Following a recent dramatic increase in illegal fishing by Indonesian fishing vessels in Australian waters in 2022, we conducted an extensive survey of coral reef communities covering 33,000 m at Mermaid Reef Marine Park in the Rowley Shoals off north-western Australia in July 2022. Species richness of sea cucumbers was 13 species (three CITES listed) and 6 species of giant clams (all CITES listed). The most abundant sea cucumber species were the low or intermediate value, asexually reproducing species Holothuria atra and H.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Advanced paternal age (APA) is associated with adverse outcomes to offspring health, including increased risk for neurodevelopmental disorders. The aim of this study was to investigate the methylome and transcriptome of the first two early embryonic tissue lineages, the inner cell mass (ICM) and the trophectoderm (TE), from human blastocysts in association with paternal age and disease risk. High quality human blastocysts were donated with patient consent from donor oocyte IVF cycles from either APA (≥ 50 years) or young fathers.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAneuploidy frequently arises during human meiosis and is the primary cause of early miscarriage and in vitro fertilization (IVF) failure. Individuals undergoing IVF exhibit significant variability in aneuploidy rates, although the exact genetic causes of the variability in aneuploid egg production remain unclear. Preimplantation genetic testing for aneuploidy (PGT-A) using next-generation sequencing is a standard test for identifying and selecting IVF-derived euploid embryos.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground/objectives: Sinonasal inverted papilloma (IP) is a rare but serious diagnosis, with a paucity of patient-centred information regarding this condition. As more patients are seeking healthcare information online, the quality and comprehensibility of this information becomes ever more important. The aim of the study was to investigate the readability and quality of websites on inverted papilloma.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFChildren and adolescents can present to the emergency department with acute agitation and aggression due to various physical and/or mental health conditions. With acute agitation/aggression, these patients may present a risk of injury to themselves, their caregivers, or emergency department providers/staff. It is imperative for providers to understand how to safely care for these children.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Aneuploidy, the state of a cell containing extra or missing chromosomes, frequently arises during human meiosis and is the primary cause of early miscarriage and maternal age-related in vitro fertilization (IVF) failure. IVF patients exhibit significant variability in aneuploidy rates, although the exact genetic causes of the variability in aneuploid egg production remain unclear. Preimplantation genetic testing for aneuploidy (PGT-A) using ultra-low coverage whole-genome sequencing (ulc-WGS) is a standard test for identifying and selecting IVF-derived embryos with a normal chromosome complement.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe aim of this study was to characterize a large set of full segmental aneuploidies identified in trophectoderm (TE) biopsies and evaluate concordance in human blastocysts. Full segmental aneuploid errors were identified in TE biopsies (n = 2766) from preimplantation genetic testing for aneuploid (PGT-A) cycles. Full segmental deletions (n = 1872; 66.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOvarian aging precedes that of any other mammalian organ and is the primary cause of female age-related infertility. The biological mechanisms responsible for ovarian aging remain unclear. Previous studies have been limited by their use of bulk RNA-sequencing, which masks the dynamic and heterogeneous nature of the ovary.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Children's exposure to toxic stress (e.g., parental depression, violence, poverty) predicts developmental and physical health problems resulting in health care system burden.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: To investigate how endogenously elevated DNA fragmentation alters the human sperm proteome, and whether this fragmentation contributes to genomic deletions.
Design: Research study.
Setting: Commercial fertility clinic.
AbstractCrown-of-thorns sea stars ( sp.) are among the most studied coral reef organisms, owing to their propensity to undergo major population irruptions, which contribute to significant coral loss and reef degradation throughout the Indo-Pacific. However, there are still important knowledge gaps pertaining to the biology, ecology, and management of sp.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: To investigate the biological networks associated with DOR in young women and the subsequent molecular impact on preimplantation embryos.
Methods: Whole peripheral blood was collected from patients: young women presenting with diminished ovarian reserve (DOR) and age-matched young women with normal ovarian reserve. Maternal exome sequencing was performed on the NovaSEQ 6000 and sequencing validation was completed using Taqman® SNP Genotyping Assays.
Objective: To evaluate the epigenetic consequence of a prolonged disease state of infertility in euploid blastocysts.
Design: Methylome analysis as well as targeted imprinted methylation and expression analysis on individual human euploid blastocysts examined in association with duration of patient infertility and time to live birth.
Setting: Research study.
Coral reefs in the tropical Pacific region are exposed to a range of anthropogenic local pressures. Climate change is exacerbating local impacts, causing unprecedented declines in coral reef habitats and bringing negative socio-economic consequences to Pacific communities who depend heavily on coral reefs for food, income and livelihoods. Continued increases in greenhouse gas emissions will drive future climate change, which will accelerate coral reef degradation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOn coral reefs, changes in the cover and relative abundance of hard coral taxa often follow disturbance. Although the ecological responses of common coral taxa have been well documented, little is known about the ecological responses of uncommon coral taxa or of coral morphological groups across multiple adjacent reef zones. We used Multivariate Auto-Regressive State-Space modelling to assess the rate and direction of change of hard coral cover across a variety of coral genera, growth forms, and susceptibility to bleaching and physical damage covering multiple reef zones at northern Ningaloo Reef in Western Australia.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPaternal aging and the prevalence of neurodevelopmental disorders in offspring are well documented. Yet, the underlying mechanism and the mode of inheritance have not been conclusively established. Advancing paternal age is a subtle and varying phenotype.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Human papilloma virus (HPV)-positive oropharyngeal cancer carries a good prognosis when managed with primary chemoradiotherapy. However, the dramatically increasing rate of this disease means more patients are now developing recurrence, with surgery remaining the mainstay of treatment. Despite this, there is no agreed technique for excision of recurrent oropharyngeal cancer.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMetastatic disease to the parotid lymph nodes typically occurs secondary to head and neck and cutaneous squamous cell carcinomas (SCC). Nasal septal SCC is an exceedingly rare primary cancer that rarely spreads to regional lymph nodes. A 39-year-old man presented with left-sided cervical lymphadenopathy and nasal polyposis.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAims: One-third of DCM patients experience ventricular tachycardia (VT), but a clear biological basis for this has not been established. The purpose of this study was to identify transcriptome signatures and enriched pathways in the hearts of dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) patients with VT.
Methods And Results: We used RNA-sequencing in explanted heart tissue from 49 samples: 19 DCM patients with VT, 16 DCM patients without VT, and 14 non-failing controls.
Unlabelled: Dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) is a leading cause of heart failure, sudden cardiac death and heart transplant. DCM is inherited in approximately 50% of cases, in which the most frequent genetic defects are truncation variants of the titin gene (tv). encodes titin, which is the largest protein in the body and is an essential component of the sarcomere.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFOne of the most robust metrics for assessing the effectiveness of protected areas is the temporal trend in the abundance of the species they are designed to protect. We surveyed coral-reef fish and living hard coral in and adjacent to a sanctuary zone (SZ: where all forms of fishing are prohibited) in the World Heritage-listed Ningaloo Marine Park during a 10-year period. There were generally more individuals and greater biomass of many fish taxa (especially emperors and parrotfish) in the SZ than the adjacent recreation zone (RZ: where recreational fishing is allowed) - so log response ratios of abundance were usually positive in each year.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Am Coll Cardiol
September 2019
Background: Genotype-phenotype correlations in dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) and, in particular, the effects of gene variants on clinical outcomes remain poorly understood.
Objectives: The purpose of this study was to investigate the prognostic role of genetic variant carrier status in a large cohort of DCM patients.
Methods: A total of 487 DCM patients were analyzed by next-generation sequencing and categorized the disease genes into functional gene groups.
Many factors affect learning outcomes, however studies comparing the effectiveness of different clinical teaching methods are limited. We utilize the list of influences on educational achievement compiled by John Hattie to inform a meta-analysis of learning effect sizes (ESs) associated with teaching-learning factors (TLFs) in clinical education. A literature search was conducted in PubMed to identify articles examining clinically relevant TLFs.
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