Noninvasive twin genotyping for recessive monogenic disorders by relative haplotype dosage.

OBJECTIVE: To establish a haplotype-based noninvasive prenatal testing (NIPT) workflow for single-gene recessive disorders that adapt to dizygotic (DZ) twin pregnancies. METHOD: Twin pregnancies at risk of Duchenne muscular dystrophy, Becker muscular dystrophy, hemophilia B, spinal muscular atrophy, phenylketonuria, and nonsyndromic hearing loss were recruited. For subsequent analysis, capture sequencing targeting highly heterozygotic single nucleotide polymorphism sites was conducted. Paternal-specific alleles were used to calculate the total and individual fetal fractions and determine zygosity. A two-step Bayes Factor model was applied to clarify the complex genomic landscape in the maternal plasma: the first step involved determining whether the twins inherited the same haplotype, and the second step involved estimating their individual genotypes. NIPT results were subsequently confirmed by invasive diagnosis. RESULTS: Nine twin pregnancies were recruited, including five DZ and four monozygotic (MZ) twins. The earliest gestational age was 8+0 weeks, and the minimum fetal fraction was 4.6%. Three twin pregnancies were reported with one affected fetus, while the remaining six were reported without affected fetuses. Two dichorionic diamniotic twin pregnancies were confirmed to be MZ twins. The NIPT results were 100% consistent with those of invasive procedures or diagnostic genetic testing after birth. CONCLUSION: This study is the first to perform NIPT for single-gene disorders in twin pregnancies and preliminarily confirm its clinical feasibility. Acknowledging the twins' genotypes in the first trimester is valuable as it empowers obstetric care providers and parents to have adequate time for pregnancy management and decision-making.

First-trimester noninvasive prenatal diagnosis of seven facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy type 1 families using SNP-based amplicon sequencing: An earlier, rapid and safer way.

The study is to explore the feasibility and value of SNP-based noninvasive prenatal diagnosis (NIPD) for facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy type 1 (FSHD1) in early pregnancy weeks. We prospectively collected seven FSHD1 families, with an average gestational age of 8+6. Among these seven couples, there were three affected FSHD1 mothers and four affected fathers. A multiplex-PCR panel comprising 402 amplicons was designed to selective enrich for highly heterozygous SNPs upstream of the DUX4 gene. Risk haplotype was constructed based on familial linkage analysis. Fetal genotypes were accurately inferred through relative haplotype dosage analysis using Bayes Factor. All tests were successfully completed in a single attempt, and no recombination events were detected. NIPD results were provided within a week, which is 4 weeks earlier than karyomapping and 7 weeks earlier than Bionano single-molecule optical mapping (BOM). Ultimately, five FSHD1 fetuses and two normal fetuses were successfully identified, with a 100% concordance rate with karyomapping and BOM. Therefore, SNP-based NIPD for FSHD1 was demonstrated to be feasible and accurate in early weeks of gestation, although the risk of recombination events cannot be completely eliminated. In the future, testing of more cases is still necessary to fully determine the clinical utility.

Exploring factors impacting haplotype-based noninvasive prenatal diagnosis for single-gene recessive disorders.

Haplotype-based noninvasive prenatal diagnosis (NIPD) is applicable for various recessive single-gene disorders in proband families. However, a comprehensive exploration of critical factors influencing the assay performance, such as fetal fraction, informative single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) count, and recombination events, has yet to be performed. It is critical to identify key factors affecting NIPD performance, including its accuracy and success rate, and their impact on clinical diagnostics to guide clinical practice. We conducted a prospective study, recruiting 219 proband families with singleton pregnancies at risk for eight recessive single-gene disorders (Duchenne muscular dystrophy, spinal muscular atrophy, phenylketonuria, methylmalonic acidemia, hemophilia A, hemophilia B, non-syndromic hearing loss, and congenital adrenal hyperplasia) at 7-14 weeks of gestation. Haplotype-based NIPD was performed by evaluating the relative haplotype dosage (RHDO) in maternal circulation, and the results were validated via invasive prenatal diagnosis or newborn follow-ups. Among the 219 families, the median gestational age at first blood draw was 8+5 weeks. Initial testing succeeded for 190 families and failed for 29 due to low fetal fraction (16), insufficient informative SNPs (9), and homologous recombination near pathogenic variation (4). Among low fetal fraction families, successful testing was achieved for 11 cases after a redraw, while 5 remained inconclusive. Test failures linked to insufficient informative SNPs correlated with linkage disequilibrium near the genes, with F8 and MMUT exhibiting the highest associated failure rates (14.3% and 25%, respectively). Homologous recombination was relatively frequent around the DMD and SMN1 genes (8.8% and 4.8%, respectively) but led to detection failure in only 44.4% (4/9) of such cases. All NIPD results from the 201 successful families were consistent with invasive diagnostic findings or newborn follow-up. Fetal fraction, informative SNPs count, and homologous recombination are pivotal to NIPD performance. Redrawing blood effectively improves the success rate for low fetal fraction samples. However, informative SNPs count and homologous recombination rates vary significantly across genes, necessitating careful consideration in clinical practice. We have designed an in silico method based on linkage disequilibrium data to predict the number of informative SNPs. This can identify genomic regions where there might be an insufficient number of SNPs, thereby guiding panel design. With these factors properly accounted for, NIPD is highly accurate and reliable.

Haplotype-based noninvasive prenatal diagnosis of methylmalonic acidemia and the discovery of a recurrent pathogenic haplotype associated with c.609G>A.

BACKGROUND: Early diagnosis and intervention are crucial for the prognosis of methylmalonic acidemia (MMA). However, research focused on early prenatal diagnosis of MMA is limited. METHODS: A 161.89kb capture panel was designed for selectively enriching highly heterozygous SNPs. Fetal genotypes were inferred using relative haplotype dosage (RHDO) and Bayes factor, followed by invasive prenatal diagnosis (IPD) for validation. A core pathogenic haplotype associated with c.609G>A was identified based on the frequency differences between pathogenic and normal haplotypes. RESULTS: We recruited 41 pregnancies at risk of MMA with a median gestational age of 8+2  weeks. The assay success rate of NIPD-MMA for maternal variants was 92.7% (38/41), and after incorporating the paternal result, the overall assay success rate reached 100% (41/41). All NIPD results were concordant with IPD. Notably, a core haplotype (hap_2), comprising 28 SNPs, demonstrates significant enrichment within pathogenic haplotypes bearing the c.609G>A variation. On average, c.609G>A carriers had 22.38 heterozygous loci within these 28 SNPs. CONCLUSION: NIPD-MMA presents a viable choice for early, accurate, and safe prenatal diagnosis. Furthermore, the discovery of the recurrent core pathogenic haplotype provides a novel approach for haplotype phasing and has the potential for realizing proband-independent NIPD in the future.

Testing of a novel multi-branch horizontal well remediation technology for in situ remediation of contaminated soil and groundwater.

Soil and groundwater contamination has become a key issue in urban redevelopment. It is particularly difficult to use heavy equipment for the remediation of restricted sites or areas contaminated by factories that are still in operation. In this case, horizontal wells are considered a potentially useful technology as they can potentially remediate contamination areas located below buildings and other surface/subsurface obstacles. This research first introduces the principles and advantages and disadvantages of direct push injection, improved slant well, high-pressure rotary jet technology, horizontal reactive media treatment wells, and horizontal directional drilling well. The key aspects for promising in-situ remediation techniques were summarized as remediation well design, remediation agent injection technology and drill pipe and well wall sealing technology. Based on the requirements for key technologies, a novel multi-branch horizontal well in-situ remediation process was proposed, which integrates vertical/horizontal directional drilling, rotary injection, and expansion sealing techniques, and relevant supporting drilling and injecting equipment were developed. A bench test and field test were conducted to test drilling tool performance, drilling accuracy, and injection radius of influence. The results showed that the developed supporting drilling tool met the process requirements and could complete multi-branch horizontal well remediation engineering construction. The deviation between the measured depth and the design depth of the multi-branch horizontal well constructed using this technology was less than 9%, and the deviation between the depth displayed by the guidance instrument and the measured depth was less than 1%. The injection radius of influence in the test field measured from the monitoring wells was greater than or equal to 5 m. The results of this research can provide an effective method for the remediation of contaminated sites.

Noninvasive prenatal testing of Duchenne muscular dystrophy in a twin gestation.

PURPOSE: Haplotype-based assay has been proved efficient in noninvasive prenatal testing for various monogenic disorders in singleton pregnancies. However, its application in twin pregnancies is still blank. Here we provide a novel algorithmic approach to noninvasively assess fetal genotypes in a dizygotic twin pregnancy at risk for Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD). METHODS: One pregnant woman carrying a dizygotic twin gestation was recruited as she was a heterozygote of DMD gene duplication and has delivered an affected son. Construction of parental haplotypes was achieved by target sequencing of DNA samples from the parent and the proband. Single nucleotide polymorphisms within target regions were classified into six categories according to parental haplotypes. Individual fetal fractions were calculated using paternal heterozygous. Maternal-inherited haplotype was deduced using relative haplotype dosage through a two-step Bayesian model. RESULTS: One male fetus with a lower fetal fraction of 4.6% and one female fetus with a higher fetal fraction of 10.1% were observed. The male fetus was predicted to be a DMD pathogenic variant carrier, while the female fetus was predicted to be homozygous normal. Noninvasive prenatal testing (NIPT) results were concordant with the findings of invasive prenatal diagnosis. CONCLUSIONS: This study is the first report of the use of NIPT for the assessment of DMD in a twin pregnancy. The algorithm provided could expand the use of NIPT to monogenic disorders in dizygotic twin pregnancies.

Wear Behaviors of AISI 4145H Drilling Tool Steel under Drilling Fluid Environment Conditions.

4145H steel is a commonly used material for downhole tools. However, up to now the wear behavior of 4145H drilling tool steel under real drilling fluid environment conditions is still not clear. In this work, this was investigated using a modified ASTM B611 rubber ring wet grinding test system, in which six kinds of abrasives (talc, dolomite or fluorite, as well as their mixed abrasive with quartz) with metal hardness-to-abrasive hardness ratios (H/HA) ranging from 0.25 to 6.25 were used in the drilling fluid for experiments. The results show that the H/HA value determined the wear mechanism of 4145H steel. When a single soft abrasive was used (with H/HA higher than 1.3-1.5), polishing was the dominantly observed mechanism. While mixed abrasives were applied, a microcutting mechanism due to the ploughing of hard abrasive particles on the steel surface was also observed. The increase in mass fraction of the soft abrasives has little effect on the wear rate of 4145H steel, but its wear rate will significantly increase as the mass fraction of hard abrasives increases. Therefore, in order to extend the life of drilling tools and reduce downhole accidents, the mass fraction of hard particles in the drilling fluid should be reduced as much as possible.

Haplotype-Based Noninvasive Prenatal Diagnosis of 21 Families With Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy: Real-World Clinical Data in China.

Noninvasive prenatal diagnosis (NIPD) of single-gene disorders has recently become the focus of clinical laboratories. However, reports on the clinical application of NIPD of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) are limited. This study aimed to evaluate the detection performance of haplotype-based NIPD of DMD in a real clinical environment. Twenty-one DMD families at 7-12 weeks of gestation were prospectively recruited. DNA libraries of cell-free DNA from the pregnant and genomic DNA from family members were captured using a custom assay for the enrichment of DMD gene exons and spanning single-nucleotide polymorphisms, followed by next-generation sequencing. Parental haplotype phasing was based on family linkage analysis, and fetal genotyping was inferred using the Bayes factor through target maternal plasma sequencing. Finally, the entire experimental process was promoted in the local clinical laboratory. We recruited 13 complete families, 6 families without paternal samples, and 2 families without probands in which daughter samples were collected. Two different maternal haplotypes were constructed based on family members in all 21 pedigrees at as early as 7 gestational weeks. Among the included families, the fetal genotypes of 20 families were identified at the first blood collection, and a second blood collection was performed for another family due to low fetal concentration. The NIPD result of each family was reported within 1 week. The fetal fraction in maternal cfDNA ranged from 1.87 to 11.68%. In addition, recombination events were assessed in two fetuses. All NIPD results were concordant with the findings of invasive prenatal diagnosis (chorionic villus sampling or amniocentesis). Exon capture and haplotype-based NIPD of DMD are regularly used for DMD genetic diagnosis, carrier screening, and noninvasive prenatal diagnosis in the clinic. Our method, haplotype-based early screening for DMD fetal genotyping via cfDNA sequencing, has high feasibility and accuracy, a short turnaround time, and is inexpensive in a real clinical environment.

[Progress of research on induced pluripotent stem cell models for Down syndrome].

With an incidence of 1/800 - 1/600, Down syndrome (DS) is the most common chromosomal disorder in humans. Whilst most DS patients has trisomy 21, a small proportion may carry translocations or mosaicisms involving chromosome 21. The main characteristics of DS include mental retardation, peculiar facies, growth retardation, congenital heart disease, duodenal stenosis, Alzheimer's disease, leukemia, and immunodeficiency, which may be due to increased dosage of critical genes. Recent studies also showed that epigenetic changes may also occur in DS. For research on patients with DS or other trisomies have been restricted by ethical considerations, and commonly used mouse models cannot fully replicate the characteristic features of DS, pluripotent stem cells induced from fetal samples or biopsy tissues from DS patients may generate models with the same genetic content, which may provide idea materials for studying the pathogenesis of DS and customized cell and/or gene therapies.

Rapid prenatal diagnosis of Facioscapulohumeral Muscular Dystrophy 1 by combined Bionano optical mapping and karyomapping.

PURPOSE: To explore the feasibility of performing rapid prenatal diagnoses of FSHD1 using a combination of Bianano optical mapping and linkage-based karyomapping. METHODS: DNA specimens from a family that had been previously diagnosed with FSHD1 using Southern Blot analysis were used for this study. Genetic diagnosis of the proband, fetus chorionic amniotic fluid, and aborted fetal tissue was performed using Bianano optical mapping (BOM) together with linkage-based karyomapping. RESULTS: BOM analysis showed that the proband's 4q35.2 region contained four D4Z4 repeats and the 4qA permissible allele, consistent with the previous FSHD1 diagnosis obtained by Southern Blotting. BOM analysis of the fetus' 4q35.2 region was consistent with that of the proband. Karyomap analysis revealed that the fetus inherited the affected chromosome segment from the proband. After genetic counseling, the couple choose termination of pregnancy, and we performed gene diagnosis of the abortus tissue by BOM. CONCLUSIONS: Bianano optical mapping can determine the number of D4Z4 repeats and exclude interference of the 10q26.3 homologous region, and in combination with karyomapping, can be used for rapid and accurate prenatal diagnosis of FSHD1.

Genetic analysis of 1051 Chinese families with Duchenne/Becker Muscular Dystrophy.

BACKGROUND: Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD) is the most common muscle disease in children, and there are no effective therapies for DMD or Becker Muscular Dystrophy (BMD). Currently, targeted gene therapy treatments have emerged. As a result, genetic diagnosis is the basis of treatment. In addition, genetic and prenatal diagnosis significantly reduces their incidence rates. This study combines the application of multiplex ligation-dependent probe amplification technology (MLPA) and "next-generation" sequencing technology (NGS) as the most economical and efficient method of diagnosis. Therefore, in the diagnosis of DMD/BMD, patients' MLPA data are first used to detect DMD gene deletions or duplications, and NGS and Sanger sequencing are then applied to exclude MLPA-negative samples. Meanwhile, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is used to detect single exon deletions to exclude false-positives in MLPA caused by point mutations. METHODS: In this study, we recruited 1051 proband families of DMD from 2016 to 2018 and had access to information that could identify individual participants during or after data collection. Patients who were diagnosed with DMD were first tested by MLPA. MLPA results with single exon deletions were validated with PCR amplification and Sanger sequencing. The negative results of MLPA were further analysed with NGS and validated by Sanger sequencing. For novel missense mutations, phenotype-genotype correlations were analysed using PolyPhen2 and mutation taster. All methods were performed in accordance with the relevant guidelines and regulations. RESULTS: DMD mutations were identified in 1029 families (97.91%, 1029/1051). Large deletions, duplications, and small mutations accounted for 70.41% (740/1051), 8.28% (87/1051), and 19.12% (201/1051) of all cases, respectively. There were 205 small mutation types, 53 of which were novel. The rate of de novo mutations was 39.45% (187/474) and was higher in large duplications (49.53%, 157/317). Among 68 asymptomatic patients (< 3 years old) with unexplained persistent hyperCKaemia upon conventional physical examination, 63 were diagnosed as DMD/BMD according to genetic diagnosis. CONCLUSION: Our results expand the spectrum of DMD mutations, which could contribute to the treatment of DMD/BMD and provide an effective diagnosis method. Thus, the combination of MLPA, NGS and Sanger sequencing is of great significance for family analysis, gene diagnosis and gene therapy.

[Application of Karyomapping for the prenatal diagnosis of five families affected with facioscapulohumerial muscular dystrophy type 1].

OBJECTIVE: To assess the value of Karyomapping for the prenatal diagnosis of facioscapulohumerial muscular dystrophy type 1 (FSHD1). METHODS: Peripheral blood and chorionic villi samples were collected from five families affected with FSHD1. Linkage-based diagnosis was carried out by using the Karyomapping method. Diagnosis for two fetal samples was carried out with the next-generation optical mapping system. RESULTS: The results of Karyomapping showed that three fetuses inherited the risky 4q35 region of the proband and two fetuses did not. The fetuses of families 1 and 2 received further diagnosis by the next-generation optical mapping system, and the results were consistent with those of Karyomapping. CONCLUSION: Karyomapping has enabled prenatal diagnosis for the five families affected with FSHD1. The method was faster and simpler compared with conventional strategies, though its feasibility still needs further validation. Since there were no SNP loci designed on the Karyomap chip for the DUX4 gene and its 3' flanking regions, misjudgment due to chromosomal recombination could not be completely eliminated. The accuracy of this method still needs further validation.