Global urban environmental change drives adaptation in white clover

Urbanization transforms environments in ways that alter biological evolution. We examined whether urban environmental change drives parallel evolution by sampling 110,019 white clover plants from 6169 populations in 160 cities globally. Plants were assayed for a Mendelian antiherbivore defense that also affects tolerance to abiotic stressors. Urban-rural gradients were associated with the evolution of clines in defense in 47% of cities throughout the world. Variation in the strength of clines was explained by environmental changes in drought stress and vegetation cover that varied among cities. Sequencing 2074 genomes from 26 cities revealed that the evolution of urban-rural clines was best explained by adaptive evolution, but the degree of parallel adaptation varied among cities. Our results demonstrate that urbanization leads to adaptation at a global scale

Immunological Aspects of Human Papilloma Virus-Related Cancers Always Says, “I Am like a Box of Complexity, You Never Know What You Are Gonna Get”

The human papillomavirus (HPV) can cause different cancers in both men and women. The virus interferes with functions of the cervix, vulva, vagina, anus in the anogenital area, breast, and head and neck cancer due to the local lesions. The tumors lead to death if not treated as a result of distant metastasis to internal organs and brain. Moreover, HPV attenuates the immune system during chronic infection and releases viral antigens into the tumor microenvironment. The tumors know how difficult is to win the battle with a strong united army of immune cells that are equipped with cytokines and enzymes. They confuse the immune cells with secreting viral antigens. The immune system is equipped with cytokines, a complement system, antibodies, and other secretory proteins to overcome the foreign invaders and viral antigens. However, the majority of the time, tumors win the battle without having all the equipment of the immune cells. Thus, in this review, we describe the recent progression in cellular and humoral immunity studies during the progression of HPV-related cancers. First of all, we describe the role of B, plasmoid cells, and B regulatory cells (Breg) in their functions in the tumor microenvironment. Then, different subtypes of T cells such as T CD8, CD4, T regulatory (Treg) cells were studied in recently published papers. Furthermore, NK cells and their role in tumor progression and prevention were studied. Finally, we indicate the breakthroughs in immunotherapy techniques for HPV-related cancers

A specific abnormal scattergram of peripheral blood leukocytes suggestive for the presence of proerythroblast

A specific abnormal scattergram of peripheral blood leukocytes suggestive for the presence of proerythroblast

Lack of harmonization in high fluorescent cell automated counts with body fluids mode in ascitic, pleural, synovial, and cerebrospinal fluids

INTRODUCTION. Cellular analysis in body fluids (BFs) provides important diagnostic information in various pathological settings. This study was hence aimed at comparing automated cell count obtained with Mindray BC-6800 (BC-BF) vs Sysmex XN-series (XN-BF) and evaluating other quantitative and qualitative information provided by these analyzers in ascitic (AF), pleural (PF), synovial (SF), and cerebrospinal (CSF) fluids. METHODS: Three hundred and fifty-one samples (99 AFs, 45 PFs, 75 SFs, and 132 CSFs) were analyzed in parallel with BC-BF, XN-BF, and optical microscopy (OM). The study also included the assessment of diagnostic agreement among BC-BF, XN-BF, and OM. RESULTS: The comparison of BC-BF vs XN-BF yielded slopes of Passing and Bablok regression always comprised between 0.9 and 1.0 except for EO-BF and HF-BF, whilst the intercepts ranged from -0.4 for MN-BF and 12.0 for PMN-BF. The bias was comprised between -103.3% and 67.1% for HF-BF and EO-BF, respectively. A significant bias was found for TC-BF, WBC-BF, HF-BF (negative bias) and for PMN-BF and EO-BF (positive bias). The agreement (Cohen's kappa) between XN-BF and BC-BF was always ≥0.7, ranging between 0.87 in CSFs and 0.94 in AFs, and that with OM was similar (ie, 0.85 and 0.96). CONCLUSION: The cytometric analysis of BF samples using BC-BF and XN-BF is clinically favorable when appropriately combined with OM. Quantitative and qualitative parameters displayed optimal agreement, whilst instrument-specific cut-offs should be defined and implemented for HF-BF and EO-BF. Further efforts should be made for achieving better harmonization in cytometric analysis of BF samples

Biological variation estimates of complete blood count parameters in healthy subjects

Background: the complete blood count (CBC) is the test more frequently requested in clinical practice. Therefore, estimating the biological variation (BV) of CBC parameters is essential for assessing the analytical performance of hematological analyzers and for enabling accurate data interpretation and appropriate clinical management. This study was aimed to define BV estimates and reference change value (RCV) of CBC parameters. Methods: the study population consisted of 21 healthy volunteers, who had BV of CBC parameters assessed with Sysmex XN. The study protocol, the analytical measurements and the statistical analysis were carried out according to current recommendations of the European Federation for Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine (EFLM). Results: Within-subject BV ranged between 0,3% for mean cell hemoglobin (MCH) and 19,7% for immature granulocytes (IG), whilst between-subjects BVs ranged between 0,9% for mean corpuscolar haemoglobin concentration (MCHC) and 66,6% for microcytic red blood cells (Micro-R). The RCV ranged between 2,3% for MCH and 73,5% for IG. Conclusion: This study has allowed the estimation of BV of many CBC parameters, some of which have not been currently explored, thus leading the way to use RCV calculated according to time of monitoring and/or differentiated by sex

Cell population data and reflex testing rules of cell analysis in pleural and ascitic fluids using body fluid mode on sysmex XN-9000

BACKGROUND: Although optical microscopy (OM) remains the reference technique for analysis of ascitic (AF) and pleural (PF) fluids, novel hematological analyzers are equipped with modules for body fluids (BFs) analysis. This study was aimed to analyze the performance of XN-BF module in Sysmex XN-9000, and to develop validation rules for automated cell counts in BFs.METHODS: The evaluation of XN-BF module included assessment of carryover, Limit of Blank (LoB), Limit of Detection (LoD), Limit of Quantitation (LoQ), linearity, data comparison with OM, and development of rules for assisting the validation of automated analysis of BFs and activating reflex testing.RESULTS: The carryover was negligible. The LoB, LoD, LoQ and linearity were always excellent. The comparison with OM was characterized by Pearson's correlations ranging from r=0.50 to r=0.99 (p<0.001), modest bias and high diagnostic concordance (Area Under the Curve between 0.85-0.99). The use of instrument-specific cut-offs further increased diagnostic concordance. The implementation of reflex testing rules based on XN-BF data increased sensitivity and specificity of BFs classification to 0.98 and 0.95.CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that the XN-BF module on Sysmex-9000 may be a suitable alternative to OM for screening BF samples, especially when specific validation rules are used

Short- and medium-term biological variation estimates of red blood cell and reticulocyte parameters in healthy subjects

BACKGROUND: The integrated evaluation of traditional and innovative red blood cell (RBC) and reticulocyte parameters is a rapid, inexpensive and non-invasive diagnostic tools for differential diagnosis and follow-up of anemia and other pathological conditions needing bone marrow erythropoiesis assessment. Therefore, estimating the biological variation (BV) of these parameters is essential for evaluating the analytical performance of hematological analyzers, and for enabling accurate data interpretation and appropriate clinical management. This study aims to define short- and medium-term BV estimates and reference change value (RCV) of RBC and reticulocyte parameters. METHODS: Twenty-one healthy volunteers participated in the assessment of medium-term BV (blood sampling once/week, five consecutive weeks) and 22 volunteers in the assessment of short-term BV (blood sampling once/day, five consecutive days) using Sysmex XN. Outlier analysis was performed before CV-ANOVA, to determine BV estimates with confidence intervals (CI). RESULTS: Medium- and short-term within-subject BV were between 0.3% and 16.4% and 0.2%-10.4% (MCH and IRF), respectively, whereas medium and short-term between-subjects BV ranged between 0.9% and 66.6% (MCHC and Micro-R) and 1.4%-43.6% (MCHC and IRF), respectively. The RCVs were similar for all parameters in both arms of the study, except for hemoglobin, RDW-CV and MCV. CONCLUSIONS: This study allowed for estimating the BV of many RBC and reticulocyte parameters, some of which have not been currently explored. For RBC, hemoglobin, RDW-CV and MCV it seems advisable to use RCV calculated according to monitoring time and/or differentiated by sex. As regards analytical goals, we suggest using the most stringent targets found in the short-term arm of this study

Assessment of blood sample stability for complete blood count using the Sysmex XN-9000 and Mindray BC-6800 analyzers

Different hematological analyzers have different analytical performances that are often reflected in the criteria for sample stability of the complete blood count. This study aimed to assess the stability of several hematological parameters using the XN-9000 Sysmex and BC-6800 Mindray analyzers