Associations between Toxoplasma gondii Infection and Multiple Sclerosis: A Case-Control Seroprevalence Study

Background: Currently, there are conflicting reports on the associations between Toxoplasma gondii infection and multiple sclerosis (MS) in humans. In the present study, a case–control study was carried out to assess associations between seropositivity to T. gondii infection and MS. Methods: This case-control study was carried out on 200 MS patients (cases) attended in Sina Hospital affiliated to Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran, and 200 healthy subjects from the general population of the same city, March to July 2017. Blood samples were collected from individuals and were examined using Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) for the presence of T. gondii IgG antibodies and the IgG-positive samples were further analyzed for specific anti-T. gondii IgM. Results: The overall seroprevalence of anti-T. gondii IgG was 44.2% (177/400) in 121 (60.5%) sera of the 200 MS patients (cases) and 56 (28.0%) sera of the 200 controls (OR = 3.94; 95% CI: 2.59–5.99; P 0.05). Anti-T. gondii IgM antibodies were not detected in anti-T. gondii IgG positive patients.  Conclusion: T. gondii infection might be a probability risk factor for MS. However, further studies are necessary to describe clearly the roles of T. gondii infection in MS

Chronic cerebrospinal venous insufficiency in patients with multiple sclerosis: A case-control study from Iran

SummaryIntroductionChronic cerebrospinal venous insufficiency (CCSVI) is a newly suggested cause for multiple sclerosis (MS) detected by color-coded Doppler sonography. Our aim was to evaluate the relationship between CCSVI and MS compared to the control group.MethodsThe study was performed on 84 MS patients and 115 healthy subjects. The presence of at least two of the extra- and/or intra-cranial Zamboni's criteria was considered positive for evidence of CCSVI.ResultsAlthough the total number of MS patients with any detectable CCSVI criterion was significantly higher than the controls (22.6% vs. 10.4%, P=0.019), only one out of 84 patients fulfilled the Zamboni's criteria (1.2% vs. none, P=0.422).ConclusionOur results do not support the presence of a relationship between MS and CCSVI criteria defined by Zamboni

A robust benchmark for detection of germline large deletions and insertions

New technologies and analysis methods are enabling genomic structural variants (SVs) to be detected with ever-increasing accuracy, resolution, and comprehensiveness. To help translate these methods to routine research and clinical practice, we developed the first sequence-resolved benchmark set for identification of both false negative and false positive germline large insertions and deletions. To create this benchmark for a broadly consented son in a Personal Genome Project trio with broadly available cells and DNA, the Genome in a Bottle (GIAB) Consortium integrated 19 sequence-resolved variant calling methods from diverse technologies. The final benchmark set contains 12745 isolated, sequence-resolved insertion (7281) and deletion (5464) calls ≥50 base pairs (bp). The Tier 1 benchmark regions, for which any extra calls are putative false positives, cover 2.51 Gbp and 5262 insertions and 4095 deletions supported by ≥1 diploid assembly. We demonstrate the benchmark set reliably identifies false negatives and false positives in high-quality SV callsets from short-, linked-, and long-read sequencing and optical mapping

Author Correction: A robust benchmark for detection of germline large deletions and insertions.

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper