Chargaff's "Grammar of Biology": New Fractal-like Rules

Chargaff once said that "I saw before me in dark contours the beginning of a grammar of Biology". In linguistics, "grammar" is the set of natural language rules, but we do not know for sure what Chargaff meant by "grammar" of Biology. Nevertheless, assuming the metaphor, Chargaff himself started a "grammar of Biology" discovering the so called Chargaff's rules. In this work, we further develop his grammar. Using new concepts, we were able to discovery new genomic rules that seem to be invariant across a large set of organisms, and show a fractal-like property, since no matter the scale, the same pattern is observed (self-similarity). We hope that these new invariant genomic rules may be used in different contexts since short read data bias detection to genome assembly quality assessment.Comment: 17 page

Bioinformatics methodologies for detection and study of repetitive sequences in gene loci of chimeric transcripts

Orientador: Michel Eduardo Beleza YamagishiTese (doutorado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de BiologiaResumo: A grande quantidade de dados biológicos gerados recentemente permitiu verificar que os genomas são repletos de seqüências repetitivas (SR), como microsatélites e elementos genéticos móveis, altamente improváveis de ocorrer estatisticamente se os genomas fossem gerados a partir de uma distribuição aleatória de nucleotídeos. Tal comprovação motivou a classificação de tais seqüências e também a construção de diversas ferramentas de bioinformática, além de mecanismos de armazenamento baseados em sistemas de gerenciamento de bancos de dados (SGBD) para permitir localizá-las e armazená-las para posterior estudo. Entretanto, foi com a comprovação biológica da importância das SR, como no mecanismo de interferência por RNAi (SR reversa complementar), que as SR despertaram maior interesse por parte da comunidade científica. Atualmente, já há fortes evidências que associam as SR com fenômenos biológicos bastante interessantes, como o processamento de RNA por cis-splicing e a formação de transcritos quiméricos, freqüentes em organismos inferiores e muito raro em organismos superiores. Tais tipos de transcritos podem ser gerados a partir de trans-splicing ou, como conjecturamos nesse trabalho, pela transposição de elementos genéticos móveis (como por exemplo transposons ou retrotransposons). Em virtude disso, este projeto propõe a construção de metodologias de Bioinformática, disponibilizadas na WEB, para detectar transcritos quiméricos em genomas de organismos, tanto em versões draft ou em alta qualidade, e também estudar as SR que ocorrem no locus gênico dos transcritos envolvidos na formação de uma seqüência quimérica. As ferramentas propostas permitiram identificar, a partir de bibliotecas de transcritos de full-length cDNA, tanto de humanos quanto de bovinos, novos transcritos quiméricos provenientes de células de tecidos normais, e que não seguem splice-sites canônicos na região de fusão dos transcritos envolvidos. Além disso, as seqüências encontradas apresentam uma elevada taxa de concentração de pares de SR do tipo reverso complementar no locus gênico dos dois transcritos que formam a seqüência quimérica. As ferramentas propostas podem ser utilizadas para outros organismos e direcionar trabalhos experimentais para tentar comprovar em bancada novos transcritos quiméricos, tanto em organismos inferiores quanto em superioresAbstract: The recent availability of a huge amount of biological data allowed to know about the high concentration of repetitive sequences (SR) like microsatellites and genetic mobile elements in different genomes. Repetitive sequences are improbable to occur statistically if genome data were generated by a random distribution of nucleotides. Such observation motivated the classification of repetitive sequences, and the construction of several bioinformatics tools. Furthermore, several mechanisms to store repetitive sequences, which are based on data base management systems (DBMS) were proposed and created. They can be used to search for specific sequences to make a posteriori study. However, it was with the biological confirmation of the importance of repetitive sequences, like by the RNA interference (reverse complement, or inverted repeat) mechanism, that the scientific community gained more interest by such sequences. Actually, there is strong evidence that associates the repetitive sequences with some interesting biological phenomena, like in RNA processing by cis-splicing, and in chimeric transcript formation mechanism. This last one is very frequently in inferior organism, but rare in superior organisms. Such types of transcripts can be generated by trans-splicing, or like conjectured in this work, by the retrotransposition of mobile genetic elements (like transposons or retrotransposons). In this way, this work proposed the construction of several Bioinformatics methodologies, available in the WEB, to detect new evidences of chimeric transcripts in genomes of different organisms, both in draft genome and in high quality genome assemblage. We also studied repetitive sequences in gene loci of the involved transcripts in a chimeric sequence formation. The proposed tools allowed us to identify, using a full-length cDNA databank, new chimeric transcript candidates in human and in bovine genome. They are from cells of normal tissues, and do not follow canonical splice-sites in the fusion region of the involved transcripts. Moreover, it was possible to show that the detected sequences have high concentration pairs of reverse complement type of repetitive sequences in gene loci of the two involved transcripts, which originated a new chimeric transcript candidate. The created bioinformatics tools can be used in other organisms in addition to the one used in this work, leading to the proposition of new experimental work to try to prove in vivo new chimeric transcripts, both in superior organism and in inferior organismDoutoradoBioinformaticaDoutor em Genetica e Biologia Molecula

Saprochaete clavata invasive infection: characterization, antifungal susceptibility, and biofilm evaluation of a rare yeast isolated in Brazil

Rare emerging pathogens such as Saprochaete clavata are associated with invasive fungal diseases, high morbidity, mortality, rapidly fatal infections, and outbreaks. However, little is known about S. clavata infections, epidemiology, risk factors, treatment, biofilms, and disease outcomes. The objective of this study was to describe a new case of severe S. clavata infection in a patient diagnosed at a referral children’s hospital in Brazil, including antifungal minimal inhibitory concentration, S. clavata biofilm characterization, and molecular characterization. The S. clavata isolated from an immunocompromised 11-year-old male patient was characterized using MALDI-TOF, Gram staining, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and next generation sequencing (NGS) of genomic DNA. Biofilm production was also evaluated in parallel with determining minimal inhibitory concentration (MIC) and biofilm sensitivity to antifungal treatment. We observed small to medium, whitish, farinose, dry, filamentous margin colonies, yeast-like cells with bacillary features, and biofilm formation. The MALDI-TOF system yielded a score of ≥ 2,000, while NGS confirmed S. clavata presence at the nucleotide level. The MIC values (in mg L-1) for tested drugs were as follows: fluconazole = 2, voriconazole ≤ 2, caspofungin ≥ 8, micafungin = 2, amphotericin B = 4, flucytosine ≤ 1, and anidulafungin = 1. Amphotericin B can be active against S. clavata biofilm and the fungus can be susceptible to new azoles. These findings were helpful for understanding the development of novel treatments for S. clavata-induced disease, including combined therapy for biofilm-associated infections

Blocking Zika virus vertical transmission.

The outbreak of the Zika virus (ZIKV) has been associated with increased incidence of congenital malformations. Although recent efforts have focused on vaccine development, treatments for infected individuals are needed urgently. Sofosbuvir (SOF), an FDA-approved nucleotide analog inhibitor of the Hepatitis C (HCV) RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) was recently shown to be protective against ZIKV both in vitro and in vivo. Here, we show that SOF protected human neural progenitor cells (NPC) and 3D neurospheres from ZIKV infection-mediated cell death and importantly restored the antiviral immune response in NPCs. In vivo, SOF treatment post-infection (p.i.) decreased viral burden in an immunodeficient mouse model. Finally, we show for the first time that acute SOF treatment of pregnant dams p.i. was well-tolerated and prevented vertical transmission of the virus to the fetus. Taken together, our data confirmed SOF-mediated sparing of human neural cell types from ZIKV-mediated cell death in vitro and reduced viral burden in vivo in animal models of chronic infection and vertical transmission, strengthening the growing body of evidence for SOF anti-ZIKV activity

Author Correction: Blocking Zika virus vertical transmission.

A correction to this article has been published and is linked from the HTML and PDF versions of this paper. The error has not been fixed in the paper

Is a Genome a Codeword of an Error-Correcting Code?

Since a genome is a discrete sequence, the elements of which belong to a set of four letters, the question as to whether or not there is an error-correcting code underlying DNA sequences is unavoidable. The most common approach to answering this question is to propose a methodology to verify the existence of such a code. However, none of the methodologies proposed so far, although quite clever, has achieved that goal. In a recent work, we showed that DNA sequences can be identified as codewords in a class of cyclic error-correcting codes known as Hamming codes. In this paper, we show that a complete intron-exon gene, and even a plasmid genome, can be identified as a Hamming code codeword as well. Although this does not constitute a definitive proof that there is an error-correcting code underlying DNA sequences, it is the first evidence in this direction

Proposal of a performance modeling and analytical prediction system for a parallel processing system

Orientador: Marco Aurelio Amaral HenriquesDissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Faculdade de Engenharia Eletrica e de ComputaçãoResumo: A predição de desempenho é um importante mecanismo para avaliar a utilização de recursos e estimar o tempo de execução de aplicações em sistemas paralelos. Este trabalho apresenta uma ferramenta que permite criar modelos que representam características da aplicação e dos computadores utilizados para processá-la. Tais modelos são combinados para gerar um modelo de desempenho mais abrangente, cuja análise permite obter estimativas de tempo de execução que contemplem fatores de atraso tais como operações aritméticas sobre diferentes tipos de dados e efeitos de contenção, causados por concorrência. As estimativas podem ser geradas em poucos segundos e permitem analisar o impacto causado na aplicação pela utilização de diferentes configurações do sistema de processamento paralelo. A ferramenta foi implementada para um sistema de processamento paralelo baseado em Java, chamado JoiN, e ela mostrou ser possível obter estimativas satisfatórias de tempos de execução para diversos tipos de aplicações paralelasAbstract: Performance prediction is an important mechanism to evaluate the use of resources and predict the execution time of applications in parallel systems. This work presents a tool for the creation of models that represent applications and computers characteristics. Such models are combined to generate a performance model, whose analysis derives execution time estimates that include delay factors, such as arithmetic operations on different data types and contention effects caused by process concurrence. The estimates can be generated in a few seconds and allow the analysis of the impact caused in the application by changes in the parallel system configuration. The tool was implemented for a Java based parallel processing system called JoiN and it showed that satisfactory execution time estimates can be obtained for several types of parallel applicationsMestradoEngenharia de ComputaçãoMestre em Engenharia Elétric