Standing at The Crossroads: The Intersection of Sexual, Racial/ethnic, and Spiritual/religious Identities in African American Men Who have Sex with Men

The purpose of this research was to investigate Conflict in Allegiance (CIA), an intersectional construct, and its associations with racism in LGB communities, perceived homonegativity within racial and religious communities, and frequency of unprotected anal intercourse (UAI) among religiously affiliated African American men who have sex with men (AAMSM). A review of literature on the established relationships between disproportional HIV-incidence among AAMSM, racism, homonegativity, and UAI was presented. The experience of CIA was hypothesized to correlate with racism in LGB communities, homonegativity within racial and religious communities, and UAI. A sample of 238 religiously-affiliated AAMSM completed the Conflict in Allegiance Scale, Racism in LGB Communities Scale, Homonegativity within Racial and Religious Communities Scales, and a frequency of UAI scale. Pearson product moment correlations were utilized to examine the hypothesized relationships between the variables and revealed significant correlations between CIA and the oppression-related variables. CIA was also found to be significantly correlated with UAI. Differences in CIA among participants who were younger (18-35) and older (36+) from self-described liberal or conservative religious institutions were sought. A two-way analysis of variance revealed no difference in CIA between older and younger participants from liberal and conservative religious institutions. These major findings, including additional findings, current literature, and theories of sexual orientation identity development were presented. Limitations, areas of future research, and implications Counselor Education and clinical practice were identified

Genome-wide Analyses Identify KIF5A as a Novel ALS Gene

To identify novel genes associated with ALS, we undertook two lines of investigation. We carried out a genome-wide association study comparing 20,806 ALS cases and 59,804 controls. Independently, we performed a rare variant burden analysis comparing 1,138 index familial ALS cases and 19,494 controls. Through both approaches, we identified kinesin family member 5A (KIF5A) as a novel gene associated with ALS. Interestingly, mutations predominantly in the N-terminal motor domain of KIF5A are causative for two neurodegenerative diseases: hereditary spastic paraplegia (SPG10) and Charcot-Marie-Tooth type 2 (CMT2). In contrast, ALS-associated mutations are primarily located at the C-terminal cargo-binding tail domain and patients harboring loss-of-function mutations displayed an extended survival relative to typical ALS cases. Taken together, these results broaden the phenotype spectrum resulting from mutations in KIF5A and strengthen the role of cytoskeletal defects in the pathogenesis of ALS.Peer reviewe