Can mutations in ELA2, neutrophil elastase expression or differential cell toxicity explain sulphasalazine-induced agranulocytosis?

BACKGROUND: Drug-induced agranulocytosis, a severe side effect marked by a deficit or absolute lack of granulocytic white blood cells, is a rare side-effect of the anti-inflammatory drug sulphasalazine. Mutations in the human neutrophil elastase gene (ELA2), causing increased intracellular concentration of this serine protease, inhibits neutrophil differentiation in severe congenital neutropenia (SCN). Since the clinical symptoms of agranulocytosis and SCN are similar, we hypothesized that it may origin from a common genetic variation in ELA2 or that sulphasalazine may affect human neutrophil elastase activity and protein expression. METHODS: We screened for genetic differences in ELA2 in DNA from 36 patients who had suffered from sulphasalazine-induced agranulocytosis, and compared them with 72 patients treated with sulphasalazine without blood reactions. We also performed in vitro studies of the blood cell lines HL60 and U937 after sulphasalazine exposure with respect to cell survival index, neutrophil elastase protein expression and activity. RESULTS: None of the mutations in ELA2, which previously have been reported to be associated with SCN, was found in this material. Protein expression of human neutrophil elastase in lymphoma U937 cells was not affected by treatment with concentrations equivalent to therapeutic doses. Cell survival of lymphoma U937 and promyelocytic leukemia HL-60 cells was not affected in this concentration range, but exhibited a decreased proliferative capacity with higher sulphasalazine concentrations. Interestingly the promyelocytic cells were more sensitive to sulphasalazine than the lymphoma cell line. CONCLUSION: Neutrophil elastase expression and ELA2 mutations do, however, not seem to be involved in the etilogy of sulphasalazine-induced agranulocytosis. Why sulphasalazine is more toxic to promyelocytes than to lymphocytes remains to be explained

A ‘quiet revolution’? The impact of Training Schools on initial teacher training partnerships

This paper discusses the impact on initial teacher training of a new policy initiative in England: the introduction of Training Schools. First, the Training School project is set in context by exploring the evolution of a partnership approach to initial teacher training in England. Ways in which Training Schools represent a break with established practice are considered together with their implications for the dominant mode of partnership led by higher education institutions (HEIs). The capacity of Training Schools to achieve their own policy objectives is examined, especially their efficacy as a strategy for managing innovation and the dissemination of innovation. The paper ends by focusing on a particular Training School project which has adopted an unusual approach to its work and enquires whether this alternative approach could offer a more profitable way forward. During the course of the paper, five different models of partnership are considered: collaborative, complementary, HEI-led, school-led and partnership within a partnership

What kind of evidence is it that Evidence-Based Medicine advocates want health care providers and consumers to pay attention to?

BACKGROUND: In 1992, Evidence-Based Medicine advocates proclaimed a "new paradigm", in which evidence from health care research is the best basis for decisions for individual patients and health systems. Hailed in New York Times Magazine in 2001 as one of the most influential ideas of the year, this approach was initially and provocatively pitted against the traditional teaching of medicine, in which the key elements of knowing for clinical purposes are understanding of basic pathophysiologic mechanisms of disease coupled with clinical experience. This paper reviews the origins, aspirations, philosophical limitations, and practical challenges of evidence-based medicine. DISCUSSION: EBM has long since evolved beyond its initial (mis)conception, that EBM might replace traditional medicine. EBM is now attempting to augment rather than replace individual clinical experience and understanding of basic disease mechanisms. EBM must continue to evolve, however, to address a number of issues including scientific underpinnings, moral stance and consequences, and practical matters of dissemination and application. For example, accelerating the transfer of research findings into clinical practice is often based on incomplete evidence from selected groups of people, who experience a marginal benefit from an expensive technology, raising issues of the generalizability of the findings, and increasing problems with how many and who can afford the new innovations in care. SUMMARY: Advocates of evidence-based medicine want clinicians and consumers to pay attention to the best findings from health care research that are both valid and ready for clinical application. Much remains to be done to reach this goal

A synthesis of bacterial and archaeal phenotypic trait data

A synthesis of phenotypic and quantitative genomic traits is provided for bacteria and archaea, in the form of a scripted, reproducible workflow that standardizes and merges 26 sources. The resulting unified dataset covers 14 phenotypic traits, 5 quantitative genomic traits, and 4 environmental characteristics for approximately 170,000 strain-level and 15,000 species-aggregated records. It spans all habitats including soils, marine and fresh waters and sediments, host-associated and thermal. Trait data can find use in clarifying major dimensions of ecological strategy variation across species. They can also be used in conjunction with species and abundance sampling to characterize trait mixtures in communities and responses of traits along environmental gradients

HMMSplicer: A Tool for Efficient and Sensitive Discovery of Known and Novel Splice Junctions in RNA-Seq Data

Background: High-throughput sequencing of an organism’s transcriptome, or RNA-Seq, is a valuable and versatile new strategy for capturing snapshots of gene expression. However, transcriptome sequencing creates a new class of alignment problem: mapping short reads that span exon-exon junctions back to the reference genome, especially in the case where a splice junction is previously unknown. Methodology/Principal Findings: Here we introduce HMMSplicer, an accurate and efficient algorithm for discovering canonical and non-canonical splice junctions in short read datasets. HMMSplicer identifies more splice junctions than currently available algorithms when tested on publicly available A. thaliana, P. falciparum, and H. sapiens datasets without a reduction in specificity. Conclusions/Significance: HMMSplicer was found to perform especially well in compact genomes and on genes with low expression levels, alternative splice isoforms, or non-canonical splice junctions. Because HHMSplicer does not rely on prebuilt gene models, the products of inexact splicing are also detected. For H. sapiens, we find 3.6 % of 39 splice sites and 1.4% of 59 splice sites are inexact, typically differing by 3 bases in either direction. In addition, HMMSplicer provides a score for every predicted junction allowing the user to set a threshold to tune false positive rates depending on the needs of the experiment. HMMSplicer is implemented in Python. Code and documentation are freely available a

A high density genetic map of tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum L.) obtained from large scale microsatellite marker development

Tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum L.) is a species in the large family of the Solanaceae and is important as an agronomic crop and as a model system in plant biotechnology. Despite its importance, only limited molecular marker resources are available that can be used for genome analysis, genetic mapping and breeding. We report here on the development and characterization of 5,119 new and functional microsatellite markers and on the generation of a high-resolution genetic map for the tetraploid tobacco genome. The genetic map was generated using an F2 mapping population derived from the intervarietal cross of Hicks Broadleaf × Red Russian and merges the polymorphic markers from this new set with those from a smaller set previously used to produce a lower density map. The genetic map described here contains 2,317 microsatellite markers and 2,363 loci, resulting in an average distance between mapped microsatellite markers which is less than 2 million base pairs or 1.5 cM. With this new and expanded marker resource, a sufficient number of markers are now available for multiple applications ranging from tobacco breeding to comparative genome analysis. The genetic map of tobacco is now comparable in marker density and resolution with the best characterized genomes of the Solanaceae: tomato and potato

Clara Cell 10-kDa Protein Gene Transfection Inhibits NF-κB Activity in Airway Epithelial Cells

Clara cell 10-kDa protein (CC10) is a multifunctional protein with anti-inflammatory and immunomodulatory effects. Induction of CC10 expression by gene transfection may possess potential therapeutic effect. Nuclear factor κB (NF-κB) plays a key role in the inflammatory processes of airway diseases.To investigate potential therapeutic effect of CC10 gene transfection in controlling airway inflammation and the underlying intracellular mechanisms, in this study, we constructed CC10 plasmid and transfected it into bronchial epithelial cell line BEAS-2B cells and CC10 knockout mice. In BEAS-2B cells, CC10's effect on interleukin (IL)-1β induced IL-8 expression was explored by means of RT-PCR and ELISA and its effect on NF-κB classical signaling pathway was studied by luciferase reporter, western blot, and immunoprecipitation assay. The effect of endogenous CC10 on IL-1β evoked IL-8 expression was studied by means of nasal explant culture. In mice, CC10's effect on IL-1β induced IL-8 and nuclear p65 expression was examined by immunohistochemistry. First, we found that the CC10 gene transfer could inhibit IL-1β induced IL-8 expression in BEAS-2B cells. Furthermore, we found that CC10 repressed IL-1β induced NF-κB activation by inhibiting the phosphorylation of IκB-α but not IκB kinase-α/β in BEAS-2B cells. Nevertheless, we did not observe a direct interaction between CC10 and p65 subunit in BEAS-2B cells. In nasal explant culture, we found that IL-1β induced IL-8 expression was inversely correlated with CC10 levels in human sinonasal mucosa. In vivo study revealed that CC10 gene transfer could attenuate the increase of IL-8 and nuclear p65 staining in nasal epithelial cells in CC10 knockout mice evoked by IL-1β administration.These results indicate that CC10 gene transfer may inhibit airway inflammation through suppressing the activation of NF-κB, which may provide us a new consideration in the therapy of airway inflammation

Influence of Landscape Structure and Human Modifications on Insect Biomass and Bat Foraging Activity in an Urban Landscape

Urban landscapes are often located in biologically diverse, productive regions. As such, urbanization may have dramatic consequences for this diversity, largely due to changes in the structure and function of urban communities. We examined the influence of landscape productivity (indexed by geology), housing density and vegetation clearing on the spatial distribution of nocturnal insect biomass and the foraging activity of insectivorous bats in the urban landscape of Sydney, Australia. Nocturnal insect biomass (g) and bat foraging activity were sampled from 113 sites representing backyard, open space, bushland and riparian landscape elements, across urban, suburban and vegetated landscapes within 60 km of Sydney's Central Business District. We found that insect biomass was at least an order of magnitude greater within suburban landscapes in bushland and backyard elements located on the most fertile shale influenced geologies (both p<0.001) compared to nutrient poor sandstone landscapes. Similarly, the feeding activity of bats was greatest in bushland, and riparian elements within suburbs on fertile geologies (p = 0.039). Regression tree analysis indicated that the same three variables explained the major proportion of the variation in insect biomass and bat foraging activity. These were ambient temperature (positive), housing density (negative) and the percent of fertile shale geologies (positive) in the landscape; however variation in insect biomass did not directly explain bat foraging activity. We suggest that prey may be unavailable to bats in highly urbanized areas if these areas are avoided by many species, suggesting that reduced feeding activity may reflect under-use of urban habitats by bats. Restoration activities to improve ecological function and maintain the activity of a diversity of bat species should focus on maintaining and restoring bushland and riparian habitat, particularly in areas with fertile geology as these were key bat foraging habitats

α1Proteinase Inhibitor Regulates CD4+ Lymphocyte Levels and Is Rate Limiting in HIV-1 Disease

Background: The regulation of adult stem cell migration through human hematopoietic tissue involves the chemokine CXCL12 (SDF-1) and its receptor CXCR4 (CD184). In addition, human leukocyte elastase (HLE) plays a key role. When HLE is located on the cell surface (HLE CS), it acts not as a proteinase, but as a receptor for a 1proteinase inhibitor (a 1PI, a 1antitrypsin, SerpinA1). Binding of a1PI to HLECS forms a motogenic complex. We previously demonstrated that a1PI deficiency attends HIV-1 disease and that a1PI augmentation produces increased numbers of immunocompetent circulating CD4 + lymphocytes. Herein we investigated the mechanism underlying the a 1PI deficiency that attends HIV-1 infection. Methods and Findings: Active a 1PI in HIV-1 subjects (median 17 mM, n = 35) was significantly below normal (median 36 mM, p,0.001, n = 30). In HIV-1 uninfected subjects, CD4 + lymphocytes were correlated with the combined factors a1PI, HLECS + lymphocytes, and CXCR4 + lymphocytes (r 2 = 0.91, p,0.001, n = 30), but not CXCL12. In contrast, in HIV-1 subjects with.220 CD4 cells/ml, CD4 + lymphocytes were correlated solely with active a 1PI (r 2 =0.93,p,0.0001, n = 26). The monoclonal anti-HIV-1 gp120 antibody 3F5 present in HIV-1 patient blood is shown to bind and inactivate human a 1PI. Chimpanzee a 1PI differs from human a1PI by a single amino acid within the 3F5-binding epitope. Unlike human a1PI, chimpanzee a1PI did not bind 3F5 or become depleted following HIV-1 challenge, consistent with the normal CD4 + lymphocyte levels and benign syndrome of HIV-1 infected chimpanzees. The presence of IgG-a 1PI immune complexes correlated with decreased CD4 + lymphocytes in HIV-1 subjects