Sustainability-oriented labs in real-world contexts: An exploratory review

There are growing claims that meaningfully engaging with complex sustainability challenges requires change of a systemic nature. In governing transitions to sustainability, laboratories in real world contexts are growing in presence and promise. Yet, they span an array of contexts, conceptualisations and cases, making it difficult to find and relate labs across disciplines. Moreover, it is unclear how these labs vary in their approaches to sustainability, the importance of which has been voiced by the sustainability transitions community. In addressing these concerns, we adopted the broad research question:\ua0How can sustainability-oriented labs in real-world contexts be understood?\ua0We systematically reviewed 53 labs from disparate fields of research that broadly share a focus on sustainability. Through a mixed-methods analysis, we present three levels of results. Firstly, we provide an overview of the diversity in distribution, thematic focus and setup of labs. Secondly, we trace 7 different research communities where sustainability-oriented labs have been conceptualized (Living, Urban Living, Real-world, Evolutionary Learning, Urban Transition, Change and Transformation labs). Thirdly, we identify three key dimensions of labs, space, process and organisation, enabling a structured understanding of lab approaches towards sustainability. We then situate our results within salient transitions research areas, namely transition geographies, governance and innovation. In concluding, we point towards fruitful avenues for future research, capable of 1) unpacking lab approaches to sustainability as a dynamic normative property, and 2) providing a basis for complementary case-based comparison

Sustainability-oriented labs in transitions: An empirically grounded typology

Sustainability is high on the political agenda, with its analytical and practical importance underscored in the field of sustainability transitions. Experiments, arenas, and laboratories are frequently highlighted as real-world objects to investigate sustainability in place. Despite existing lab studies, attempts at comparison at the empirical level remain unconvincing. Here, sustainability remains oversimplified, warranting further investigation to unpack how labs compare in their orientation towards sustainability. This article presents a rigorous and transparent empirically grounded typology, intended to discern ways to engage with sustainability. We outline and elaborate upon six distinctive types entitled: 1) Fix and control, 2) (Re-)Design and optimize, 3) Make and relate, 4) Educate and engage, 5) Empower and govern, and 6) Explore and shape. This study highlights similarities and differences between labs, and across different types. These findings are discussed with reference to ongoing conceptualizations on directionality, providing a fruitful point of departure for ongoing transitions research

Pubertal development in healthy children is mirrored by DNA methylation patterns in peripheral blood

Puberty marks numerous physiological processes which are initiated by central activation of the hypothalamic–pituitary–gonadal axis, followed by development of secondary sexual characteristics. To a large extent, pubertal timing is heritable, but current knowledge of genetic polymorphisms only explains few months in the large inter-individual variation in the timing of puberty. We have analysed longitudinal genome-wide changes in DNA methylation in peripheral blood samples (n = 102) obtained from 51 healthy children before and after pubertal onset. We show that changes in single methylation sites are tightly associated with physiological pubertal transition and altered reproductive hormone levels. These methylation sites cluster in and around genes enriched for biological functions related to pubertal development. Importantly, we identified that methylation of the genomic region containing the promoter of TRIP6 was co-ordinately regulated as a function of pubertal development. In accordance, immunohistochemistry identified TRIP6 in adult, but not pre-pubertal, testicular Leydig cells and circulating TRIP6 levels doubled during puberty. Using elastic net prediction models, methylation patterns predicted pubertal development more accurately than chronological age. We demonstrate for the first time that pubertal attainment of secondary sexual characteristics is mirrored by changes in DNA methylation patterns in peripheral blood. Thus, modulations of the epigenome seem involved in regulation of the individual pubertal timing

Discovery of a fungal copper radical oxidase with high catalytic efficiency towards 5-hydroxymethylfurfural and benzyl alcohols for green bioprocessing

Copyright © 2020 American Chemical Society. Alternatives to petroleum-based chemicals are highly sought-after for ongoing efforts to reduce the damaging effects of human activity on the environment. Copper radical oxidases from Auxiliary Activity Family 5/Subfamily 2 (AA5_2) are attractive biocatalysts because they oxidize primary alcohols in a chemoselective manner without complex organic cofactors. However, despite numerous studies on canonical galactose oxidases (GalOx, EC 1.1.3.9) and engineered variants, and the recent discovery of a Colletotrichum graminicola copper radical alcohol oxidase (AlcOx, EC 1.1.3.13), the catalytic potentials of very few AA5_2 members have been characterized. Guided by the sequence similarity network and phylogenetic analyses, we targeted a distinct paralog from the fungus C. graminicola as a representative member of a large uncharacterized subgroup of AA5_2. Through recombinant production and detailed kinetic analysis, we demonstrated that this enzyme is weakly active toward carbohydrates but efficiently catalyzes the oxidation of aryl alcohols to the corresponding aldehydes. As such, this represents the initial characterization of a demonstrable aryl alcohol oxidase (AAO, EC 1.1.3.7) in AA5, an activity which is classically associated with flavin-dependent glucose-methanol-choline (GMC) oxidoreductases of Auxiliary Activity Family 3 (AA3). X-ray crystallography revealed a distinct multidomain architecture comprising an N-terminal PAN domain abutting a canonical AA5 seven-bladed propeller catalytic domain. Of direct relevance to biomass processing, the wild-type enzyme exhibits the highest activity on the primary alcohol of 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF), a product of significant interest in the lignocellulosic biorefinery concept. Thus, the chemoselective oxidation of HMF to 2,5-diformylfuran (DFF) by C. graminicola aryl alcohol oxidase (CgrAAO) from AA5 provides a fundamental building block for chemistry via biotechnology

Seed amplification and neurodegeneration marker trajectories in individuals at risk of prion disease

Human prion diseases are remarkable for long incubation times followed typically by rapid clinical decline. Seed amplification assays and neurodegeneration biofluid biomarkers are remarkably useful in the clinical phase, but their potential to predict clinical onset in healthy people remains unclear. This is relevant not only to the design of preventive strategies in those at-risk of prion diseases, but more broadly, because prion-like mechanisms are thought to underpin many neurodegenerative disorders. Here, we report the accrual of a longitudinal biofluid resource in patients, controls and healthy people at risk of prion diseases, to which ultrasensitive techniques such as real-time quaking-induced conversion (RT-QuIC), and single molecule array (Simoa) digital immunoassays were applied for preclinical biomarker discovery. We studied 648 CSF and plasma samples, including 16 people who had samples taken when healthy but later developed inherited prion disease (IPD) ("converters"; range from 9.9 prior to, and 7.4 years after onset). Symptomatic IPD CSF samples were screened by RT-QuIC assay variations, before testing the entire collection of at-risk samples using the most sensitive assay. Glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), neurofilament light (NfL), tau and ubiquitin carboxy-terminal hydrolase L1 (UCH-L1) levels were measured in plasma and CSF. Second generation (IQ-CSF) RT-QuIC proved 100% sensitive and specific for sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (sCJD), iatrogenic (iCJD) and familial CJD phenotypes, and subsequently detected seeding activity in four presymptomatic CSF samples from three E200K carriers; one converted in under two months while two remain asymptomatic after at least three years' follow-up. A bespoke HuPrP P102L RT-QuIC showed partial sensitivity for P102L disease. No compatible RT-QuIC assay was discovered for classical 6-OPRI, A117V and D178N, and these at-risk samples tested negative with bank vole RT-QuIC. Plasma GFAP and NfL, and CSF NfL levels emerged as proximity markers of neurodegeneration in the typically slow IPDs (e.g. P102L), with significant differences in mean values segregating healthy control from IPD carriers (within 2 years to onset) and symptomatic IPD cohorts; plasma GFAP appears to change before NfL, and before clinical conversion. In conclusion, we show distinct biomarker trajectories in fast and slow IPDs. Specifically, we identify several years of presymptomatic seeding positivity in E200K, a new proximity marker (plasma GFAP) and sequential neurodegenerative marker evolution (plasma GFAP followed by NfL) in slow IPDs. We suggest a new preclinical staging system featuring clinical, seeding and neurodegeneration aspects, for validation with larger prion at-risk cohorts, and with potential application to other neurodegenerative proteopathies

Genetic association study of QT interval highlights role for calcium signaling pathways in myocardial repolarization.

The QT interval, an electrocardiographic measure reflecting myocardial repolarization, is a heritable trait. QT prolongation is a risk factor for ventricular arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death (SCD) and could indicate the presence of the potentially lethal mendelian long-QT syndrome (LQTS). Using a genome-wide association and replication study in up to 100,000 individuals, we identified 35 common variant loci associated with QT interval that collectively explain ∼8-10% of QT-interval variation and highlight the importance of calcium regulation in myocardial repolarization. Rare variant analysis of 6 new QT interval-associated loci in 298 unrelated probands with LQTS identified coding variants not found in controls but of uncertain causality and therefore requiring validation. Several newly identified loci encode proteins that physically interact with other recognized repolarization proteins. Our integration of common variant association, expression and orthogonal protein-protein interaction screens provides new insights into cardiac electrophysiology and identifies new candidate genes for ventricular arrhythmias, LQTS and SCD