Evaluation on the use of Nanopore sequencing for direct characterization of coronaviruses from respiratory specimens, and a study on emerging missense mutations in partial RdRP gene of SARS-CoV-2.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has been a catastrophic burden to global healthcare systems. The fast spread of the etiologic agent, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), highlights the need to identify unknown coronaviruses rapidly for prompt clinical and public health decision making. Moreover, owing to the high mutation rate of RNA viruses, periodic surveillance on emerging variants of key virus components is essential for evaluating the efficacy of antiviral drugs, diagnostic assays and vaccines.

Target fluorescence in-situ hybridization (Target FISH) for plasma cell enrichment in myeloma.

Background: Cytogenetic abnormalities are important prognostic markers in plasma cell myeloma (PCM) and detection is routinely performed by interphase fluorescence in-situ hybridization (FISH) with a panel of probes after enrichment of the plasma cells in the bone marrow specimen. Cell sorting by immunomagnetic beads and concurrent labeling of the cytoplasmic immunoglobulin are the usual enrichment methods. We present an alternative method of plasma cell enrichment termed Target FISH, which is an automated system that combines the images of May-Grünwald- Giemsa (MGG) staining and FISH study on the same plasma cell for analysis.