Amphipod intersex, metals and latitude: A perspective

Intersexuality has been widely reported in crustaceans with several mechanisms being directly or indirectly held responsible for its occurrence, amongst which pollution. No mechanistic relationship between metals and intersex has ever been established. Also the incidence of intersex in populations of the same invertebrate species in a latitudinal gradient has never been studied so far. Three populations (Iceland,Scotland and Portugal) of the amphipod Echinogammarus marinus were scrutinized. Intersex females from Iceland registered the highest fecundity loss. Only in Scottish samples females with two genital papillae and males with only one genital papillae were observed. Nevertheless, water, biota and sediment samples pointed to equivalent metal levels, and in consonance the prevalence of intersex was not significantly different between locations. An unequivocal relationship between metal presence and intersex induction cannot be presented, but our results advocate the potential role of metals as a direct cause of intersexuality in E. marinus

Machine learning-based immune phenotypes correlate with STK11/KEAP1 co-mutations and prognosis in resectable NSCLC: a sub-study of the TNM-I trial

Background - We aim to implement an immune cell score model in routine clinical practice for resected non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients (NCT03299478). Molecular and genomic features associated with immune phenotypes in NSCLC have not been explored in detail. Patients and methods - We developed a machine learning (ML)-based model to classify tumors into one of three categories: inflamed, altered, and desert, based on the spatial distribution of CD8+ T cells in two prospective (n = 453; TNM-I trial) and retrospective (n = 481) stage I-IIIA NSCLC surgical cohorts. NanoString assays and targeted gene panel sequencing were used to evaluate the association of gene expression and mutations with immune phenotypes. Results - Among the total of 934 patients, 24.4% of tumors were classified as inflamed, 51.3% as altered, and 24.3% as desert. There were significant associations between ML-derived immune phenotypes and adaptive immunity gene expression signatures. We identified a strong association of the nuclear factor-κB pathway and CD8+ T-cell exclusion through a positive enrichment in the desert phenotype. KEAP1 [odds ratio (OR) 0.27, Q = 0.02] and STK11 (OR 0.39, Q = 0.04) were significantly co-mutated in non-inflamed lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD) compared to the inflamed phenotype. In the retrospective cohort, the inflamed phenotype was an independent prognostic factor for prolonged disease-specific survival and time to recurrence (hazard ratio 0.61, P = 0.01 and 0.65, P = 0.02, respectively). Conclusions - ML-based immune phenotyping by spatial distribution of T cells in resected NSCLC is able to identify patients at greater risk of disease recurrence after surgical resection. LUADs with concurrent KEAP1 and STK11 mutations are enriched for altered and desert immune phenotypes

Multi-criteria assessment tool for sustainability appraisal of remediation alternatives for a contaminated site

Purpose: In order to improve and support decision-making for the selection of remedial techniques for contaminated sites, a multi-criteria assessment (MCA) method has been developed. The MCA framework is structured in a decision process actively involving stakeholders, and compares the sustainability of remediation alternatives by integrating environmental, societal, and economic criteria in the assessment. Materials and methods: The MCA includes five main decision criteria: remedial effect, remediation cost, remediation time, environmental impacts, and societal impacts. The main criteria are divided into a number of sub-criteria. The environmental impacts consider secondary impacts to the environment caused by remedial activities and are assessed by life-cycle assessment (LCA). The societal impacts mainly consider local impacts and are assessed in a more qualitative manner on a scale from 1 to 5. The performance on each main criterion is normalized to a score between 0 and 1, with 1 being the worst score. An overall score is obtained by calculating a weighted sum with criteria weights determined by stakeholders. The MCA method was applied to assess remediation alternatives for the Groyne 42 site, one of the largest contaminated sites in Denmark. Results and discussion: The compared remediation alternatives for the site were: (1) excavation of the site followed by soil treatment; (2) in situ alkaline hydrolysis; (3) in situ thermal remediation; and (4) continued encapsulation of the site by sheet piling. Criteria weights were derived by a stakeholder panel. The stakeholders gave the highest weighting to the remedial effect of the methods and to the societal impacts. For the Groyne 42 case study, the excavation option obtained the lowest overall score in the MCA, and was therefore found to be the most sustainable option. This was especially due to the fact that this option obtained a high score in the main categories Effect and Social impacts, which were weighted highest by the stakeholders. Conclusions: The developed MCA method is structured with five main criteria. Effect and time are included in addition to the three pillars of sustainability (environment, society, and economy). The remedial effect of remediation is therefore assessed and weighted separately from the main criteria environment. This structure makes interpretation of criteria scores more transparent and emphasizes the importance of effect and time as decision parameters. This also facilitated an easier weighting procedure for the stakeholders in the case study, who expressed a wish to weigh the remedial effect independently from the secondary environmental impacts.</p

Differential Sex, Morphotype and Tissue Accumulation of Mercury in the Crab Carcinus maenas

Carcinus maenas is an invasive species of recognised economical and ecological importance in which mercury accumulation could be a pathway for bioamplification through food webs. Little information is available about differential accumulation between crab sexes and morphotypes. Taking this in mind, a set of different industrial discharge scenarios were investigated in 96-h laboratory experiments for assessing the accumulation of inorganic mercury from contaminated seawater into the tissues of C. maenas. Three groups of crabs (green males, green and red females) where exposed to 5, 50 and 250 μg Hg L −1. Differences among sexes, morphotypes and tissues were detected, depending on the mercury concentration. The muscle did not show differential accumulation between sexes or morphotypes. For mercury exposed crabs, the contaminant was accumulated preferably in the gills (more than 75%) while, in control experiments, it was in the internal organs, muscle and hepatopancreas, and gills corresponded to less than 31% of the total mercury quantified. The different tissue contamination seems dependent on the major pathway of exposure, diet or water. Mercury accumulation by the crab was a rapid process and could represent a risk for the environment only after 96 h. In a scenario of a discharge point of 250 μgL −1, all tissues of crabs exposed would attain a very close, or even exceed the threshold concentration value for human consumption (0.5 mg kg−1).The present work was supported by FCT (Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia) through a PhD grant awarded to Sónia Costa (SFRH/BD/31247/2006) and through the Research Project MERCOAST (PTDC/MAR/101906/ 2008). The authors are indebted to all colleagues who assisted in the field and laboratory work.publishe