Potent Neutralizing Antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 Identified by High-Throughput Single-Cell Sequencing of Convalescent Patients' B Cells.

The COVID-19 pandemic urgently needs therapeutic and prophylactic interventions. Here, we report the rapid identification of SARS-CoV-2-neutralizing antibodies by high-throughput single-cell RNA and VDJ sequencing of antigen-enriched B cells from 60 convalescent patients. From 8,558 antigen-binding IgG1+ clonotypes, 14 potent neutralizing antibodies were identified, with the most potent one, BD-368-2, exhibiting an IC50 of 1.2 and 15 ng/mL against pseudotyped and authentic SARS-CoV-2, respectively. BD-368-2 also displayed strong therapeutic and prophylactic efficacy in SARS-CoV-2-infected hACE2-transgenic mice. Additionally, the 3.8 Å cryo-EM structure of a neutralizing antibody in complex with the spike-ectodomain trimer revealed the antibody's epitope overlaps with the ACE2 binding site. Moreover, we demonstrated that SARS-CoV-2-neutralizing antibodies could be directly selected based on similarities of their predicted CDR3H structures to those of SARS-CoV-neutralizing antibodies. Altogether, we showed that human neutralizing antibodies could be efficiently discovered by high-throughput single B cell sequencing in response to pandemic infectious diseases.

Large-Scale Whole-Genome Sequencing of Three Diverse Asian Populations in Singapore.

Underrepresentation of Asian genomes has hindered population and medical genetics research on Asians, leading to population disparities in precision medicine. By whole-genome sequencing of 4,810 Singapore Chinese, Malays, and Indians, we found 98.3 million SNPs and small insertions or deletions, over half of which are novel. Population structure analysis demonstrated great representation of Asian genetic diversity by three ethnicities in Singapore and revealed a Malay-related novel ancestry component. Furthermore, demographic inference suggested that Malays split from Chinese ∼24,800 years ago and experienced significant admixture with East Asians ∼1,700 years ago, coinciding with the Austronesian expansion. Additionally, we identified 20 candidate loci for natural selection, 14 of which harbored robust associations with complex traits and diseases. Finally, we show that our data can substantially improve genotype imputation in diverse Asian and Oceanian populations. These results highlight the value of our data as a resource to empower human genetics discovery across broad geographic regions.

Using off-target data from whole-exome sequencing to improve genotyping accuracy, association analysis and polygenic risk prediction.

Whole-exome sequencing (WES) has been widely used to study the role of protein-coding variants in genetic diseases. Non-coding regions, typically covered by sparse off-target data, are often discarded by conventional WES analyses. Here, we develop a genotype calling pipeline named WEScall to analyse both target and off-target data. We leverage linkage disequilibrium shared within study samples and from an external reference panel to improve genotyping accuracy. In an application to WES of 2527 Chinese and Malays, WEScall can reduce the genotype discordance rate from 0.26% (SE= 6.4 × 10-6) to 0.08% (SE = 3.6 × 10-6) across 1.1 million single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the deeply sequenced target regions. Furthermore, we obtain genotypes at 0.70% (SE = 3.0 × 10-6) discordance rate across 5.2 million off-target SNPs, which had ~1.2× mean sequencing depth. Using this dataset, we perform genome-wide association studies of 10 metabolic traits. Despite of our small sample size, we identify 10 loci at genome-wide significance (P < 5 × 10-8), including eight well-established loci. The two novel loci, both associated with glycated haemoglobin levels, are GPATCH8-SLC4A1 (rs369762319, P = 2.56 × 10-12) and ROR2 (rs1201042, P = 3.24 × 10-8). Finally, using summary statistics from UK Biobank and Biobank Japan, we show that polygenic risk prediction can be significantly improved for six out of nine traits by incorporating off-target data (P < 0.01). These results demonstrate WEScall as a useful tool to facilitate WES studies with decent amounts of off-target data.

MR-Corr2: a two-sample Mendelian randomization method that accounts for correlated horizontal pleiotropy using correlated instrumental variants.

MOTIVATION: Mendelian randomization (MR) is a valuable tool to examine the causal relationships between health risk factors and outcomes from observational studies. Along with the proliferation of genome-wide association studies, a variety of two-sample MR methods for summary data have been developed to account for horizontal pleiotropy (HP), primarily based on the assumption that the effects of variants on exposure (γ) and HP (α) are independent. In practice, this assumption is too strict and can be easily violated because of the correlated HP. RESULTS: To account for this correlated HP, we propose a Bayesian approach, MR-Corr2, that uses the orthogonal projection to reparameterize the bivariate normal distribution for γ and α, and a spike-slab prior to mitigate the impact of correlated HP. We have also developed an efficient algorithm with paralleled Gibbs sampling. To demonstrate the advantages of MR-Corr2 over existing methods, we conducted comprehensive simulation studies to compare for both type-I error control and point estimates in various scenarios. By applying MR-Corr2 to study the relationships between exposure-outcome pairs in complex traits, we did not identify the contradictory causal relationship between HDL-c and CAD. Moreover, the results provide a new perspective of the causal network among complex traits. AVAILABILITY AND IMPLEMENTATION: The developed R package and code to reproduce all the results are available at https://github.com/QingCheng0218/MR.Corr2. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.

A tissue-specific collaborative mixed model for jointly analyzing multiple tissues in transcriptome-wide association studies.

Transcriptome-wide association studies (TWASs) integrate expression quantitative trait loci (eQTLs) studies with genome-wide association studies (GWASs) to prioritize candidate target genes for complex traits. Several statistical methods have been recently proposed to improve the performance of TWASs in gene prioritization by integrating the expression regulatory information imputed from multiple tissues, and made significant achievements in improving the ability to detect gene-trait associations. Unfortunately, most existing multi-tissue methods focus on prioritization of candidate genes, and cannot directly infer the specific functional effects of candidate genes across different tissues. Here, we propose a tissue-specific collaborative mixed model (TisCoMM) for TWASs, leveraging the co-regulation of genetic variations across different tissues explicitly via a unified probabilistic model. TisCoMM not only performs hypothesis testing to prioritize gene-trait associations, but also detects the tissue-specific role of candidate target genes in complex traits. To make full use of widely available GWASs summary statistics, we extend TisCoMM to use summary-level data, namely, TisCoMM-S2. Using extensive simulation studies, we show that type I error is controlled at the nominal level, the statistical power of identifying associated genes is greatly improved, and the false-positive rate (FPR) for non-causal tissues is well controlled at decent levels. We further illustrate the benefits of our methods in applications to summary-level GWASs data of 33 complex traits. Notably, apart from better identifying potential trait-associated genes, we can elucidate the tissue-specific role of candidate target genes. The follow-up pathway analysis from tissue-specific genes for asthma shows that the immune system plays an essential function for asthma development in both thyroid and lung tissues.

Hypoxia enhances antibody-dependent dengue virus infection.

Dengue virus (DENV) has been found to replicate in lymphoid organs such as the lymph nodes, spleen, and liver in post-mortem analysis. These organs are known to have low oxygen levels (~0.5-4.5% O2) due to the vascular anatomy. However, how physiologically low levels of oxygen affect DENV infection via hypoxia-induced changes in the immune response remains unknown. Here, we show that monocytes adapted to 3% O2 show greater susceptibility to antibody-dependent enhancement of DENV infection. Low oxygen level induces HIF1α-dependent upregulation of fragment crystallizable gamma receptor IIA (FcγRIIA) as well as HIF1α-independent alterations in membrane ether lipid concentrations. The increased FcγRIIA expression operates synergistically with altered membrane composition, possibly through increase membrane fluidity, to increase uptake of DENV immune complexes for enhanced infection. Our findings thus indicate that the increased viral burden associated with secondary DENV infection is antibody-dependent but hypoxia-induced and suggest a role for targeting hypoxia-induced factors for anti-dengue therapy.

Gα-13 induces CXC motif chemokine ligand 5 expression in prostate cancer cells by transactivating NF-κB.

GNA13, the α subunit of a heterotrimeric G protein, mediates signaling through G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs). GNA13 is up-regulated in many solid tumors, including prostate cancer, where it contributes to tumor initiation, drug resistance, and metastasis. To better understand how GNA13 contributes to tumorigenesis and tumor progression, we compared the entire transcriptome of PC3 prostate cancer cells with those cells in which GNA13 expression had been silenced. This analysis revealed that GNA13 levels affected multiple CXC-family chemokines. Further investigation in three different prostate cancer cell lines singled out pro-tumorigenic CXC motif chemokine ligand 5 (CXCL5) as a target of GNA13 signaling. Elevation of GNA13 levels consistently induced CXCL5 RNA and protein expression in all three cell lines. Analysis of the CXCL5 promoter revealed that the -505/+62 region was both highly active and influenced by GNA13, and a single NF-κB site within this region of the promoter was critical for GNA13-dependent promoter activity. ChIP experiments revealed that, upon induction of GNA13 expression, occupancy at the CXCL5 promoter was significantly enriched for the p65 component of NF-κB. GNA13 knockdown suppressed both p65 phosphorylation and the activity of a specific NF-κB reporter, and p65 silencing impaired the GNA13-enhanced expression of CXCL5. Finally, blockade of Rho GTPase activity eliminated the impact of GNA13 on NF-κB transcriptional activity and CXCL5 expression. Together, these findings suggest that GNA13 drives CXCL5 expression by transactivating NF-κB in a Rho-dependent manner in prostate cancer cells.

Dynamic transcriptome changes during adipose tissue energy expenditure reveal critical roles for long noncoding RNA regulators.

Enhancing brown fat activity and promoting white fat browning are attractive therapeutic strategies for treating obesity and associated metabolic disorders. To provide a comprehensive picture of the gene regulatory network in these processes, we conducted a series of transcriptome studies by RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) and quantified the mRNA and long noncoding RNA (lncRNA) changes during white fat browning (chronic cold exposure, beta-adrenergic agonist treatment, and intense exercise) and brown fat activation or inactivation (acute cold exposure or thermoneutrality, respectively). mRNA-lncRNA coexpression networks revealed dynamically regulated lncRNAs to be largely embedded in nutrient and energy metabolism pathways. We identified a brown adipose tissue-enriched lncRNA, lncBATE10, that was governed by the cAMP-cAMP response element-binding protein (Creb) axis and required for a full brown fat differentiation and white fat browning program. Mechanistically, lncBATE10 can decoy Celf1 from Pgc1α, thereby protecting Pgc1α mRNA from repression by Celf1. Together, these studies provide a comprehensive data framework to interrogate the transcriptomic changes accompanying energy homeostasis transition in adipose tissue.

Regulation of the boundaries of accessible chromatin.

Regulatory regions maintain nucleosome-depleted, open chromatin status but simultaneously require the presence of nucleosomes for specific histone modifications. It remains unclear how these can be achieved for proper regulatory function. Here we demonstrate that nucleosomes positioned within accessible chromatin regions near the boundaries provide platforms for histone modifications while preventing the occlusion of regulatory elements. These boundary nucleosomes were particularly enriched for active or poised regulatory marks in human, such as histone acetylations, H3K4 methylations, H3K9me3, H3K79me2, and H4K20me1. Additionally, we found that based on a genome-wide profiling of ~100 recombinant yeast strains, the location of open chromatin borders tends to vary mostly within 150 bp upon genetic perturbation whereas this positional variation increases in proportion to the sequence preferences of the underlying DNA for nucleosome formation. More than 40% of the local boundary shifts were associated with genetic variation in cis- or trans-acting factors. A sizeable fraction of the identified genetic factors was also associated with nearby gene expression, which was correlated with the distance between the transcription start site (tss) and the boundary that faces the tss. Taken together, the variation in the width of accessible chromatin regions may arise in conjunction with the modulation of the boundary nucleosomes by post-translational modifications or by chromatin regulators and in association with the activity of nearby gene transcription.

SARS-CoV-2-specific T-cell responses are induced in people living with human immunodeficiency virus after booster vaccination.

BACKGROUND: T-cell-mediated immunity is crucial for the effective clearance of viral infection, but the T-cell-mediated immune responses that are induced by booster doses of inactivated severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) vaccines in people living with human immunodeficiency virus (PLWH) remain unclear. METHODS: Forty-five PLWH who had received antiretroviral therapy (ART) for more than two years and 29 healthy controls (HCs) at Beijing Youan Hospital were enrolled to assess the dynamic changes in T-cell responses between the day before the third vaccine dose (week 0) and 4 or 12 weeks (week 4 or week 12) after receiving the third dose of inactivated SARS-CoV-2 vaccine. Flow cytometry, enzyme-linked immunospot (ELISpot), and multiplex cytokines profiling were used to assess T-cell responses at the three timepoints in this study. RESULTS: The results of the ELISpot and activation-induced marker (AIM) assays showed that SARS-CoV-2-specific T-cell responses were increased in both PLWH and HCs after the third dose of the inactivated SARS-CoV-2 vaccine, and a similar magnitude of immune response was induced against the Omicron (B.1.1.529) variant compared to the wild-type strain. In detail, spike-specific T-cell responses (measured by the ELISpot assay for interferon γ [IFN-γ] release) in both PLWH and HCs significantly increased in week 4, and the spike-specific T-cell responses in HCs were significantly stronger than those in PLWH 4 weeks after the third vaccination. In the AIM assay, spike-specific CD4+ T-cell responses peaked in both PLWH and HCs in week 12. Additionally, significantly higher spike-specific CD8+ T-cell responses were induced in PLWH than in HCs in week 12. In PLWH, the release of the cytokines interleukin-2 (IL-2), tumour necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α), and IL-22 by peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) that were stimulated with spike peptides increased in week 12. In addition, the levels of IL-4 and IL-5 were higher in PLWH than in HCs in week 12. Interestingly, the magnitude of SARS-CoV-2-specific T-cell responses in PLWH was negatively associated with the extent of CD8+ T-cell activation and exhaustion. In addition, positive correlations were observed between the magnitude of spike-specific T-cell responses (determined by measuring IFN-γ release by ELISpot) and the amounts of IL-4, IL-5, IL-2 and IL-17F. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggested that SARS-CoV-2-specific T-cell responses could be enhanced by the booster dose of inactivated COVID-19 vaccines and further illustrate the importance of additional vaccination for PLWH.

Machine learning to determine relative contribution of modifiable and non-modifiable risk factors of major eye diseases.

AIMS: To use machine learning (ML) to determine the relative contributions of modifiable and non-modifiable clinical, metabolic, genetic, lifestyle and socioeconomic factors on the risk of major eye diseases. METHODS: We conducted analyses in a cross-sectional multi-ethnic population-based study (n=10 033 participants) and determined a range of modifiable and non-modifiable risk factors of common eye diseases, including diabetic retinopathy (DR), non-diabetic-related retinopathy (NDR); early and late age-related macular degeneration (AMD); nuclear, cortical and posterior subcapsular (PSC) cataract; and primary open-angle (POAG) and primary angle-closure glaucoma (PACG). Risk factors included individual characteristics, metabolic profiles, genetic background, lifestyle patterns and socioeconomic status (n~100 risk factors). We used gradient boosting machine to estimate the relative influence (RI) of each risk factor. RESULTS: Among the range of risk factors studied, the highest contributions were duration of diabetes for DR (RI=22.1%), and alcohol consumption for NDR (RI=6.4%). For early and late AMD, genetic background (RI~20%) and age (RI~15%) contributed the most. Axial length was the main risk factor of PSC (RI=30.8%). For PACG, socioeconomic factor (mainly educational level) had the highest influence (20%). POAG was the disease with the highest contribution of modifiable risk factors (cumulative RI~35%), followed by PACG (cumulative RI ~30%), retinopathy (cumulative RI between 20% and 30%) and late AMD (cumulative RI ~20%). CONCLUSION: This study illustrates the utility of ML in identifying factors with the highest contributions. Risk factors possibly amenable to interventions were intraocular pressure (IOP) and Body Mass Index (BMI) for glaucoma, alcohol consumption for NDR and levels of HbA1c for DR.

Association of Glaucoma Risk Genes with Retinal Nerve Fiber Layer in a Multi-ethnic Asian Population: The Singapore Epidemiology of Eye Diseases Study.

Purpose: Genome-wide association studies have identified several genes associated with glaucoma. However, their roles in the pathogenesis of glaucoma remain unclear, particularly their effects on retinal nerve fiber layer (RNFL) thickness. The aim of this study was to investigate the associations between the identified glaucoma risk genes and RNFL thickness. Methods: A total of 3843 participants (7,020 healthy eyes) were enrolled from the Singapore Epidemiology of Eye Diseases (SEED) study, a population-based study composing of three major ethnic groups-Malay, Indian, and Chinese-in Singapore. Ocular examinations were performed, and spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (SD-OCT) was used to measure circumpapillary RNFL thickness. We selected 35 independent glaucoma-associated genetic loci for analysis. An linear regression model was conducted to determine the association of these variants with circumpapillary RNFL, assuming an additive genetic model. We conducted association analysis in each of the three ethnic groups, followed by a meta-analysis of them. Results: The mean age of the included participants was 59.4 ± 8.9 years, and the mean RFNL thickesss is 92.3 ± 11.2 µm. In the meta-analyses, of the 35 glacuoma loci, we found that only SIX6 was significantly associated with reduction in global RNFL thickness (rs33912345; ß = -1.116 um per risk allele, P = 1.64E-05), and the effect size was larger in the inferior RNFL quadrant (ß = -2.015 µm, P = 2.9E-6), and superior RNFL quadrant (ß = -1.646 µm, P = 6.54E-5). The SIX6 association were consistently observed across all three ethnic groups. Other than RNFL, we also found several genetic varaints associated with vertical cuo-to-disc ratio (ATOH7, CDKN2B-AS1, and TGFBR3-CDC7), rim area (SIX6 and CDKN2B-AS1), and disc area (SIX6, ATOH7, and TGFBR3-CDC7). The association of SIX6 rs33912345 with NRFL thickness remained similar after further adjusting for disc area and 3 other disc parameter associated SNPs (ATOH7, CDKN2B-AS1, and TGFBR3-CDC7). Conclusions: Of the 35 glaucoma identified risk loci, only SIX6 is significantly and independently associated with thinner RNFL. Our study further supports the involvement of SIX6 with RNFL thickness and pathogensis of glaucoma.

Analysis of 47 Non-MHC Ankylosing Spondylitis Susceptibility Loci Regarding Associated Variants across Whites and Han Chinese.

OBJECTIVE: To present a systematic evaluation of 47 non-MHC ankylosing spondylitis (AS) susceptibility loci that have been initially discovered through white genome-wide association studies in Han Chinese. METHODS: Originally, 10,743 samples representing north and south Chinese in 4 datasets were obtained. After data quality control and imputation, metaanalysis results of 94,621 variants within 47 loci were extracted. Four ERAP1 single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) and HLA-B27 tag SNP rs13202464 were used for interaction analysis. Population-attributable risk percentages of AS-associated variants were compared. Functional annotations of AS-associated variants were conducted using HaploReg, RegulomeDB, and rVarBase databases. RESULTS: We revealed 16 AS-associated variants with nominal evidence in Han Chinese, including rs10865331 (p = 6.30 × 10-10), rs10050860 (p = 4.09 × 10-5) and rs8070463 (p = 1.03 × 10-4). Potential susceptible SNP within these 47 loci were also identified, such as rs13024541 (2p15), rs17401719 (5q15), and rs62074054 (17q21). Epistatic interactions between 3 ERAP1 SNP (rs17401719, rs30187, and rs10050860) and HLA-B27 were confirmed. Among the 16 AS-associated variants, rs30187 showed weaker risk effect, while rs10050860 and rs12504282 seemed to attribute more risk in Han Chinese than in whites. Further genomic annotation pinpointed 35 candidate functional SNP, especially in the 2p15, ERAP1, and NPEPPS-TBKBP1 regions. CONCLUSION: Our results provided a detailed spectrum of all the reported non-MHC AS susceptibility loci in Han Chinese, which comprehensively exhibited the ethnic heterogeneity of AS susceptibility and highlighted that 2p15, ERAP1, and NPEPPS-TBKBP1 regions may play a critical role in AS pathogenesis across diverse populations.

Common variants in SOX-2 and congenital cataract genes contribute to age-related nuclear cataract.

Nuclear cataract is the most common type of age-related cataract and a leading cause of blindness worldwide. Age-related nuclear cataract is heritable (h2 = 0.48), but little is known about specific genetic factors underlying this condition. Here we report findings from the largest to date multi-ethnic meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies (discovery cohort N = 14,151 and replication N = 5299) of the International Cataract Genetics Consortium. We confirmed the known genetic association of CRYAA (rs7278468, P = 2.8 × 10-16) with nuclear cataract and identified five new loci associated with this disease: SOX2-OT (rs9842371, P = 1.7 × 10-19), TMPRSS5 (rs4936279, P = 2.5 × 10-10), LINC01412 (rs16823886, P = 1.3 × 10-9), GLTSCR1 (rs1005911, P = 9.8 × 10-9), and COMMD1 (rs62149908, P = 1.2 × 10-8). The results suggest a strong link of age-related nuclear cataract with congenital cataract and eye development genes, and the importance of common genetic variants in maintaining crystalline lens integrity in the aging eye.

Antibody-Dependent Dengue Virus Entry Modulates Cell Intrinsic Responses for Enhanced Infection.

Dengue is caused by infection with any one of four dengue viruses (DENV); the risk of severe disease appears to be enhanced by the cross-reactive or subneutralizing levels of antibody from a prior DENV infection. These antibodies opsonize DENV entry through the activating Fc gamma receptors (FcγR), instead of infection through canonical receptor-mediated endocytosis, to result in higher levels of DENV replication. However, whether the enhanced replication is solely due to more efficient FcγR-mediated DENV entry or is also through FcγR-mediated alteration of the host transcriptome response to favor DENV infection remains unclear. Indeed, more efficient viral entry through activation of the FcγR can result in an increased viral antigenic load within target cells and confound direct comparisons of the host transcriptome response under antibody-dependent and antibody-independent conditions. Herein, we show that, despite controlling for the viral antigenic load in primary monocytes, the antibody-dependent and non-antibody-dependent routes of DENV entry induce transcriptome responses that are remarkably different. Notably, antibody-dependent DENV entry upregulated DENV host dependency factors associated with RNA splicing, mitochondrial respiratory chain complexes, and vesicle trafficking. Additionally, supporting findings from other studies, antibody-dependent DENV entry impeded the downregulation of ribosomal genes caused by canonical receptor-mediated endocytosis to increase viral translation. Collectively, our findings support the notion that antibody-dependent DENV entry alters host responses that support the viral life cycle and that host responses to DENV need to be defined in the context of its entry pathway.IMPORTANCE Dengue virus is the most prevalent mosquito-borne viral infection globally, resulting in variable manifestations ranging from asymptomatic viremia to life-threatening shock and multiorgan failure. Previous studies have indicated that the risk of severe dengue in humans can be increased by a specific range of preexisting anti-dengue virus antibody titers, a phenomenon termed antibody-dependent enhancement. There is hence a need to understand how antibodies augment dengue virus infection compared to the alternative canonical receptor-mediated viral entry route. Herein, we show that, besides facilitating viral uptake, antibody-mediated entry increases the expression of early host dependency factors to promote viral infection; these factors include RNA splicing, mitochondrial respiratory chain complexes, vesicle trafficking, and ribosomal genes. These findings will enhance our understanding of how differences in entry pathways can affect host responses and offer opportunities to design therapeutics that can specifically inhibit antibody-dependent enhancement of dengue virus infection.

Exploring the underlying biology of intrinsic cardiorespiratory fitness through integrative analysis of genomic variants and muscle gene expression profiling.

Intrinsic cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) is defined as the level of CRF in the sedentary state. There are large individual differences in intrinsic CRF among sedentary adults. The physiology of variability in CRF has received much attention, but little is known about the genetic and molecular mechanisms that impact intrinsic CRF. These issues were explored in the present study by interrogating intrinsic CRF-associated DNA sequence variation and skeletal muscle gene expression data from the HERITAGE Family Study through an integrative bioinformatics guided approach. A combined analytic strategy involving genetic association, pathway enrichment, tissue-specific network structure, cis-regulatory genome effects, and expression quantitative trait loci was used to select and rank genes through a variation-adjusted weighted ranking scheme. Prioritized genes were further interrogated for corroborative evidence from knockout mouse phenotypes and relevant physiological traits from the HERITAGE cohort. The mean intrinsic V̇o2max was 33.1 ml O2·kg-1·min-1 (SD = 8.8) for the sample of 493 sedentary adults. Suggestive evidence was found for gene loci related to cardiovascular physiology (ATE1, CASQ2, NOTO, and SGCG), hematopoiesis (PICALM, SSB, CA9, and CASQ2), skeletal muscle phenotypes (SGCG, DMRT2, ADARB1, and CASQ2), and metabolism (ATE1, PICALM, RAB11FIP5, GBA2, SGCG, PRADC1, ARL6IP5, and CASQ2). Supportive evidence for a role of several of these loci was uncovered via association between DNA variants and muscle gene expression levels with exercise cardiovascular and muscle physiological traits. This initial effort to define the underlying molecular substrates of intrinsic CRF warrants further studies based on appropriate cohorts and study designs, complemented by functional investigations. NEW & NOTEWORTHY Intrinsic cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) is measured in the sedentary state and is highly variable among sedentary adults. The physiology of variability in intrinsic cardiorespiratory fitness has received much attention, but little is known about the genetic and molecular mechanisms that impact intrinsic CRF. These issues were explored computationally in the present study, with further corroborative evidence obtained from analysis of phenotype data from knockout mouse models and human cardiovascular and skeletal muscle measurements.

Culturing functional pancreatic islets on α5-laminins and curative transplantation to diabetic mice.

The efficacy of islet transplantation for diabetes treatment suffers from lack of cadaver-derived islets, islet necrosis and long transfer times prior to transplantation. Here, we developed a method for culturing mouse and human islets in vitro on α5-laminins, which are natural components of islet basement membranes. Adhering islets spread to form layers of 1-3 cells in thickness and remained normoxic and functional for at least 7 days in culture. In contrast, spherical islets kept in suspension developed hypoxia and central necrosis within 16 h. Transplantation of 110-150 mouse islets cultured on α5-laminin-coated polydimethylsiloxane membranes for 3-7 days normalized blood glucose already within 3 days in mice with streptozotocin-induced diabetes. RNA-sequencing of isolated and cultured mouse islets provided further evidence for the adhesion and spreading achieved with α5-laminin. Our results suggest that use of such in vitro expanded islets may significantly enhance the efficacy of islet transplantation treatment for diabetes.

The effect of Bacopa monnieri on gene expression levels in SH-SY5Y human neuroblastoma cells.

Bacopa monnieri is a plant used as a nootropic in Ayurveda, a 5000-year-old system of traditional Indian medicine. Although both animal and clinical studies supported its role as a memory enhancer, the molecular and cellular mechanism underlying Bacopa's nootropic action are not understood. In this study, we used deep sequencing (RNA-Seq) to identify the transcriptome changes upon Bacopa treatment on SH-SY5Y human neuroblastoma cells. We identified several genes whose expression levels were regulated by Bacopa. Biostatistical analysis of the RNA-Seq data identified biological pathways and molecular functions that were regulated by Bacopa, including regulation of mRNA translation and transmembrane transport, responses to oxidative stress and protein misfolding. Pathway analysis using the Ingenuity platform suggested that Bacopa may protect against brain damage and improve brain development. These newly identified molecular and cellular determinants may contribute to the nootropic action of Bacopa and open up a new direction of investigation into its mechanism of action.

Loss of tumor suppressor KDM6A amplifies PRC2-regulated transcriptional repression in bladder cancer and can be targeted through inhibition of EZH2.

Trithorax-like group complex containing KDM6A acts antagonistically to Polycomb-repressive complex 2 (PRC2) containing EZH2 in maintaining the dynamics of the repression and activation of gene expression through H3K27 methylation. In urothelial bladder carcinoma, KDM6A (a H3K27 demethylase) is frequently mutated, but its functional consequences and therapeutic targetability remain unknown. About 70% of KDM6A mutations resulted in a total loss of expression and a consequent loss of demethylase function in this cancer type. Further transcriptome analysis found multiple deregulated pathways, especially PRC2/EZH2, in KDM6A-mutated urothelial bladder carcinoma. Chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing analysis revealed enrichment of H3K27me3 at specific loci in KDM6A-null cells, including PRC2/EZH2 and their downstream targets. Consequently, we targeted EZH2 (an H3K27 methylase) and demonstrated that KDM6A-null urothelial bladder carcinoma cell lines were sensitive to EZH2 inhibition. Loss- and gain-of-function assays confirmed that cells with loss of KDM6A are vulnerable to EZH2. IGFBP3, a direct KDM6A/EZH2/H3K27me3 target, was up-regulated by EZH2 inhibition and contributed to the observed EZH2-dependent growth suppression in KDM6A-null cell lines. EZH2 inhibition delayed tumor onset in KDM6A-null cells and caused regression of KDM6A-null bladder tumors in both patient-derived and cell line xenograft models. In summary, our study demonstrates that inactivating mutations of KDM6A, which are common in urothelial bladder carcinoma, are potentially targetable by inhibiting EZH2.

Differentiation of Human Embryonic Stem Cells to Endothelial Progenitor Cells on Laminins in Defined and Xeno-free Systems.

A major hurdle for in vitro culturing of primary endothelial cells (ECs) is that they readily dedifferentiate, hampering their use for therapeutic applications. Human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) may provide an unlimited cell source; however, most current protocols deriving endothelial progenitor cells (EPCs) from hESCs use direct differentiation approaches albeit on undefined matrices, yet final yields are insufficient. We developed a method to culture monolayer hESCs on stem cell niche laminin (LN) LN511 or LN521 matrix. Here, we report a chemically defined, xeno-free protocol for differentiation of hESCs to EPCs using LN521 as the main culture substrate. We were able to generate ∼95% functional EPCs defined as VEGFR2+CD34+CD31+VE-Cadherin+. RNA-sequencing analyses of hESCs, EPCs, and primary human umbilical vein endothelial cells showed differentiation-related EC expression signatures, regarding basement membrane composition, cell-matrix interactions, and changes in endothelial lineage markers. Our results may facilitate production of stable ECs for the treatment of vascular diseases and in vitro cell modeling.