Erratum to: 36th International Symposium on Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1186/s13054-016-1208-6.]

Making real neural nets - design criteria

Neural nets may be assembled with living nerve cells in vitro to test theories about neural processing and the ways in which patterns develop in the nervous system, and to test ideas about plasticity and learning in processing systems. This may benefit the design of computer systems and prosthetic devices. Extracting information from such nets ran be achieved by means of intracellular and extracellular microelectrodes and fluorescent dyes. Patterning of cells may be achieved using fabrication techniques, and extracellular electrodes can be combined within the patterned substrate

XBP1s levels are implicated in the biology and outcome of myeloma mediating different clinical outcomes to thalidomide-based treatments

Immunoglobulin production by myeloma plasma cells depends on the unfolded protein response for protein production and folding. Recent studies have highlighted the importance of IRE1alpha and X box binding protein 1 (XBP1), key members of this pathway, in normal B-plasma cell development. We have determined the gene expression levels of IRE1alpha, XBP1, XBP1UNSPLICED (XBP1u), and XBP1SPLICED (XBP1s) in a series of patients with myeloma and correlated findings with clinical outcome. We show that IRE1alpha and XBP1 are highly expressed and that patients with low XBP1s/u ratios have a significantly better overall survival. XBP1s is an independent prognostic marker and can be used with beta2 microglobulin and t(4;14) to identify a group of patients with a poor outcome. Furthermore, we show the beneficial therapeutic effects of thalidomide in patients with low XBP1s/u ratios. This study highlights the importance of XBP1 in myeloma and its significance as an independent prognostic marker and as a predictor of thalidomide response