Progressive Glenohumeral Instability in an Adolescent Ice Hockey Athlete: A Case Report

This case follows the injury presentation of a 16-year-old male, right-hand dominant, left-hand shot, Tier I ice hockey player who sustained an initial injury to the left shoulder from a body check during a game. What follows is a cascade of events involving 3 injuries and 2 surgeries, highlighting the complex and potentially compounding nature of instability. Glenohumeral (GH) instability among collision athletes is rare in the absence of contributing genetic conditions or a dislocation or subluxation event. Authors discuss the key concepts related to the diagnosis and management of GH instability, with a special emphasis on subtle injury indicators and an individualized approach to patient care

Social-Emotional Learning Amidst COVID-19 School Closures: Positive Findings from an Efficacy Study of Adventures Aboard the S.S. GRIN Program

School closures because of natural phenomena, such as COVID-19, have emphasized the importance of effective distance learning strategies when there are no in-person alternatives. Although infrequently mentioned in discussions of student performance, social-emotional skill building came to the forefront of conversations due to the isolation and stresses created by stay-at-home protocols. Our original research study describes the implementation of a game-based online social-emotional learning program during in-person learning and how we adapted implementation to distance learning due to COVID-19 based on schools’ infrastructure, preparations, and resource availability. In addition to the successful implementation, the results have indicated that the program was significantly and positively associated with gains in students’ social emotional skills

Microbial hitchhikers on intercontinental dust: high-throughput sequencing to catalogue microbes in small sand samples

Microbiological studies on the intercontinental transport of dust are confounded by the difficulty of obtaining sufficient material for analysis. Axenic samples of dust collected at high altitudes or historic specimens in museums are often so small and precious that the material can only be sacrificed when positive results are assured. With this in mind, we evaluated current methods and developed new ones in an attempt to catalogue all microbes present in small dust or sand samples. The methods used included classical microbiological approaches in which sand extracts were plated out on a variety of different media, polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based amplification of 16S/18S rRNA sequences followed by construction of clone libraries, PCR amplification of 16S rRNA sequences followed by high-throughput sequencing (HtS) of the products and direct HtS of DNA extracted from the sand. A representative sand sample collected at Bahaï Wadi in the desert of the Republic of Chad was used. HtS with or without amplification showed the most promise and can be performed on ≤100ng DNA. Since living microbes are often required, current best practices would involve geochemical and microscopic characterisation of the sample, followed by DNA isolation and direct HtS. Once the microbial content of the sample has been deciphered, growth conditions (including media) can be tailored to isolate the micro-organisms of interes

Mutation mapping and identification by whole-genome sequencing

Genetic mapping of mutations in model systems has facilitated the identification of genes contributing to fundamental biological processes including human diseases. However, this approach has historically required the prior characterization of informative markers. Here we report a fast and cost-effective method for genetic mapping using next-generation sequencing that combines single nucleotide polymorphism discovery, mutation localization, and potential identification of causal sequence variants. In contrast to prior approaches, we have developed a hidden Markov model to narrowly define the mutation area by inferring recombination breakpoints of chromosomes in the mutant pool. In addition, we created an interactive online software resource to facilitate automated analysis of sequencing data and demonstrate its utility in the zebrafish and mouse models. Our novel methodology and online tools will make next-generation sequencing an easily applicable resource for mutation mapping in all model systems.Harvard Stem Cell Institute (Junior Faculty Grant)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant 1R01DK090311)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant 5R01MH084676

Gut Microbiome Metagenomics Analysis Suggests a Functional Model for the Development of Autoimmunity for Type 1 Diabetes

Peer reviewe

Ca. Nitrososphaera and Bradyrhizobium are inversely correlated and related to agricultural practices in long-term field experiments

Agricultural land management, such as fertilization, liming, and tillage affects soil properties, including pH, organic matter content, nitrification rates, and the microbial community. Three different study sites were used to identify microorganisms that correlate with agricultural land use and to determine which factors regulate the relative abundance of the microbial signatures of the agricultural land-use. The three sites included in this study are the Broadbalk Experiment at Rothamsted Research, UK, the Everglades Agricultural Area, Florida, USA, and the Kellogg Biological Station, Michigan, USA. The effects of agricultural management on the abundance and diversity of bacteria and archaea were determined using high throughput, barcoded 16S rRNA sequencing. In addition, the relative abundance of these organisms was correlated with soil features. Two groups of microorganisms involved in nitrogen cycle were highly correlated with land use at all three sites. The ammonia oxidizing-archaea, dominated by Ca. Nitrososphaera, were positively correlated with agriculture while a ubiquitous group of soil bacteria closely related to the diazotrophic symbiont, Bradyrhizobium, was negatively correlated with agricultural management. Analysis of successional plots showed that the abundance of ammonia oxidizing-archaea declined and the abundance of bradyrhizobia increased with time away from agriculture. This observation suggests that the effect of agriculture on the relative abundance of these genera is reversible. Soil pH and NH(3) concentrations were positively correlated with archaeal abundance but negatively correlated with the abundance of Bradyrhizobium. The high correlations of Ca. Nitrososphaera and Bradyrhizobium abundances with agricultural management at three long-term experiments with different edaphoclimatic conditions allowed us to suggest these two genera as signature microorganisms for agricultural land use

Effects of cover crops on multiple ecosystem services: Ten meta-analyses of data from arable farmland in California and the Mediterranean

Cover crops are considered to be beneficial for multiple ecosystem services, and they have been widely promoted through the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) in the EU and Farm Bill Conservation Title Programs, such as the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), in the USA. However, it can be difficult to decide whether the beneficial effects of cover crops on some ecosystem services are likely to outweigh their harmful effects on other services, and thus to decide whether they should be promoted by agricultural policy in specific situations. We used meta-analysis to quantify the effects of cover crops on five ecosystem services (food production, climate regulation, soil and water regulation, and weed control) in arable farmland in California and the Mediterranean, based on 326 experiments reported in 57 publications. In plots with cover crops, there as 13% less water, 9% more organic matter and 41% more microbial biomass in the soil, 27% fewer weeds, and 15% higher carbon dioxide emissions (but also more carbon stored in soil organic matter), compared to control plots with bare soils or winter fallows. Cash crop yields were 16% higher in plots that had legumes as cover crops (compared to controls) but 7% lower in plots that had non-legumes as cover crops. Soil nitrogen content was 41% lower, and nitrate leaching was 53% lower, in plots that had non-legume cover crops (compared to controls) but not significantly different in plots that had legumes. We did not find enough data to quantify the effects of cover crops on biodiversity conservation, pollination, or pest regulation. These gaps in the evidence need to be closed if cover crops continue to be widely promoted. We suggest that this novel combination of multiple meta-analyses for multiple ecosystem services could be used to support multi-criteria decision making about agri-environmental policy