LA-GEM: imputation of gene expression with incorporation of Local Ancestry.

Gene imputation and TWAS have become a staple in the genomics medicine discovery space; helping to identify genes whose regulation effects may contribute to disease susceptibility. However, the cohorts on which these methods are built are overwhelmingly of European Ancestry. This means that the unique regulatory variation that exist in non-European populations, specifically African Ancestry populations, may not be included in the current models.

Leveraging drug perturbation to reveal genetic regulators of hepatic gene expression in African Americans.

Expression quantitative locus (eQTL) studies have paved the way in identifying genetic variation impacting gene expression levels. African Americans (AAs) are disproportionately underrepresented in eQTL studies, resulting in a lack of power to identify population-specific regulatory variants especially related to drug response. Specific drugs are known to affect the biosynthesis of drug metabolism enzymes as well as other genes.

Multi-Omics Studies in Historically Excluded Populations: The Road to Equity.

Over the past few decades, genomewide association studies (GWASs) have identified the specific genetics variants contributing to many complex diseases by testing millions of genetic variations across the human genome against a variety of phenotypes. However, GWASs are limited in their ability to uncover mechanistic insight given that most significant associations are found in non-coding region of the genome. Furthermore, the lack of diversity in studies has stymied the advance of precision medicine for many historically excluded populations.

Balancing selection maintains ancient polymorphisms at conserved enhancers for the olfactory receptor genes of a Chinese marine fish.

The study of balancing selection, as a selective force maintaining adaptive genetic variation in gene pools longer than expected by drift, is currently experiencing renewed interest due to the increased availability of new data, methods of analysis, and case studies. In this investigation, evidence of balancing selection operating on conserved enhancers of the olfactory receptor (OR) genes is presented for the Chinese sleeper (Bostrychus sinensis), a coastal marine fish that is emerging as a model species for evolutionary studies in the Northwest Pacific marginal seas. Coupled with tests for Gene Ontology enrichment and transcription factor binding, population genomic data allow for the identification of an OR cluster in the sleeper with a downstream flanking region containing three enhancers that are conserved with human and other fish species.

Correction : Characterization of hybridization within a secondary contact region of the inshore fish, Bostrychus sinensis, in the East China Sea.

Following the publication of this article, the authors have requested that the Acknowledgements section be amended to thank Weidi Yang for his assistance with their Bostrychus sinensis photograph that was chosen for the front cover of the January 2018 issue of the journal. This error has been corrected in both the PDF and HTML versions of the paper. Also, the legends for Supplementary Figures 1 and 2 were not posted online.

Diversity and Dynamics of "Candidatus Endobugula" and Other Symbiotic Bacteria in Chinese Populations of the Bryozoan, Bugula neritina.

Bugula neritina is a common invasive cosmopolitan bryozoan that harbors (like many sessile marine invertebrates) a symbiotic bacterial (SB) community. Among the SB of B. neritina, "Candidatus Endobugula sertula" continues to receive the greatest attention, because it is the source of bryostatins.

Pantoea intestinalis sp. nov., isolated from the human gut.

A novel bacterial strain, 29Y89BT, was isolated from a faecal sample of a healthy human subject. Cells were Gram-stain-negative, motile, non-spore-forming and rod-shaped. Strain 29Y89BT formed cream-coloured colonies 2 mm in diameter on trypticase soy agar and showed optimum growth at 35 °C.