The synovial and blood monocyte DNA methylomes mirror prognosis, evolution and treatment in early arthritis

Identifying predictive biomarkers at early stages of early inflammatory arthritis is crucial for starting appropriate therapies to avoid poor outcomes. Monocytes and macrophages, largely associated with arthritis, are contributors and sensors of inflammation through epigenetic modifications. In this study, we investigated associations between clinical features and DNA methylation in blood and synovial fluid (SF) monocytes in a prospective cohort of early inflammatory arthritis patients. Undifferentiated arthritis (UA) blood monocyte DNA methylation profiles exhibited significant alterations in comparison with those from healthy donors. We identified additional differences both in blood and SF monocytes after comparing UA patients grouped by their future outcomes, good versus poor. Patient profiles in subsequent visits revealed a reversion towards a healthy level in both groups, those requiring disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs (DMARDs) and those that remitted spontaneously. Changes in disease activity between visits also impacted DNA methylation, partially concomitant in the SF of UA and in blood monocytes of rheumatoid arthritis patients. Epigenetic similarities between arthritis types allow a common prediction of disease activity. Our results constitute a resource of DNA methylation-based biomarkers of poor prognosis, disease activity and treatment efficacy in early untreated UA patients for the personalized clinical management of early inflammatory arthritis patients

Immunogenetic characterization of clonal plasma cells in systemic light-chain amyloidosis

This study was supported by the Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red—Área de Oncología—del Instituto de Salud Carlos III (CIBERONC; CB16/12/00369; and CB16/12/00489), Instituto de Salud Carlos III/Subdirección General de Investigación Sanitaria (FIS No. PI13/02196), Asociación Española Contra el Cáncer (GCB120981SAN and the Accelerator Award), CRIS against Cancer foundation grant 2014/0120, and the Black Swan Research Initiative of the International Myeloma Foundation.Peer reviewe

Estudio del perfil genético en pacientes con Amiloidosis de cadenas ligeras

Oral Presentation [CO-130] Introducción: Los estudios de secuenciación masiva (NGS) han permitido profundizar en el conocimiento de las gammapatías monoclonales tales como el mieloma múltiple (MM) y la macroglobulinemia de Waldesntröm’s (WM). Desafortunadamente, la baja incidencia de la amiloidosis de cadenas ligeras (AL) y la baja carga tumoral que presenta, a menudo enmascarada por un fondo policlonal de células plasmáticas (PC), explica la poca información que hay sobre la biología de la célula tumoral. Por ello, se desconoce si la AL presenta alguna mutación común como ocurre en la WM, si existen mutaciones recurrentes, y si estas podrían coincidir con las observadas en MM. Por lo tanto, el objetivo de este trabajo es realizar una secuenciación de exoma (WES) en una serie de pacientes con AL y comparar su perfil mutacional con el de MM. Métodos: En este estudio se incluyeron 28 pacientes con AL. Se realizó un WES, incluyendo las regiones reguladoras UTR (SureSelect Human All Exon V6 + UTRs (Agilent)) en 56 muestras pareadas sorteadas de células plasmáticas patológicas y sangre periférica como muestra control. Cada muestra tumoral fue capturada por triplicado y secuenciada en la plataforma NextSeq 500 (Illumina). Para el análisis de variantes somáticas se utilizaron los programas Strelka y ANNOVAR. . Las firmas mutacionales se analizaron con el software DeconstructSigs. Para comparar el perfil mutacional de AL con MM se utilizó la base de datos MMRF CoMMpass con 895 pacientes. Además, se han determinado los reordenamientos de los genes de las inmunoglobulinas (Igs) mediante NGS. Resultados: La cobertura media de secuenciación para las muestras de control y tumor fue de 64x y 186x, respectivamente. Se detectaron un total de 1983 SNV y 133 INDEL con una media de 71 (20-281) SNV y 5 (0-25) INDEL por paciente. Al comparar con MM (media 66 SNV y 2.5 INDEL) se observó una carga mutacional similar. Los únicos genes mutados tanto en AL como en MM fueron MUC16 (recurrencia 17% y 8%, respectivamente) e IGLL5 (recurrencia 17%, en ambas), siendo además los genes más frecuentemente mutados en AL Las firmas mutacionales más frecuentes que se identificaron fueron la 1 (desaminación espontánea de citosinas metiladas en sitios CpG), la 3 (fallo en la reparación de la ruptura de la doble cadena de ADN mediante recombinación homóloga), y la 9 (transveriones T> G en trinucleótidos ApTpN y TpTpN), identificadas en el 96%, 54% y 46% de los pacientes, respectivamente. Respecto al repertorio de los genes de las Igs, se observó que el 26% de los pacientes con AL presentan más de un clon, siendo esta heterogeneidad clonal similar a la encontrada en MM (23%). El gen IGHV3-30 fue identificado con mayor frecuencia tanto en AL como en MM, 10% y 12% de recurrencia, respectivamente. Conclusiones: Este es el primer estudio de WES en una serie de pacientes con AL. Los resultados muestran que no hay una mutación común driver en esta enfermedad, que podrían estar implicados múltiples procesos mutacionales, y que los genes descritos más frecuentemente mutados en AL y MM no coinciden. En conjunto, estos resultados suponen un avance en el entendimiento de la patogénesis de la AL

Satisfaction with life and its relations with religion and health in Colombian university students

El presente estudio tuvo como objetivo estimar las correlaciones entre la satisfacción con la vida, la religión y la salud en una muestra de 446 participantes (42,60% varones y el 57,40% mujeres), con edades comprendidas entre los 18 a 69 años. Adicionalmente se llevó a cabo un análisis de regresión múltiple por pasos con el fin de conocer las variables predictoras de la satisfacción con la vida. Todos los participantes completaron los siguientes instrumentos: Cuestionario sociodemográfico, Escala de Satisfacción con la Vida, Cuestionario de Salud SF-36 y Escala de Religiosidad. A partir de los resultados se comprobó que la satisfacción con la vida no se asocia con la religión profesada. Mayor satisfacción con la vida fue predicha por mayor práctica religiosa organizacional, mejor salud general, mejor salud mental y mejor rol emocional. En definitiva, el nivel de satisfacción con la vida no parece estar relacionado con la religión profesada, aunque sí con la práctica de actividades que propone la institución religiosa de cada uno.The objective of the present study was to estimate the correlations between the satisfaction with life, religion and health in a sample of 446 participants (42,60% men and 57,40% women) between the ages of 18 to 69 years. In addition, an analysis of multiple regression by steps was made in order to determine the predictors of life satisfaction. All participants completed the following instruments: Sociodemographic Questionnaire, Satisfaction with Life Scales, SF-36 Questionnaire of Health and Scale of Religiosity. From the results it was found that the satisfaction with life was not associated with the religion professed. Greater satisfaction with life was predicted by greater organizational religious practice, better general health, better mental health and better emotional role. In conclusion the level of satisfaction with life does not seem to be related to the religion professed, but with the practice of activities proposed by the religious institution of each one

Search for new physics with same-sign isolated dilepton events with jets and missing transverse energy

A search for new physics is performed in events with two same-sign isolated leptons, hadronic jets, and missing transverse energy in the final state. The analysis is based on a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.98 inverse femtobarns produced in pp collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 7 TeV collected by the CMS experiment at the LHC. This constitutes a factor of 140 increase in integrated luminosity over previously published results. The observed yields agree with the standard model predictions and thus no evidence for new physics is found. The observations are used to set upper limits on possible new physics contributions and to constrain supersymmetric models. To facilitate the interpretation of the data in a broader range of new physics scenarios, information on the event selection, detector response, and efficiencies is provided.Comment: Published in Physical Review Letter

Search for a W' boson decaying to a bottom quark and a top quark in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV

Results are presented from a search for a W' boson using a dataset corresponding to 5.0 inverse femtobarns of integrated luminosity collected during 2011 by the CMS experiment at the LHC in pp collisions at sqrt(s)=7 TeV. The W' boson is modeled as a heavy W boson, but different scenarios for the couplings to fermions are considered, involving both left-handed and right-handed chiral projections of the fermions, as well as an arbitrary mixture of the two. The search is performed in the decay channel W' to t b, leading to a final state signature with a single lepton (e, mu), missing transverse energy, and jets, at least one of which is tagged as a b-jet. A W' boson that couples to fermions with the same coupling constant as the W, but to the right-handed rather than left-handed chiral projections, is excluded for masses below 1.85 TeV at the 95% confidence level. For the first time using LHC data, constraints on the W' gauge coupling for a set of left- and right-handed coupling combinations have been placed. These results represent a significant improvement over previously published limits.Comment: Submitted to Physics Letters B. Replaced with version publishe

Compressed representation of a partially defined integer function over multiple arguments

In OLAP (OnLine Analitical Processing) data are analysed in an n-dimensional cube. The cube may be represented as a partially defined function over n arguments. Considering that often the function is not defined everywhere, we ask: is there a known way of representing the function or the points in which it is defined, in a more compact manner than the trivial one

Combined search for the quarks of a sequential fourth generation

Results are presented from a search for a fourth generation of quarks produced singly or in pairs in a data set corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 5 inverse femtobarns recorded by the CMS experiment at the LHC in 2011. A novel strategy has been developed for a combined search for quarks of the up and down type in decay channels with at least one isolated muon or electron. Limits on the mass of the fourth-generation quarks and the relevant Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskawa matrix elements are derived in the context of a simple extension of the standard model with a sequential fourth generation of fermions. The existence of mass-degenerate fourth-generation quarks with masses below 685 GeV is excluded at 95% confidence level for minimal off-diagonal mixing between the third- and the fourth-generation quarks. With a mass difference of 25 GeV between the quark masses, the obtained limit on the masses of the fourth-generation quarks shifts by about +/- 20 GeV. These results significantly reduce the allowed parameter space for a fourth generation of fermions.Comment: Replaced with published version. Added journal reference and DO

Measurement of the t t-bar production cross section in the dilepton channel in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV

The t t-bar production cross section (sigma[t t-bar]) is measured in proton-proton collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV in data collected by the CMS experiment, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 2.3 inverse femtobarns. The measurement is performed in events with two leptons (electrons or muons) in the final state, at least two jets identified as jets originating from b quarks, and the presence of an imbalance in transverse momentum. The measured value of sigma[t t-bar] for a top-quark mass of 172.5 GeV is 161.9 +/- 2.5 (stat.) +5.1/-5.0 (syst.) +/- 3.6(lumi.) pb, consistent with the prediction of the standard model.Comment: Replaced with published version. Included journal reference and DO

Search for the standard model Higgs boson in the H to ZZ to 2l 2nu channel in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV

A search for the standard model Higgs boson in the H to ZZ to 2l 2nu decay channel, where l = e or mu, in pp collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 7 TeV is presented. The data were collected at the LHC, with the CMS detector, and correspond to an integrated luminosity of 4.6 inverse femtobarns. No significant excess is observed above the background expectation, and upper limits are set on the Higgs boson production cross section. The presence of the standard model Higgs boson with a mass in the 270-440 GeV range is excluded at 95% confidence level.Comment: Submitted to JHE