Validation Studies for Single Circulating Trophoblast Genetic Testing as a Form of Noninvasive Prenatal Diagnosis

It has long been appreciated that genetic analysis of fetal or trophoblast cells in maternal blood could revolutionize prenatal diagnosis. We implemented a protocol for single circulating trophoblast (SCT) testing using positive selection by magnetic-activated cell sorting and single-cell low-coverage whole-genome sequencing to detect fetal aneuploidies and copy-number variants (CNVs) at ∼1 Mb resolution. In 95 validation cases, we identified on average 0.20 putative trophoblasts/mL, of which 55% were of high quality and scorable for both aneuploidy and CNVs. We emphasize the importance of analyzing individual cells because some cells are apoptotic, in S-phase, or otherwise of poor quality. When two or more high-quality trophoblast cells were available for singleton pregnancies, there was complete concordance between all trophoblasts unless there was evidence of confined placental mosaicism. SCT results were highly concordant with available clinical data from chorionic villus sampling (CVS) or amniocentesis procedures. Although determining the exact sensitivity and specificity will require more data, this study further supports the potential for SCT testing to become a diagnostic prenatal test

Did Charisma “Trump” Narcissism in 2016? Leader Narcissism, Attributed Charisma, Value Congruence and Voter Choice

Grandiose narcissism has been associated with negative outcomes and research suggests its potential to predict positive and negative leadership behaviors. We examined perceived leader narcissism, attributed charisma, and voter choice in the context of the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Narcissism was found to be negatively related to attributions of charisma and voter choice, and had an indirect effect on voter choice through attributed charisma. Value congruence moderated the relationship between attributed charisma and voter choice. Our findings contribute to a better understanding of the mixed results in earlier research regarding the relationship between perceived leader narcissism and attributed charisma, and highlights attributed charisma as an intervening factor in understanding leader selection