The glia response after peripheral nerve injury: A comparison between Schwann cells and olfactory ensheathing cells and their uses for neural regenerative therapies

The peripheral nervous system (PNS) exhibits a much larger capacity for regeneration than the central nervous system (CNS). One reason for this difference is the difference in glial cell types between the two systems. PNS glia respond rapidly to nerve injury by clearing debris from the injury site, supplying essential growth factors and providing structural support; all of which enhances neuronal regeneration. Thus, transplantation of glial cells from the PNS is a very promising therapy for injuries to both the PNS and the CNS. There are two key types of PNS glia: olfactory ensheathing cells (OECs), which populate the olfactory nerve, and Schwann cells (SCs), which are present in the rest of the PNS. These two glial types share many similar morphological and functional characteristics but also exhibit key differences. The olfactory nerve is constantly turning over throughout life, which means OECs are continuously stimulating neural regeneration, whilst SCs only promote regeneration after direct injury to the PNS. This review presents a comparison between these two PNS systems in respect to normal physiology, developmental anatomy, glial functions and their responses to injury. A thorough understanding of the mechanisms and differences between the two systems is crucial for the development of future therapies using transplantation of peripheral glia to treat neural injuries and/or disease.Griffith Health, School of Nursing and MidwiferyFull Tex

A randomized controlled trial of prospective memory rehabilitation in adults with traumatic brain injury

Objective: To examine the efficacy of compensatory prospective memory training, preceded by self-awareness training for adults with traumatic brain injury

Fibroblasts profiling in scarring trachoma identifies IL-6 as a functional component of a fibroblast-macrophage pro-fibrotic and pro-inflammatory feedback loop.

Trachoma is a conjunctiva scarring disease, which is the leading infectious cause of blindness worldwide. Yet, the molecular mechanisms underlying progressive fibrosis in trachoma are unknown. To investigate the contribution of local resident fibroblasts to disease progression, we isolated conjunctival fibroblasts from patients with scarring trachoma and matching control individuals, and compared their gene expression profiles and functional properties in vitro. We show that scarring trachoma fibroblasts substantially differ from control counterparts, displaying pro-fibrotic and pro-inflammatory features matched by an altered gene expression profile. This pro-inflammatory signature was exemplified by increased IL-6 expression and secretion, and a stronger response to macrophage-mediated stimulation of contraction. We further demonstrate that scarring trachoma fibroblasts can promote Akt phosphorylation in macrophages in an IL-6 -dependent manner. Overall this work has uncovered a distinctive molecular fingerprint for scarring trachoma fibroblasts, and identified IL-6- as a potential contributor to the chronic conjunctival fibrosis, mediating reciprocal pro-fibrotic/pro-inflammatory interactions between macrophages and fibroblasts

Revision workshops in elementary mathematics enhance student performance in routine laboratory calculations

The ability to understand and implement calculations required for molarity and dilution computations that are routinely undertaken in the laboratory are essential skills that should be possessed by all students entering an undergraduate Life Sciences degree. However, it is increasingly recognized that the majority of these students are ill equipped to reliably carry out such calculations. There are several factors that conspire against students' understanding of this topic, with the alien concept of the mole in relation to the mass of compounds and the engineering notation required when expressing the relatively small quantities typically involved being two key examples. In this report, we highlight teaching methods delivered via revision workshops to undergraduate Life Sciences students at the University of Nottingham. Workshops were designed to 1) expose student deficiencies in basic numeracy skills and remedy these deficiencies, 2) introduce molarity and dilution calculations and illustrate their workings in a step-by-step manner, and 3) allow students to appreciate the magnitude of numbers. Preworkshop to postworkshop comparisons demonstrated a considerable improvement in students' performance, which attenuated with time. The findings of our study suggest that an ability to carry out laboratory calculations cannot be assumed in students entering Life Sciences degrees in the United Kingdom but that explicit instruction in the form of workshops improves proficiency to a level of competence that allows students to prosper in the laboratory environment

First-Pass Meconium Samples from Healthy Term Vaginally-Delivered Neonates : An Analysis of the Microbiota

Acknowledgments The authors would like to thank the parents who consented to provide samples with limited notice at an emotional and stressful time. This work was supported entirely from personal donations to the neonatal endowments fund at Aberdeen Maternity Hospital and we thank families for their continued generosity, year-on-year. The Rowett Institute of Nutrition and Health receives funding from the Scottish Government (SG-RESAS). Funding: This work was funded from NHS Grampian Neonatal Endowments. The Rowett Institute receives funding from the Rural and Environmental Science and Analytical Services programme of the Scottish Government. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Development and application of optical fibre strain and pressure sensors for in-flight measurements

Fibre optic based sensors are becoming increasingly viable as replacements for traditional flight test sensors. Here we present laboratory, wind tunnel and flight test results of fibre Bragg gratings (FBG) used to measure surface strain and an extrinsic fibre Fabry–Perot interferometric (EFFPI) sensor used to measure unsteady pressure. The calibrated full scale resolution and bandwidth of the FBG and EFFPI sensors were shown to be 0.29% at 2.5 kHz up to 600 με and 0.15% at up to 10 kHz respectively up to 400 Pa. The wind tunnel tests, completed on a 30% scale model, allowed the EFFPI sensor to be developed before incorporation with the FBG system into a Bulldog aerobatic light aircraft. The aircraft was modified and certified based on Certification Standards 23 (CS-23) and flight tested with steady and dynamic manoeuvres. Aerobatic dynamic manoeuvres were performed in flight including a spin over a g-range −1g to +4g and demonstrated both the FBG and the EFFPI instruments to have sufficient resolution to analyse the wing strain and fuselage unsteady pressure characteristics. The steady manoeuvres from the EFFPI sensor matched the wind tunnel data to within experimental error while comparisons of the flight test and wind tunnel EFFPI results with a Kulite pressure sensor showed significant discrepancies between the two sets of data, greater than experimental error. This issue is discussed further in the paper

Evaluating the cost-effectiveness of existing needle and syringe programmes in preventing hepatitis C transmission in people who inject drugs

AIM: To evaluate the cost-effectiveness of needle and syringe programmes (NSPs) compared with no NSPs on hepatitis C virus (HCV) transmission in the United Kingdom. DESIGN: Cost-effectiveness analysis from a National Health Service (NHS)/health-provider perspective, utilizing a dynamic transmission model of HCV infection and disease progression, calibrated using city-specific surveillance and survey data, and primary data collection on NSP costs. The effectiveness of NSPs preventing HCV acquisition was based on empirical evidence. SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS: UK settings with different chronic HCV prevalence among people who inject drugs (PWID): Dundee (26%), Walsall (18%) and Bristol (45%) INTERVENTIONS: Current NSP provision is compared with a counterfactual scenario where NSPs are removed for 10 years and then returned to existing levels with effects collected for 40 years. MEASUREMENTS: HCV infections and cost per quality-adjusted life year (QALY) gained through NSPs over 50 years. FINDINGS: Compared with a willingness-to-pay threshold of £20 000 per QALY gained, NSPs were highly cost-effective over a time-horizon of 50 years and decreased the number of HCV incident infections. The mean incremental cost-effectiveness ratio was cost-saving in Dundee and Bristol, and £596 per QALY gained in Walsall, with 78, 46 and 40% of simulations being cost-saving in each city, respectively, with differences driven by coverage of NSP and HCV prevalence (lowest in Walsall). More than 90% of simulations were cost-effective at the willingness-to-pay threshold. Results were robust to sensitivity analyses, including varying the time-horizon, HCV treatment cost and numbers of HCV treatments per year. CONCLUSIONS: Needle and syringe programmes are a highly effective low-cost intervention to reduce hepatitis C virus transmission, and in some settings they are cost-saving. Needle and syringe programmes are likely to remain cost-effective irrespective of changes in hepatitis C virus treatment cost and scale-up

Ultraviolet radiation significantly enhances the molecular response to dispersant and sweet crude oil exposure in Nematostella vectensis

Author Posting. © The Author(s), 2018. This is the author's version of the work. It is posted here under a nonexclusive, irrevocable, paid-up, worldwide license granted to WHOI. It is made available for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Marine Environmental Research 134 (2018): 96-108, doi:10.1016/j.marenvres.2018.01.002.Estuarine organisms are subjected to combinations of anthropogenic and natural stressors, which together can reduce an organisms' ability to respond to either stress or can potentiate or synergize the cellular impacts for individual stressors. Nematostella vectensis (starlet sea anemone) is a useful model for investigating novel and evolutionarily conserved cellular and molecular responses to environmental stress. Using RNA-seq, we assessed global changes in gene expression in Nematostella in response to dispersant and/or sweet crude oil exposure alone or combined with ultraviolet radiation (UV). A total of 110 transcripts were differentially expressed by dispersant and/or crude oil exposure, primarily dominated by the down-regulation of 74 unique transcripts in the dispersant treatment. In contrast, UV exposure alone or combined with dispersant and/or oil resulted in the differential expression of 1133 transcripts, of which 436 were shared between all four treatment combinations. Most significant was the differential expression of 531 transcripts unique to one or more of the combined UV/chemical exposures. Main categories of genes affected by one or more of the treatments included enzymes involved in xenobiotic metabolism and transport, DNA repair enzymes, and general stress response genes conserved among vertebrates and invertebrates. However, the most interesting observation was the induction of several transcripts indicating de novo synthesis of mycosporine-like amino acids and other novel cellular antioxidants. Together, our data suggest that the toxicity of oil and/or dispersant and the complexity of the molecular response are significantly enhanced by UV exposure, which may co-occur for shallow water species like Nematostella.This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. MCB1057152 (MJJ), MCB1057354 (AMT) and DEB1545539 (AMR)

Transcriptomic assessment of resistance to effects of an aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AHR) agonist in embryos of Atlantic killifish (Fundulus heteroclitus) from a marine Superfund site

© The Author(s), 2011. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in BMC Genomics 12 (2011): 263, doi:10.1186/1471-2164-12-263.Populations of Atlantic killifish (Fundulus heteroclitus) have evolved resistance to the embryotoxic effects of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and other halogenated and nonhalogenated aromatic hydrocarbons that act through an aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AHR)-dependent signaling pathway. The resistance is accompanied by reduced sensitivity to induction of cytochrome P450 1A (CYP1A), a widely used biomarker of aromatic hydrocarbon exposure and effect, but whether the reduced sensitivity is specific to CYP1A or reflects a genome-wide reduction in responsiveness to all AHR-mediated changes in gene expression is unknown. We compared gene expression profiles and the response to 3,3',4,4',5-pentachlorobiphenyl (PCB-126) exposure in embryos (5 and 10 dpf) and larvae (15 dpf) from F. heteroclitus populations inhabiting the New Bedford Harbor, Massachusetts (NBH) Superfund site (PCB-resistant) and a reference site, Scorton Creek, Massachusetts (SC; PCB-sensitive). Analysis using a 7,000-gene cDNA array revealed striking differences in responsiveness to PCB-126 between the populations; the differences occur at all three stages examined. There was a sizeable set of PCB-responsive genes in the sensitive SC population, a much smaller set of PCB-responsive genes in NBH fish, and few similarities in PCB-responsive genes between the two populations. Most of the array results were confirmed, and additional PCB-regulated genes identified, by RNA-Seq (deep pyrosequencing). The results suggest that NBH fish possess a gene regulatory defect that is not specific to one target gene such as CYP1A but rather lies in a regulatory pathway that controls the transcriptional response of multiple genes to PCB exposure. The results are consistent with genome-wide disruption of AHR-dependent signaling in NBH fish.This work was supported in part by National Institutes of Health grants P42ES007381 (Superfund Basic Research Program at Boston University) and by a grant from the WHOI Ocean Life Institute