needs were assessed via an online survey using Google Forms. The survey was conducted from 17-27th February 2020. There were 31 questions in total, relating to topics such as symptoms, clinical wait times, satisfaction with care provided and demand …

Full Issue: The International Undergraduate Journal Of Health Sciences, Volume 1, Issue 1, June 2021, Iujhs Full Issue

International Undergraduate Journal of Health Sciences

The full June 2021 issue (Volume 1, Issue 1) of the International Undergraduate Journal of Health Sciences

Development, Expansion And Role Of Myeloid-Derived Suppressor Cells In Post-Sepsis Immune Suppression, Tuqa Alkhateeb

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs) numbers increase significantly in sepsis and are associated with high mortality rates. These myeloid cell precursors promote immunosuppression, especially in the late (post sepsis) stage. However, the mechanisms that underlie MDSC expansion and programming are not completely understood. To investigate these mechanisms, we used a cecal-ligation and puncture (CLP) mouse model of polymicrobial sepsis that progresses from an early/acute proinflammatory phase to a late/chronic immunosuppressive phase. Previous studies in our laboratory showed that microRNA (miR)-21 and miR-181b elevate levels of the transcription factor nuclear factor 1 (NFI-A) that promotes MDSC expansion. We report here that miR-21 …

Antibodies In The Diagnosis, Prognosis, And Prediction Of Psychotic Disorders., Thomas A Pollak, Jonathan P Rogers, Robert G Nagele, Mark Peakman, James M Stone, Anthony S David, Philip Mcguire

Rowan-Virtua School of Osteopathic Medicine Departmental Research

Blood-based biomarker discovery for psychotic disorders has yet to impact upon routine clinical practice. In physical disorders antibodies have established roles as diagnostic, prognostic and predictive (theranostic) biomarkers, particularly in disorders thought to have a substantial autoimmune or infective aetiology. Two approaches to antibody biomarker identification are distinguished: a "top-down" approach, in which antibodies to specific antigens are sought based on the known function of the antigen and its putative role in the disorder, and emerging "bottom-up" or "omics" approaches that are agnostic as to the significance of any one antigen, using high-throughput arrays to identify distinctive components of the …

Evaluating The Effects Of Antibody-Conjugated Multi-Walled Carbon Nanotubes In Combination With Microwave Irradiation, Amy Chall

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

Cancer remains one of the largest public health concerns of our day, particularly in developed countries where technological advances have allowed populations to live well into their eighth decade. In America, those in their 80’s have a 1 in 2 chance of developing cancer in their lifetime. Prostate cancer, specifically is the second leading cause of cancer deaths in males. Traditional cancer therapies cause high levels of toxicity to the patient due to mechanisms of action that often attack cancer cells and healthy cells alike. The holy grail of cancer research is to find a treatment that targets the cancer …

Herpes Zoster Patient Education: A Coloring Book Approach, Sophia Charuhas

Senior Honors Theses

Shingles, the disease caused by the herpes zoster virus, is a widespread and widely misunderstood illness in the United States. It is preventable, but many at-risk patients do not know what measures they may take to prevent it. Clear communication from physician to patient is crucial for patient understanding of diseases. Many patient education materials on herpes zoster currently available are often unused. It is therefore beneficial to public health to disseminate new mediums of medical communication, and one way of accomplishing this is through adult coloring books. The pathophysiology of herpes zoster virus is here explored and the idea …