Defining risk factors for genomic instability in B cells: Novel insights from NGS-based technologies

Cancer is caused by an accumulation of somatic DNA mutations. Knowledge on the cause and consequence of these mutations is essential for an effective prevention, diagnosis, prognosis and treatment of cancer. Our research focused on B cell non-Hodgkin lymphomas. These lymphomas are derived from germinal centers. Germinal centers are defined histological structures that develop during an immune response in secondary lymphatic tissues such as of lymph nodes, spleens or Peyer's Patches. Within the germinal center, B cells activated by cognate antigen undergo a critical development phase which a DNA mutator system is turned on in order to mutate antibody-encoding genes with an extremely high frequency. While this intentional mutagenesis process is of great importance for an effective immune response, it brings great risks. Disruption or aberrant targeting of this mutagenesis system may lead to genetic instability and the development of B-cell lymphomas. By investigating DNA binding profiles of activation-induced cytidine deaminase (AID), a protein central in this mutagenesis process, we aimed to answer the following questions: How specific is the mutagenesis process targeted throughout the genome? Which (onco)genes are unintentionally mutated by AID? How does AID contribute to genetic instability and especially chromosomal translocations? Chromosomal translocations are genomic mutations that occur when a DNA segment is moved from one chromosome to another (or within a chromosome). This genomic aberration can lead to deregulation of specific genes characteristic for well-defined B cell non-Hodgkin lymphomas

Roles of PCNA ubiquitination and TLS polymerases kappa and eta in the bypass of methyl methanesulfonate-induced DNA damage

Genome Instability and Cance

The JEFF evaluated nuclear data project

Proc on lineInternational audienceThe status of the Joint Evaluated Fission and Fusion file (JEFF) is described. JEFF-3.1 comprises a significant update of actinide evaluations, materials evaluations that have emerged from various European nuclear data projects, the activation library JEFF-3.1/A, the decay data and fission yield sub-libraries, and fusion-related data files from the EFF project. The revisions were motivated by the availability of new measurements, modelling capabilities and trends from integral experiments. Validations have been performed, mainly for criticality, reactivity temperature coefficients, fuel inventory and shielding of thermal and fast systems. Compared with earlier releases, JEFF-3.1 provides improved performance with respect to a variety of scientific and industrial applications. Following on from the public release of JEFF-3.1, the French nuclear power industry has selected this suite of nuclear applications libraries for inclusion in their production codes

The prototype detection unit of the KM3NeT detector: KM3NeT Collaboration

A prototype detection unit of the KM3NeT deep-sea neutrino telescope has been installed at 3500m depth 80 km offshore the Italian coast. KM3NeT in its final configuration will contain several hundreds of detection units. Each detection unit is a mechanical structure anchored to the sea floor, held vertical by a submerged buoy and supporting optical modules for the detection of Cherenkov light emitted by charged secondary particles emerging from neutrino interactions. This prototype string implements three optical modules with 31 photomultiplier tubes each. These optical modules were developed by the KM3NeT Collaboration to enhance the detection capability of neutrino interactions. The prototype detection unit was operated since its deployment in May 2014 until its decommissioning in July 2015. Reconstruction of the particle trajectories from the data requires a nanosecond accuracy in the time calibration. A procedure for relative time calibration of the photomultiplier tubes contained in each optical module is described. This procedure is based on the measured coincidences produced in the sea by the $$^{40}$$40K background light and can easily be expanded to a detector with several thousands of optical modules. The time offsets between the different optical modules are obtained using LED nanobeacons mounted inside them. A set of data corresponding to 600 h of livetime was analysed. The results show good agreement with Monte Carlo simulations of the expected optical background and the signal from atmospheric muons. An almost background-free sample of muons was selected by filtering the time correlated signals on all the three optical modules. The zenith angle of the selected muons was reconstructed with a precision of about 3$$^\circ$$∘. © 2016, The Author(s)