Cerebrospinal fluid biomarkers as predictors of multiple sclerosis severity.

Background: Prognostic biomarkers at multiple sclerosis (MS) onset to predict disease severity may help guide initial therapy selection for people with MS. Over 20 disease-modifying treatments (DMTs) of varying levels of risk and efficacy now exist. The ability to predict MS severity would help to identify those patients at higher risk where a highly effective, but potentially risky, therapy would be optimal.

A single-cell compendium of human cerebrospinal fluid identifies disease-associated immune cell populations.

Single-cell transcriptomics applied to cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) for elucidating the pathophysiology of neurologic diseases has produced only a preliminary characterization of CSF immune cells. CSF derives from and borders central nervous system (CNS) tissue, allowing for comprehensive accounting of cell types along with their relative abundance and immunologic profiles relevant to CNS diseases. Using integration techniques applied to publicly available datasets in combination with our own studies, we generated a compendium with 139 subjects encompassing 135 CSF and 58 blood samples.

A core glycolipid vaccine elicits cross-reactive antibodies against Salmonella spp. and protects against invasive nontyphoidal Salmonella disease in mice.

Background: Enteric fever caused by Salmonella enterica serovars Typhi and Paratyphi A in addition to gastroenteritis and invasive disease, predominantly attributable to nontyphoidal Salmonella serovars Typhimurium and Enteritidis, are major causes of death and disability across the globe. A broad-spectrum vaccine that protects against disease caused by typhoidal and nontyphoidal serovars of Salmonella is not available for humans but would prevent a considerable burden of disease worldwide.

Methods: We previously developed a broad-spectrum vaccine for Gram-negative bacteria that is based on the inner core domain of detoxified Escherichia coli O111, Rc (J5) mutant lipooligosaccharide, a highly conserved antigen across Gram-negative bacteria, complexed with an outer membrane protein of group B Neisseria meningitidis.

Patterns of the left thalamus embedding into the connectome associated with reading skills in children with reading disabilities.

We examined how thalamocortical connectivity structure reflects children's reading performance. Diffusion-weighted MRI at 3 T and a series of reading measures were collected from 64 children (33 girls) ages 8-14 years with and without dyslexia. The topological properties of the left and right thalamus were computed based on the whole-brain white matter network and a hub-attached reading network, and were correlated with scores on several tests of children's reading and reading-related abilities.