French Roadmap for complex Systems 2008-2009

This second issue of the French Complex Systems Roadmap is the outcome of the Entretiens de Cargese 2008, an interdisciplinary brainstorming session organized over one week in 2008, jointly by RNSC, ISC-PIF and IXXI. It capitalizes on the first roadmap and gathers contributions of more than 70 scientists from major French institutions. The aim of this roadmap is to foster the coordination of the complex systems community on focused topics and questions, as well as to present contributions and challenges in the complex systems sciences and complexity science to the public, political and industrial spheres

Association of the PHACTR1/EDN1 genetic locus with spontaneous coronary artery dissection

Background: Spontaneous coronary artery dissection (SCAD) is an increasingly recognized cause of acute coronary syndromes (ACS) afflicting predominantly younger to middle-aged women. Observational studies have reported a high prevalence of extracoronary vascular anomalies, especially fibromuscular dysplasia (FMD) and a low prevalence of coincidental cases of atherosclerosis. PHACTR1/EDN1 is a genetic risk locus for several vascular diseases, including FMD and coronary artery disease, with the putative causal noncoding variant at the rs9349379 locus acting as a potential enhancer for the endothelin-1 (EDN1) gene. Objectives: This study sought to test the association between the rs9349379 genotype and SCAD. Methods: Results from case control studies from France, United Kingdom, United States, and Australia were analyzed to test the association with SCAD risk, including age at first event, pregnancy-associated SCAD (P-SCAD), and recurrent SCAD. Results: The previously reported risk allele for FMD (rs9349379-A) was associated with a higher risk of SCAD in all studies. In a meta-analysis of 1,055 SCAD patients and 7,190 controls, the odds ratio (OR) was 1.67 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.50 to 1.86) per copy of rs9349379-A. In a subset of 491 SCAD patients, the OR estimate was found to be higher for the association with SCAD in patients without FMD (OR: 1.89; 95% CI: 1.53 to 2.33) than in SCAD cases with FMD (OR: 1.60; 95% CI: 1.28 to 1.99). There was no effect of genotype on age at first event, P-SCAD, or recurrence. Conclusions: The first genetic risk factor for SCAD was identified in the largest study conducted to date for this condition. This genetic link may contribute to the clinical overlap between SCAD and FMD

Etude de la polarite des cellules epitheliales dans le colon humain et dans des lignees d'adenocarcinomes coliques humains

SIGLECNRS T Bordereau / INIST-CNRS - Institut de l'Information Scientifique et TechniqueFRFranc

Transport and function of syntaxin 3 in human epithelial intestinal cells

Transport and function of syntaxin 3 in human epithelia

Doppler sonography and liver focal tumors

But : évaluer l'intérêt de l'écho-Doppler dans l'étude des tumeurs du foie chez l'adulte. L'écho-Doppler a été volontiers sous-estimée. ces dernières années, au profit d'autres techniques d'imagerie. Matériel et méthodes : les techniques ultrasonores en couleur font appel au Doppler fréquentiel, au Doppler énergie, voire à l'utilisation des produits de contraste spécifiques. L'opérateur a recherché un flux circulant en contraste spontané afin de mesurer des vitesses ou des index. Nous avons étudié de manière prospective 72 tumeurs focales et avons confronté nos résultats à ceux de la littérature. Résultats et discussion : ils sont exprimés sans chereber à mesurer sensibilité ou spécificité. On identifie un certain nombre de signes évocateurs de telle ou telle autre affection, en utilisant des faisceaux d'arguments, car aucun des signes pris isolément ne semble pathognomoniq ue. Conclusion : il existe des signes évocateurs de pathologies diverses telles le carcinome hépato-cellulaire, la métastase, l'angiome, l'hyerplasie nodulaire focale ou l'adénome. Ce n'est que lorsque l'examen n'est pas contributif qu'il convient de faire appel aux autres techniques d'examen. De même lorsque le traitement en découle, on ne peut se passer de la vérification histologique. A l'heure où un effort en économie de santé est demandé à tous, le corps médical devrait s'interroger sur la nécessité de faire plus appel à l'échographie, dans de telles affections

The multi-PDZ domain protein-1 (MUPP-1) expression regulates cellular levels of the PALS-1/PATJ polarity complex.

International audience: MUPP-1 (multi-PDZ domain protein-1) and PATJ (PALS-1-associated tight junction protein) proteins are closely related scaffold proteins and bind to many common interactors including PALS-1 (protein associated with Lin seven) a member of the Crumbs complex. Our goal is to understand how MUPP-1 and PATJ and their interaction with PALS-1 are regulated in the same cells. We have shown that in MCF10A cells there are at least two different and co-existing complexes, PALS-1/MUPP-1 and PALS-1/PATJ. Surprisingly, MUPP-1 levels inversely correlated with PATJ protein levels by acting on the stabilization of the PATJ/PALS-1 complex. Upon MUPP-1 depletion, the increased amounts of PATJ are in part localized at the migrating front of MCF10A cells and are able to recruit more PAR3 (partition defective 3). All together these data indicate that a precise balance between MUPP-1 and PATJ is achieved in epithelial cells by regulating their association with PALS-1