IgG Study of Blood Sera of Patients with COVID-19.

The COVID-19 pandemic, which began at the end of 2019 in Wuhan, has affected 220 countries and territories to date. In the present study, we studied humoral immunity in samples of the blood sera of COVID-19 convalescents of varying severity and patients who died due to this infection, using native SARS-CoV-2 and its individual recombinant proteins. The cross-reactivity with SARS-CoV (2002) was also assessed. We used infectious and inactivated SARS-CoV-2/human/RUS/Nsk-FRCFTM-1/2020 strain, inactivated SARS-CoV strain (strain Frankfurt 1, 2002), recombinant proteins, and blood sera of patients diagnosed with COVID-19. The blood sera from patients were analyzed by the Virus Neutralization test, Immunoblotting, and ELISA. The median values and mean ± SD of titers of specific and cross-reactive antibodies in blood sera tested in ELISA were mainly distributed in the following descending order: N > trimer S > RBD. ELISA and immunoblotting revealed a high cross-activity of antibodies specific to SARS-CoV-2 with the SARS-CoV antigen (2002), mainly with the N protein. The presence of antibodies specific to RBD corresponds with the data on the neutralizing activity of blood sera. According to the neutralization test in a number of cases, higher levels of antibodies that neutralize SARS-CoV-2 were detected in blood serum taken from patients several days before their death than in convalescents with a ranging disease severity. This high level of neutralizing antibodies specific to SARS-CoV-2 in the blood sera of patients who subsequently died in hospital from COVID-19 requires a thorough study of the role of humoral immunity as well as comorbidity and other factors affecting the humoral response in this disease.

New variants in the BRCA1 gene in Buryat Mongol breast cancer patients: Report from two families.

BACKGROUND: The BRCA1 mutations that are endemic to the Slavic population of Russia have not been identified among indigenous peoples, including the Buryats, Tuvinians and Altaians with hereditary breast cancer. OBJECTIVE: This study was aimed to identify the mutations that are responsible for the occurrence of hereditary breast cancer in the indigenous population of the Republic of Buryatia. METHODS: Mutations in the BRCA1 gene were identified in blood samples by Sanger-based sequencing. RESULTS: We identified 11 polymorphisms (10 SNPs and 1 Indel) and 6 new unclassified sequence variants in the BRCA1 gene. In our study three new sequence variants (c.321T>A, c.366T>A, c.4357+2T>A) were found in position of previously described polymorphisms in dbSNPs: rs80357544 (c.321delT), rs190900046 (c.366T>G), and rs80358152 (c.4357+2T>C), respectively. Other three new sequence variants (c.3605A>G, c.1998A>C, and c.80+13A>C) have not been previously described in dbSNP, BIC and Human Gene Mutation Databases. CONCLUSIONS: We described six new sequence variants that have never been published in the literature or databases. Further studies are required to confirm the impact of new sequence variants on the risk of breast cancer in the Buryat Mongol population.