Pediatric-onset Evans syndrome: Heterogeneous presentation and high frequency of monogenic disorders including LRBA and CTLA4 mutations

Evans syndrome (ES) is defined by the combination of autoimmune hemolytic anemia and immune thrombocytopenia. Clinical presentation includes manifestations of immune dysregulation, found in primary immune deficiencies, autoimmune lymphoproliferative syndrome with FAS (ALPS-FAS), Cytotoxic T Lymphocyte Antigen-4 (CTLA-4) and Lipopolysaccharide-Responsive vesicle trafficking Beige-like and Anchor protein (LRBA) defects. We report the clinical history and genetic results of 18 children with ES after excluding ALPS-FAS. Thirteen had organomegaly, five lymphocytic infiltration of non-lymphoid organs, nine hypogammaglobulinemia and fifteen anomalies in lymphocyte phenotyping. Seven patients had genetic defects: three CTLA4 mutations (c.151C>T; c.109+1092_568-512del; c.110-2A>G) identified by Sanger sequencing and four revealed by Next Generation Sequencing: LRBA (c.2450+1C>T), STAT3 gain-of-function (c.2147C>T; c.2144C>T) and KRAS (c.37G>T). No feature emerged to distinguish patients with or without genetic diagnosis. Our data on pediatric-onset ES should prompt physicians to perform extensive screening for mutations in the growing pool of genes involved in primary immune deficiencies with autoimmunity

Diagnostic yield of next-generation sequencing in very early-onset inflammatory bowel diseases: a multicenter study (vol 12, pg 1104, 2021)

Transplantation and immunomodulatio

Detectable clonal mosaicism and its relationship to aging and cancer

In an analysis of 31,717 cancer cases and 26,136 cancer-free controls from 13 genome-wide association studies, we observed large chromosomal abnormalities in a subset of clones in DNA obtained from blood or buccal samples. We observed mosaic abnormalities, either aneuploidy or copy-neutral loss of heterozygosity, of >2 Mb in size in autosomes of 517 individuals (0.89%), with abnormal cell proportions of between 7% and 95%. In cancer-free individuals, frequency increased with age, from 0.23% under 50 years to 1.91% between 75 and 79 years (P = 4.8 × 10(-8)). Mosaic abnormalities were more frequent in individuals with solid tumors (0.97% versus 0.74% in cancer-free individuals; odds ratio (OR) = 1.25; P = 0.016), with stronger association with cases who had DNA collected before diagnosis or treatment (OR = 1.45; P = 0.0005). Detectable mosaicism was also more common in individuals for whom DNA was collected at least 1 year before diagnosis with leukemia compared to cancer-free individuals (OR = 35.4; P = 3.8 × 10(-11)). These findings underscore the time-dependent nature of somatic events in the etiology of cancer and potentially other late-onset diseases

Female chromosome X mosaicism is age-related and preferentially affects the inactivated X chromosome

To investigate large structural clonal mosaicism of chromosome X, we analysed the SNP microarray intensity data of 38,303 women from cancer genome-wide association studies (20,878 cases and 17,425 controls) and detected 124 mosaic X events42Mb in 97 (0.25%) women. Here we show rates for X-chromosome mosaicism are four times higher than mean autosomal rates; X mosaic events more often include the entire chromosome and participants with X events more likely harbour autosomal mosaic events. X mosaicism frequency increases with age (0.11% in 50-year olds; 0.45% in 75-year olds), as reported for Y and autosomes. Methylation array analyses of 33 women with X mosaicism indicate events preferentially involve the inactive X chromosome. Our results provide further evidence that the sex chromosomes undergo mosaic events more frequently than autosomes, which could have implications for understanding the underlying mechanisms of mosaic events and their possible contribution to risk for chronic diseases

Anthropometry, physical activity, and the risk of pancreatic cancer in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition.

Tobacco smoking is the only established risk factor for pancreatic cancer. Results from several epidemiologic studies have suggested that increased body mass index and/or lack of physical activity may be associated with an increased risk of this disease. We examined the relationship between anthropometry and physical activity recorded at baseline and the risk of pancreatic cancer in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (n = 438,405 males and females age 19-84 years and followed for a total of 2,826,070 person-years). Relative risks (RR) were calculated using Cox proportional hazards models stratified by age, sex, and country and adjusted for smoking and self-reported diabetes and, where appropriate, height. In total, there were 324 incident cases of pancreatic cancer diagnosed in the cohort over an average of 6 years of follow-up. There was evidence that the RR of pancreatic cancer was associated with increased height [RR, 1.74; 95% confidence interval (95% CI), 1.20-2.52] for highest quartile compared with lowest quartile (P(trend) = 0.001). However, this trend was primarily due to a low risk in the lowest quartile, as when this group was excluded, the trend was no longer statistically significant (P = 0.27). A larger waist-to-hip ratio and waist circumference were both associated with an increased risk of developing the disease (RR per 0.1, 1.24; 95% CI, 1.04-1.48; P(trend) = 0.02 and RR per 10 cm, 1.13; 95% CI, 1.01-1.26; P(trend) = 0.03, respectively). There was a nonsignificant increased risk of pancreatic cancer with increasing body mass index (RR, 1.09; 95% CI, 0.95-1.24 per 5 kg/m(2)), and a nonsignificant decreased risk with total physical activity (RR, 0.82; 95% CI, 0.50-1.35 for most active versus inactive). Future studies should consider including measurements of waist and hip circumference, to further investigate the relationship between central adiposity and the risk of pancreatic cancer

Pregnancy Outcomes and Risk of Endometrial Cancer: A Pooled Analysis of Individual Participant Data in the Epidemiology of Endometrial Cancer Consortium

A full-term pregnancy is associated with reduced endometrial cancer risk; however, whether the effect of additional pregnancies is independent of age at last pregnancy is unknown. The associations between other pregnancy-related factors and endometrial cancer risk are less clear. We pooled individual participant data from 11 cohort and 19 case-control studies participating in the Epidemiology of Endometrial Cancer Consortium (E2C2) including 16,986 women with endometrial cancer and 39,538 control women. We used one- and two-stage meta-analytic approaches to estimate pooled odds ratios (OR) for the association between exposures and endometrial cancer risk. Ever having a full-term pregnancy was associated with a 41% reduction in risk of endometrial cancer compared to never having a full-term pregnancy (OR=0.59, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.56-0.63). The risk reduction appeared greatest for the first full-term pregnancy (OR=0.78, 95%CI 0.72-0.84), with a further ~15% reduction per pregnancy up to eight pregnancies (OR=0.20, 95%CI 0.14-0.28) that was independent of age at last full-term pregnancy. Incomplete pregnancy was also associated with decreased endometrial cancer risk (7-9% reduction per pregnancy). Twin births appeared to have the same effect as singleton pregnancies. Our pooled analysis shows that, while the magnitude of the risk reduction is greater for a full-term pregnancy than an incomplete pregnancy, each additional pregnancy is associated with further reduction in endometrial cancer risk, independent of age at last full-term pregnancy. These results suggest the very high progesterone level in the last trimester of pregnancy is not the sole explanation for the protective effect of pregnancy