Impact of community mask mandates on SARS-CoV-2 transmission in Ontario after adjustment for differential testing by age and sex.

Mask use for prevention of respiratory infectious disease transmission is not new but has proven controversial during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. In Ontario, Canada, irregular regional introduction of community mask mandates in 2020 created a quasi-experiment useful for evaluating the impact of such mandates; however, Ontario SARS-CoV-2 case counts were likely biased by testing focused on long-term care facilities and healthcare workers. We developed a regression-based method that allowed us to adjust cases for under-testing by age and gender. We evaluated mask mandate effects using count-based regression models with either unadjusted cases, or testing-adjusted case counts, as dependent variables. Models were used to estimate mask mandate effectiveness, and the fraction of SARS-CoV-2 cases, severe outcomes, and costs, averted by mask mandates. Models using unadjusted cases as dependent variables identified modest protective effects of mask mandates (range 31-42%), with variable statistical significance. Mask mandate effectiveness in models predicting test-adjusted case counts was higher, ranging from 49% (95% CI 44-53%) to 76% (95% CI 57-86%). The prevented fraction associated with mask mandates was 46% (95% CI 41-51%), with 290,000 clinical cases, 3,008 deaths, and loss of 29,038 quality-adjusted life years averted from 2020 June to December, representing $CDN 610 million in economic wealth. Under-testing in younger individuals biases estimates of SARS-CoV-2 infection risk and obscures the impact of public health preventive measures. After adjustment for under-testing, mask mandates emerged as highly effective. Community masking saved substantial numbers of lives, and prevented economic costs, during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic in Ontario, Canada.

Obesity-induced dysregulation of skin-resident PPARγ+ Treg cells promotes IL-17A-mediated psoriatic inflammation.

Obesity is a major risk factor for psoriasis, but how obesity disrupts the regulatory mechanisms that keep skin inflammation in check is unclear. Here, we found that skin was enriched with a unique population of CD4+Foxp3+ regulatory T (Treg) cells expressing the nuclear receptor peroxisome proliferation-activated receptor gamma (PPARγ). PPARγ drove a distinctive transcriptional program and functional suppression of IL-17A+ γδ T cell-mediated psoriatic inflammation. Diet-induced obesity, however, resulted in a reduction of PPARγ+ skin Treg cells and a corresponding loss of control over IL-17A+ γδ T cell-mediated inflammation. Mechanistically, PPARγ+ skin Treg cells preferentially took up elevated levels of long-chain free fatty acids in obese mice, which led to cellular lipotoxicity, oxidative stress, and mitochondrial dysfunction. Harnessing the anti-inflammatory properties of these PPARγ+ skin Treg cells could have therapeutic potential for obesity-associated inflammatory skin diseases.

Relative pandemic severity in Canada and four peer nations during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic.

Background: National responses to the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic have been highly variable. We sought to explore the effectiveness of the Canadian pandemic response up to May 2022 relative to responses in four peer countries with similar political, economic and health systems, and with close historical and cultural ties to Canada. Methods: We used reported age-specific mortality data to generate estimates of pandemic mortality standardized to the Canadian population. Age-specific case fatality, hospitalization, and intensive care admission probabilities for the Canadian province of Ontario were applied to estimated deaths, to calculate hospitalizations and intensive care admissions averted by the Canadian response. Health impacts were valued in both monetary terms, and in terms of lost quality-adjusted life years. Results: We estimated that the Canadian pandemic response averted 94,492, 64,306 and 13,641 deaths relative to the responses of the United States, United Kingdom and France, respectively, and more than 480,000 hospitalizations relative to the United States. The United States pandemic response, if applied to Canada, would have resulted in more than $40 billion in economic losses due to healthcare expenditures and lost quality-adjusted life years. In contrast, an Australian pandemic response applied to Canada would have averted over 28,000 additional deaths and averted nearly $9 billion in costs. Conclusion: Canada outperformed several peer countries that aimed for mitigation rather than elimination of SARS-CoV-2 in the first two years of the pandemic, with substantial numbers of lives saved and economic costs averted. However, a comparison with Australia demonstrated that an elimination focus would have saved Canada tens of thousands of lives as well as substantial economic costs.

Human sebum extract induces barrier disruption and cytokine expression in murine epidermis.

BACKGROUND: Previous studies have shown that human sebum may play a role in barrier function but with much debate. OBJECTIVE: To elucidate the effects of human sebum on skin barrier function. METHODS: We used hairless mouse skin to study the functional and morphological alternation of epidermis after the application of human sebum. RESULTS: The results showed a significant increase in transepidermal water loss and erythema value, and a decrease in skin hydration, accompanied by epidermal hyperplasia with parakeratosis following sebum application. Nile red staining together with electron microscopic examination confirmed the underlying mechanisms for sebum-induced barrier disruption are related directly to the interaction of sebum with the intracellular lipid lamellae of the SC, thereby leading to the increase in the fluidity of SC intracellular lipids as demonstrated by ATR-FTIR measurement. An inflammatory reaction characterized by an enhanced cytokine cascade, including up-regulation of TNF-α, IL-1α and IL-6, was also observed. On the other hand, there were insignificant expression of thymic stromal lymphopoietin and unchanged serum levels of IgE, suggesting non-immunogenic stimulation by sebum treatment. CONCLUSION: It may be concluded that inflammation induced by excess amount of sebum is more likely an irritant contact dermatitis rather than an allergic one. Moreover, these findings implicated possible relationships between sebum, irritant contact dermatitis, and seborrheic dermatitis.

Differential motion dynamics of synaptic vesicles undergoing spontaneous and activity-evoked endocytosis.

Synaptic vesicle exo- and endocytosis are usually driven by neuronal activity but can also occur spontaneously. The identity and differences between vesicles supporting evoked and spontaneous neurotransmission remain highly debated. Here we combined nanometer-resolution imaging with a transient motion analysis approach to examine the dynamics of individual synaptic vesicles in hippocampal terminals under physiological conditions. We found that vesicles undergoing spontaneous and stimulated endocytosis differ in their dynamic behavior, particularly in the ability to engage in directed motion. Our data indicate that such motional differences depend on the myosin family of motor proteins, particularly myosin II. Analysis of synaptic transmission in the presence of myosin II inhibitor confirmed a specific role for myosin II in evoked, but not spontaneous, neurotransmission and also suggested a functional role of myosin II-mediated vesicle motion in supporting vesicle mobilization during neural activity.

A quantum gas microscope for detecting single atoms in a Hubbard-regime optical lattice.

Recent years have seen tremendous progress in creating complex atomic many-body quantum systems. One approach is to use macroscopic, effectively thermodynamic ensembles of ultracold atoms to create quantum gases and strongly correlated states of matter, and to analyse the bulk properties of the ensemble. For example, bosonic and fermionic atoms in a Hubbard-regime optical lattice can be used for quantum simulations of solid-state models. The opposite approach is to build up microscopic quantum systems atom-by-atom, with complete control over all degrees of freedom. The atoms or ions act as qubits and allow the realization of quantum gates, with the goal of creating highly controllable quantum information systems. Until now, the macroscopic and microscopic strategies have been fairly disconnected. Here we present a quantum gas 'microscope' that bridges the two approaches, realizing a system in which atoms of a macroscopic ensemble are detected individually and a complete set of degrees of freedom for each of them is determined through preparation and measurement. By implementing a high-resolution optical imaging system, single atoms are detected with near-unity fidelity on individual sites of a Hubbard-regime optical lattice. The lattice itself is generated by projecting a holographic mask through the imaging system. It has an arbitrary geometry, chosen to support both strong tunnel coupling between lattice sites and strong on-site confinement. Our approach can be used to directly detect strongly correlated states of matter; in the context of condensed matter simulation, this corresponds to the detection of individual electrons in the simulated crystal. Also, the quantum gas microscope may enable addressing and read-out of large-scale quantum information systems based on ultracold atoms.

Unconditional preparation of entanglement between atoms in cascaded optical cavities.

We propose a scheme to unconditionally entangle the internal states of atoms trapped in separate high-finesse optical cavities. The scheme uses the technique of quantum reservoir engineering in a cascaded cavity-QED setting, and for ideal (lossless) coupling between the cavities generates an entangled pure state. Highly entangled states are also shown to be possible for realizable cavity-QED parameters and with nonideal coupling.

Predicting hepatitis B virus-positive metastatic hepatocellular carcinomas using gene expression profiling and supervised machine learning.

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is one of the most common and aggressive human malignancies. Its high mortality rate is mainly a result of intra-hepatic metastases. We analyzed the expression profiles of HCC samples without or with intra-hepatic metastases. Using a supervised machine-learning algorithm, we generated for the first time a molecular signature that can classify metastatic HCC patients and identified genes that were relevant to metastasis and patient survival. We found that the gene expression signature of primary HCCs with accompanying metastasis was very similar to that of their corresponding metastases, implying that genes favoring metastasis progression were initiated in the primary tumors. Osteopontin, which was identified as a lead gene in the signature, was over-expressed in metastatic HCC; an osteopontin-specific antibody effectively blocked HCC cell invasion in vitro and inhibited pulmonary metastasis of HCC cells in nude mice. Thus, osteopontin acts as both a diagnostic marker and a potential therapeutic target for metastatic HCC.

Laser capture microdissection and microarray expression analysis of lung adenocarcinoma reveals tobacco smoking- and prognosis-related molecular profiles.

Recent expression profile analyses revealed that lung adenocarcinomas can be divided into several subgroups with diverse pathological features. Because cellular heterogeneity of tumors can confound these analyses, we used laser capture microdissection and microarray expression analysis to characterize the molecular profiles of lung adenocarcinomas. We found 45 genes delineating smokers and nonsmokers that were located at chromosomal loci frequently altered in non-small cell lung cancers, and 27 genes, which were differentially expressed between survivors and nonsurvivors 5 years after surgery. These results are consistent with the hypothesis that the abnormal expression of genes involved in maintaining the mitotic spindle checkpoint and genomic stability, e.g., hBUB3, hZW10, and APC2, contribute to the molecular pathogenesis and tumor progression of tobacco smoke-induced adenocarcinoma of the lung.