Hematopoietic expression of a chimeric murine-human CALR oncoprotein allows the assessment of anti-CALR antibody immunotherapies in vivo.

Myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPNs) are characterized by a pathologic expansion of myeloid lineages. Mutations in JAK2, CALR and MPL genes are known to be three prominent MPN disease drivers. Mutant CALR (mutCALR) is an oncoprotein that interacts with and activates the thrombopoietin receptor (MPL) and represents an attractive target for targeted therapy of CALR mutated MPN.

Engineering AvidCARs for combinatorial antigen recognition and reversible control of CAR function.

T cells engineered to express chimeric antigen receptors (CAR-T cells) have shown impressive clinical efficacy in the treatment of B cell malignancies. However, the development of CAR-T cell therapies for solid tumors is hampered by the lack of truly tumor-specific antigens and poor control over T cell activity. Here we present an avidity-controlled CAR (AvidCAR) platform with inducible and logic control functions.

The COPD Knowledge Base: enabling data analysis and computational simulation in translational COPD research.

Background: Previously we generated a chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) specific knowledge base (http://www.copdknowledgebase.eu) from clinical and experimental data, text-mining results and public databases.

Survey criteria for fibromyalgia independently predict increased postoperative opioid consumption after lower-extremity joint arthroplasty: a prospective, observational cohort study.

Background: Variance in pain after total knee and hip arthroplasty may be due to a number of procedural and peripheral factors but also, in some individuals, to aberrant central pain processing as is described in conditions like fibromyalgia. To test this hypothesis, the authors conducted a prospective, observational cohort study of patients undergoing lower-extremity joint arthroplasty.

Methods: Five hundred nineteen patients were preoperatively phenotyped using validated self-reported pain questionnaires, psychological measures, and health information.