In vitro biocompatibility of a new hydrogel with Crocin, powerful antioxidant found in Crocus Sativus L. flowers

Recently, attention has been paid to the identification of natural antioxidants from the petals of Crocus S. flowers that are normally considered waste[1]. The antioxidant activities are mainly attributed to carotenoid compounds, like crocin. Scientific evidences demonstrate that this kind of compounds are among the most important natural plant sources of antioxidant activity in the human diet, protecting the body against damages caused by reactive oxygen species (ROS). This antioxidant was extracted using methanol and ethanol. In this experiment, it was used a new hydrogel consisting of three polymers - Polyvinyl pyrrolidone (PVP), Agar and Polyethylene glycol (PEG) – and Crocin, mixed, reticulated and then sterilized by gamma irradiation at 25 kGy. For the in vitro experimental protocol, it was used a primary culture of fibroblasts taken from the subcutaneous tissue of a newborn mice, seeding the cells on a little square (1cm2 area) of both kinds of hydrogel. As the ISO protocol prescribes, the experiments were repeated 3 times for each kind of hydrogel, stopping the culture at the 3rd, 7th and 14th day after the seeding. For all steps, 3 Petri dishes were used as controls without biomaterials. At fixed deadline, all Petri dishes were stained, using the Wright method for cell counting and morphological evaluations. The microscopic analysis revealed the complete biocompatibility of the hydrogel. The Petri dishes with this kind of new hydrogel has an overproduction of collagen from the fibroblasts. The presence of this natural important compound in saffron petals, now offers new possibilities for the best use of the hole flower. This study is still in progress.http://www.fupress.net/index.php/ijae/article/view/1495

Apolipoprotein L1 gene variants associate with prevalent kidney but not prevalent cardiovascular disease in the Systolic Blood Pressure Intervention Trial.

Apolipoprotein L1 gene (APOL1) G1 and G2 coding variants are strongly associated with chronic kidney disease (CKD) in African Americans (AAs). Here APOL1 association was tested with baseline estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR), urine albumin:creatinine ratio (UACR), and prevalent cardiovascular disease (CVD) in 2571 AAs from the Systolic Blood Pressure Intervention Trial (SPRINT), a trial assessing effects of systolic blood pressure reduction on renal and CVD outcomes. Logistic regression models that adjusted for potentially important confounders tested for association between APOL1 risk variants and baseline clinical CVD (myocardial infarction, coronary, or carotid artery revascularization) and CKD (eGFR under 60 ml/min per 1.73 m(2) and/or UACR over 30 mg/g). AA SPRINT participants were 45.3% female with a mean (median) age of 64.3 (63) years, mean arterial pressure 100.7 (100) mm Hg, eGFR 76.3 (77.1) ml/min per 1.73 m(2), and UACR 49.9 (9.2) mg/g, and 8.2% had clinical CVD. APOL1 (recessive inheritance) was positively associated with CKD (odds ratio 1.37, 95% confidence interval 1.08-1.73) and log UACR estimated slope (β) 0.33) and negatively associated with eGFR (β -3.58), all significant. APOL1 risk variants were not significantly associated with prevalent CVD (1.02, 0.82-1.27). Thus, SPRINT data show that APOL1 risk variants are associated with mild CKD but not with prevalent CVD in AAs with a UACR under 1000 mg/g

ObStruct: A method to objectively analyse factors driving population structure using Bayesian ancestry profiles

Bayesian inference methods are extensively used to detect the presence of population structure given genetic data. The primary output of software implementing these methods are ancestry profiles of sampled individuals. While these profiles robustly partition the data into subgroups, currently there is no objective method to determine whether the fixed factor of interest (e.g. geographic origin) correlates with inferred subgroups or not, and if so, which populations are driving this correlation. We present ObStruct, a novel tool to objectively analyse the nature of structure revealed in Bayesian ancestry profiles using established statistical methods. ObStruct evaluates the extent of structural similarity between sampled and inferred populations, tests the significance of population differentiation, provides information on the contribution of sampled and inferred populations to the observed structure and crucially determines whether the predetermined factor of interest correlates with inferred population structure. Analyses of simulated and experimental data highlight ObStruct's ability to objectively assess the nature of structure in populations. We show the method is capable of capturing an increase in the level of structure with increasing time since divergence between simulated populations. Further, we applied the method to a highly structured dataset of 1,484 humans from seven continents and a less structured dataset of 179 Saccharomyces cerevisiae from three regions in New Zealand. Our results show that ObStruct provides an objective metric to classify the degree, drivers and significance of inferred structure, as well as providing novel insights into the relationships between sampled populations, and adds a final step to the pipeline for population structure analyses. © 2014 Gayevskiy et al

Vitamin D heritability and effect of pregnancy status in Vervet monkeys ( Chlorocebus aethiops sabaeus ) under conditions of modest and high dietary supplementation: Vitamin D, Pregnancy, Diet Interaction in Vervets

The two objectives of the current study were to: 1) investigate the genetic contributions to variations in serum vitamin D concentrations under two dietary conditions (a standard monkey biscuit diet vs. a diet designed to model typical American consumption) and; 2) explore the interaction of vitamin D with pregnancy status using a cohort of pedigreed female vervet/African green monkeys

Genome-Wide Detection of Allele Specific Copy Number Variation Associated with Insulin Resistance in African Americans from the HyperGEN Study

African Americans have been understudied in genome wide association studies of diabetes and related traits. In the current study, we examined the joint association of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and copy number variants (CNVs) with fasting insulin and an index of insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) in the HyperGEN study, a family based study with proband ascertainment for hypertension. This analysis is restricted to 1,040 African Americans without diabetes. We generated allele specific CNV genotypes at 872,243 autosomal loci using Birdsuite, a freely available multi-stage program. Joint tests of association for SNPs and CNVs were performed using linear mixed models adjusting for covariates and familial relationships. Our results highlight SNPs associated with fasting insulin and HOMA-IR (rs6576507 and rs8026527, 3.7*10−7≤P≤1.1*10−5) near ATPase, class V, type 10A (ATP10A), and the L Type voltage dependent calcium channel (CACNA1D, rs1401492, P≤5.2*10−6). ATP10A belongs to a family of aminophospholipid-transporting ATPases and has been associated with type 2 diabetes in mice. CACNA1D has been linked to pancreatic beta cell generation in mice. The two most significant copy variable markers (rs10277702 and rs361367; P<2.0*10−4) were in the beta variable region of the T-cell receptor gene (TCRVB). Human and mouse TCR has been shown to mimic insulin and its receptor and could contribute to insulin resistance. Our findings differ from genome wide association studies of fasting insulin and other diabetes related traits in European populations, highlighting the continued need to investigate unique genetic influences for understudied populations such as African Americans

A Comprehensive Analysis of Shared Loci between Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (SLE) and Sixteen Autoimmune Diseases Reveals Limited Genetic Overlap

In spite of the well-known clustering of multiple autoimmune disorders in families, analyses of specific shared genes and polymorphisms between systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and other autoimmune diseases (ADs) have been limited. Therefore, we comprehensively tested autoimmune variants for association with SLE, aiming to identify pleiotropic genetic associations between these diseases. We compiled a list of 446 non–Major Histocompatibility Complex (MHC) variants identified in genome-wide association studies (GWAS) of populations of European ancestry across 17 ADs. We then tested these variants in our combined Caucasian SLE cohorts of 1,500 cases and 5,706 controls. We tested a subset of these polymorphisms in an independent Caucasian replication cohort of 2,085 SLE cases and 2,854 controls, allowing the computation of a meta-analysis between all cohorts. We have uncovered novel shared SLE loci that passed multiple comparisons adjustment, including the VTCN1 (rs12046117, P = 2.02×10−06) region. We observed that the loci shared among the most ADs include IL23R, OLIG3/TNFAIP3, and IL2RA. Given the lack of a universal autoimmune risk locus outside of the MHC and variable specificities for different diseases, our data suggests partial pleiotropy among ADs. Hierarchical clustering of ADs suggested that the most genetically related ADs appear to be type 1 diabetes with rheumatoid arthritis and Crohn's disease with ulcerative colitis. These findings support a relatively distinct genetic susceptibility for SLE. For many of the shared GWAS autoimmune loci, we found no evidence for association with SLE, including IL23R. Also, several established SLE loci are apparently not associated with other ADs, including the ITGAM-ITGAX and TNFSF4 regions. This study represents the most comprehensive evaluation of shared autoimmune loci to date, supports a relatively distinct non–MHC genetic susceptibility for SLE, provides further evidence for previously and newly identified shared genes in SLE, and highlights the value of studies of potentially pleiotropic genes in autoimmune diseases

Ground penetrating radar prototypes developed in COST action TU1208

In this contribution, two prototypes of Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) are presented, developed in the framework of COST Action TU1208 “Civil engineering applications of Ground Penetrating Radar.” The first prototype is a reconfigurable stepped-frequency GPR: the original version of this system was designed and implemented in 2008 and represented an outcome of the Italian research project Aitech. During the Action’s lifetime, the prototype has been improved and widely tested. Particular care has been taken to develop a technique for the reconfigurability of the integration time of the harmonic tones. The second prototype is a Frequency-Modulated Continuous Wave radar, which is still under development. It takes inspiration from a system implemented by the MIT Lincoln Laboratory. The radar is conceived to be cheap and easy to be built, so that it can be smoothly replicated and used for training purposes or to carry out basic experiments, in order to get acquainted with the GPR technology and methodology