ZBTB18 regulates cytokine expression and affects microglia/macrophage recruitment and commitment in glioblastoma.

Glioma associated macrophages/microglia (GAMs) play an important role in glioblastoma (GBM) progression, due to their massive recruitment to the tumor site and polarization to a tumor promoting phenotype. GAMs secrete a variety of cytokines, which facilitate tumor cell growth and invasion, and prevent other immune cells from mounting an immune response against the tumor. Here, we demonstrate that zinc finger and BTB containing domain 18 (ZBTB18), a transcriptional repressor with tumor suppressive function in glioblastoma, impairs the production of key cytokines, which function as chemoattractant for GAMs.

A summary of the main themes and findings presented at the ASM Intermountain Branch meeting (2024).

The annual meeting for the Intermountain Branch was held in April 2024 on the campus of Brigham Young University. There were 127 branch members from Utah, Idaho, and Nevada who attended the meeting and were composed of undergraduate students, graduate or medical students, and faculty. This report highlights the diversity of, and the emerging trends in, the research conducted by American Society for Microbiology members in the Intermountain Branch.

Effectiveness of combined first-line medical treatment in acromegaly with prolactin cosecretion.

Objective: The aim of this study is to compare the response to first-line medical treatment in treatment-naive acromegaly patients with pure growth hormone (GH)-secreting pituitary adenoma (GH-PA) and those with GH and prolactin cosecreting PA (GH&PRL-PA).

Design: This is a retrospective multicentric study of acromegaly patients followed from 2003 to 2023 in 33 tertiary Spanish hospitals with at least 6 months of first-line medical treatment.

Methods: Baseline characteristics, first-line medical treatment strategies, and outcomes were analyzed.

Adrenal incidentalomas, cortisol secretion and cancer: is there a real crosstalk?

Background: Cortisol has immunomodulatory effects that increase the risk and evolution of several diseases. Cancer is characterized by a proinflammatory state in which cells exert impaired function and proliferation. The relation between cortisol secretion and increased risk of malignant neoplasm, or their behavior, has not been fully elucidated.

Level of agreement between midwives and obstetricians performing ultrasound examination during labor.

Objective: To evaluate the level of agreement between ultrasound measurements to evaluate fetal head position and progress of labor by attending midwives and obstetricians after appropriate training.

Methods: In this prospective study, women in the first stage of labor giving birth to a single baby in cephalic presentation at our Obstetric Unit between March 2018 and December 2019 were invited to participate; 109 women agreed. Transperineal and transabdominal ultrasound was independently performed by a trained midwife and an obstetrician.

PI3K/AKT signaling allows for MAPK/ERK pathway independency mediating dedifferentiation-driven treatment resistance in melanoma.

Background: Current therapeutic management of advanced melanoma patients largely depends on their BRAF mutation status. However, the vast heterogeneity of the tumors hampers the success of therapies targeting the MAPK/ERK pathway alone. Dissecting this heterogeneity will contribute to identifying key players in the oncogenic progression to tailor more effective therapies.

Individual-specific levels of CTG•CAG somatic instability are shared across multiple tissues in myotonic dystrophy type 1.

Myotonic dystrophy type 1 is a complex disease caused by a genetically unstable CTG repeat expansion in the 3'-untranslated region of the DMPK gene. Age-dependent, tissue-specific somatic instability has confounded genotype-phenotype associations, but growing evidence suggests that it also contributes directly toward disease progression. Using a well-characterized clinical cohort of DM1 patients from Costa Rica, we quantified somatic instability in blood, buccal cells, skin and skeletal muscle.

Dynamic transcriptome analysis reveals signatures of paradoxical effect of vemurafenib on human dermal fibroblasts.

Background: Vemurafenib (PLX4032) is one of the most frequently used treatments for late-stage melanoma patients with the BRAF mutation; however, acquired resistance to the drug poses as a major challenge. It remains to be determined whether off-target effects of vemurafenib on normal stroma components could reshape the tumor microenvironment in a way that contributes to cancer progression and drug resistance.

Methods: By using temporally-resolved RNA- and ATAC-seq, we studied the early molecular changes induced by vemurafenib in human dermal fibroblast (HDF), a main stromal component in melanoma and other tumors with high prevalence of BRAF mutations.

Myotonic dystrophy type 1 (DM1) clinical subtypes and CTCF site methylation status flanking the CTG expansion are mutant allele length-dependent.

Myotonic dystrophy type 1 (DM1) is a complex disease with a wide spectrum of symptoms. The exact relationship between mutant CTG repeat expansion size and clinical outcome remains unclear. DM1 congenital patients (CDM) inherit the largest expanded alleles, which are associated with abnormal and increased DNA methylation flanking the CTG repeat.

Aerial strategies advance volcanic gas measurements at inaccessible, strongly degassing volcanoes.

Volcanic emissions are a critical pathway in Earth's carbon cycle. Here, we show that aerial measurements of volcanic gases using unoccupied aerial systems (UAS) transform our ability to measure and monitor plumes remotely and to constrain global volatile fluxes from volcanoes. Combining multi-scale measurements from ground-based remote sensing, long-range aerial sampling, and satellites, we present comprehensive gas fluxes-3760 ± [600, 310] tons day CO and 5150 ± [730, 340] tons day SO-for a strong yet previously uncharacterized volcanic emitter: Manam, Papua New Guinea.

Longitudinal increases in somatic mosaicism of the expanded CTG repeat in myotonic dystrophy type 1 are associated with variation in age-at-onset.

In myotonic dystrophy type 1 (DM1), somatic mosaicism of the (CTG)n repeat expansion is age-dependent, tissue-specific and expansion-biased. These features contribute toward variation in disease severity and confound genotype-to-phenotype analyses. To investigate how the (CTG)n repeat expansion changes over time, we collected three longitudinal blood DNA samples separated by 8-15 years and used small pool and single-molecule PCR in 43 DM1 patients.

Analysis of mutational dynamics at the DMPK (CTG)n locus identifies saliva as a suitable DNA sample source for genetic analysis in myotonic dystrophy type 1.

Genotype-to-phenotype correlation studies in myotonic dystrophy type 1 (DM1) have been confounded by the age-dependent, tissue-specific and expansion-biased features of somatic mosaicism of the expanded CTG repeat. Previously, we showed that by controlling for the confounding effects of somatic instability to estimate the progenitor allele CTG length in blood DNA, age at onset correlations could be significantly improved. To determine the suitability of saliva DNA as a source for genotyping, we used small pool-PCR to perform a detailed quantitative study of the somatic mutational dynamics of the CTG repeat in saliva and blood DNA from 40 DM1 patients.

Ozonesonde Quality Assurance: The JOSIE-SHADOZ (2017) Experience.

The ozonesonde is a small balloon-borne instrument that is attached to a standard radiosonde to measure profiles of ozone from the surface to 35 km with ~100-m vertical resolution. Ozonesonde data constitute a mainstay of satellite calibration and are used for climatologies and analysis of trends, especially in the lower stratosphere where satellites are most uncertain. The electrochemical-concentration cell (ECC) ozonesonde has been deployed at ~100 stations worldwide since the 1960s, with changes over time in manufacture and procedures, including details of the cell chemical solution and data processing.

Candidate gene study reveals DRD1 and DRD2 as putative interacting risk factors for youth depression.

Alterations in the monoaminergic neurotransmission systems are suspected to be involved in the etiology of neuropsychiatric disorders, including depression. The role of these pathways in the risk of developing depressive symptoms during childhood or adolescence is still not completely clear. This study sought to identify putative genetic factors in genes of serotonergic and dopaminergic systems modulating the level of manifestation of depressive symptoms in children and adolescents.

A polymorphism in the MSH3 mismatch repair gene is associated with the levels of somatic instability of the expanded CTG repeat in the blood DNA of myotonic dystrophy type 1 patients.

Somatic mosaicism of the expanded CTG repeat in myotonic dystrophy type 1 is age-dependent, tissue-specific and expansion-biased, contributing toward the tissue-specificity and progressive nature of the symptoms. Previously, using regression modelling of repeat instability we showed that variation in the rate of somatic expansion in blood DNA contributes toward variation in age of onset, directly implicating somatic expansion in the disease pathway. Here, we confirm these results using a larger more genetically homogenous Costa Rican DM1 cohort (p<0.

Unmanned aerial mass spectrometer systems for in-situ volcanic plume analysis.

Technology advances in the field of small, unmanned aerial vehicles and their integration with a variety of sensor packages and instruments, such as miniature mass spectrometers, have enhanced the possibilities and applications of what are now called unmanned aerial systems (UAS). With such technology, in situ and proximal remote sensing measurements of volcanic plumes are now possible without risking the lives of scientists and personnel in charge of close monitoring of volcanic activity. These methods provide unprecedented, and otherwise unobtainable, data very close in space and time to eruptions, to better understand the role of gas volatiles in magma and subsequent eruption products.

Mitochondrial impact of human immunodeficiency virus and antiretrovirals on infected pediatric patients with or without lipodystrophy.

We determined the mitochondrial status of a group of HIV-infected children, some with body fat abnormalities (BFA). We included 24 controls, 16 HIV-infected untreated, 26 HIV-infected treated, 6 BFA-untreated, and 21 BFA-treated patients. Genetic, translational, and functional mitochondrial values were measured.

Analysis technique for asymmetrically coupled resonator structures.

Asymmetrical acoustically coupled structures are present in several acoustic applications. Specifically when they are used in filter design, some configurations provide unexplored and special response characteristics with high selectivity and relatively wide bandwidths. The relationships between geometries, configurations, and response specifications do not rely on a direct link.

Long-term outcomes in patients with schizophrenia treated with risperidone long-acting injection or oral antipsychotics in Spain: results from the electronic Schizophrenia Treatment Adherence Registry (e-STAR).

Background: The electronic Schizophrenia Treatment Adherence Registry (e-STAR) is a prospective, observational study of patients with schizophrenia designed to evaluate long-term treatment outcomes in routine clinical practice.

Methods: Parameters were assessed at baseline and at 3 month intervals for 2 years in patients initiated on risperidone long-acting injection (RLAI) (n=1345) or a new oral antipsychotic (AP) (n=277; 35.7% and 36.

Equivalent circuit modeling of coupled resonator filters.

Using the stacked crystal filter (SCF) concept, a coupled resonator filter (CRF) can be interpreted as a device in which 2 piezoresonators are stacked on top of each other in such a way that a certain degree of acoustic interaction occurs. The work presented in this paper reports a novel all-electrical model for the CRF. The model associates acoustical coupling with an equivalent electrical coupling between resonators.

[Informal caretakers in Spain, their profile and care provided].

The authors carried out a systematic search in main data bases and a methodological content review by paired authors about selected publications. The authors reviewed and analyzed 332 articles about informal caretakers and they chose 182 which complied with their selection criteria. The profile for informal caretakers of persons aged over 65 in Spain is identified as well as the type of care he/she provides.

Resource consumption and costs of palliative care services in Spain: a multicenter prospective study.

Patients (n=395) with terminal-stage cancer receiving attention from palliative care services (PCSs) were recruited over a period of 15 consecutive days from 171 participating PCS units. Resource consumption and costs were evaluated for 16 weeks of follow-up, and the findings were compared with a study conducted in 1992 so as to assess change over time. The most frequent health care interventions were homecare visits, hospital admissions, and patient-consultant phone calls.

Discovery of a cool planet of 5.5 Earth masses through gravitational microlensing.

In the favoured core-accretion model of formation of planetary systems, solid planetesimals accumulate to build up planetary cores, which then accrete nebular gas if they are sufficiently massive. Around M-dwarf stars (the most common stars in our Galaxy), this model favours the formation of Earth-mass (M(o)) to Neptune-mass planets with orbital radii of 1 to 10 astronomical units (au), which is consistent with the small number of gas giant planets known to orbit M-dwarf host stars. More than 170 extrasolar planets have been discovered with a wide range of masses and orbital periods, but planets of Neptune's mass or less have not hitherto been detected at separations of more than 0.