An analytical hierarchical model explaining the robustness and flaw-tolerance of the interlocking barb-barbule structure of bird feathers

This work is partially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) (No. 31300780, 11272091, 11422222, 31470043), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (No. 2242016R30014), and ARC (FT140101152). NMP is supported by the European Research Council (ERC StG Ideas 2011 BIHSNAM no. 279985, ERC PoC 2015 SILKENE No. 693670) and by the European Commission under the Graphene Flagship (WP14 "Polymer Composites", No. 696656)

Whole-genome sequencing of chronic lymphocytic leukemia identifies subgroups with distinct biological and clinical features

The value of genome-wide over targeted driver analyses for predicting clinical outcomes of cancer patients is debated. Here, we report the whole-genome sequencing of 485 chronic lymphocytic leukemia patients enrolled in clinical trials as part of the United Kingdom’s 100,000 Genomes Project. We identify an extended catalog of recurrent coding and noncoding genetic mutations that represents a source for future studies and provide the most complete high-resolution map of structural variants, copy number changes and global genome features including telomere length, mutational signatures and genomic complexity. We demonstrate the relationship of these features with clinical outcome and show that integration of 186 distinct recurrent genomic alterations defines five genomic subgroups that associate with response to therapy, refining conventional outcome prediction. While requiring independent validation, our findings highlight the potential of whole-genome sequencing to inform future risk stratification in chronic lymphocytic leukemia