Metagenome-informed metaproteomics of the human gut microbiome, host, and dietary exposome uncovers signatures of health and inflammatory bowel disease.

Host-microbiome-dietary interactions play crucial roles in regulating human health, yet their direct functional assessment remains challenging. We adopted metagenome-informed metaproteomics (MIM), in mice and humans, to non-invasively explore species-level microbiome-host interactions during commensal and pathogen colonization, nutritional modification, and antibiotic-induced perturbation. Simultaneously, fecal MIM accurately characterized the nutritional exposure landscape in multiple clinical and dietary contexts.

Systems-level immunomonitoring in children with solid tumors to enable precision medicine.

Cancer is the leading cause of death from disease in children. Survival depends not only on surgery, cytostatic drugs, and radiation but also on systemic immune responses. Factors influencing these immune responses in children of different ages and tumor types are unknown.

Structural and functional analysis of the Nipah virus polymerase complex.

Nipah virus (NiV) is a bat-borne, zoonotic RNA virus that is highly pathogenic in humans. The NiV polymerase, which mediates viral genome replication and mRNA transcription, is a promising drug target. We determined the cryoelectron microscopy (cryo-EM) structure of the NiV polymerase complex, comprising the large protein (L) and phosphoprotein (P), and performed structural, biophysical, and in-depth functional analyses of the NiV polymerase.

Parental origin of transgene modulates amyloid-β plaque burden in the 5xFAD mouse model of Alzheimer's disease.

In Alzheimer's disease (AD) research, the 5xFAD mouse model is commonly used as a heterozygote crossed with other genetic models to study AD pathology. We investigated whether the parental origin of the 5xFAD transgene affects plaque deposition. Using quantitative light-sheet microscopy, we found that paternal inheritance of the transgene led to a 2-fold higher plaque burden compared with maternal inheritance, a finding consistent across multiple 5xFAD colonies.

Conjoint specification of action by neocortex and striatum.

The interplay between two major forebrain structures-cortex and subcortical striatum-is critical for flexible, goal-directed action. Traditionally, it has been proposed that striatum is critical for selecting what type of action is initiated, while the primary motor cortex is involved in specifying the continuous parameters of an upcoming/ongoing movement. Recent data indicate that striatum may also be involved in specification.

Glioma-induced alterations in excitatory neurons are reversed by mTOR inhibition.

Gliomas are aggressive neoplasms that diffusely infiltrate the brain and cause neurological symptoms, including cognitive deficits and seizures. Increased mTOR signaling has been implicated in glioma-induced neuronal hyperexcitability, but the molecular and functional consequences have not been identified. Here, we show three types of changes in tumor-associated neurons: (1) downregulation of transcripts encoding excitatory and inhibitory postsynaptic proteins and dendritic spine development and upregulation of cytoskeletal transcripts via neuron-specific profiling of ribosome-bound mRNA, (2) marked decreases in dendritic spine density via light and electron microscopy, and (3) progressive functional alterations leading to neuronal hyperexcitability via in vivo calcium imaging.

Closed-loop modulation of remote hippocampal representations with neurofeedback.

Humans can remember specific remote events without acting on them and influence which memories are retrieved based on internal goals. However, animal models typically present sensory cues to trigger memory retrieval and then assess retrieval based on action. Thus, it is difficult to determine whether measured neural activity patterns relate to the cue(s), the memory, or the behavior.

Social behavior: A tiny fish with prodigious skills.

Identifying new organisms that allow linking brain-wide circuit dynamics to complex adaptive behaviors is an ongoing challenge. A new study has demonstrated that Danionella cerebrum - a miniature teleost fish - is capable of multimodal sensory discrimination and displays oxytocin-dependent social interaction, thus opening the way for a wide range of detailed circuit investigations.

Cognitive neuroscience: How the brain navigates abstract task spaces.

Humans and other animals learn the abstract structure of a task and then use this structure to rapidly generalize to new situations. A recent study reveals how the brain builds and uses abstract task representations.

Itch.

A camping trip will quickly become unpleasant if a horde of mosquitoes descends while you pitch your tent, or you find yourself in a patch of poison oak. Whether due to an insect bite, a poisonous plant, or a chronic skin disease, everyone has experienced the urgent sensation of itch and the sweet relief of scratching. The itch-scratch cycle is so powerful that just reading about itch or seeing someone scratching elicits a strong desire to scratch.

Iberian ribbed newts.

Matheson et al. introduce the Iberian ribbed newt (Pleurodeles waltl), a species of salamander that lives some of its adult life on land and some in water, requiring remarkable physiological and behavioral plasticity to adapt to these very different environments.

There is no "I" in team: Implications for academic radiology.

All of us must find the right balance between team science and fostering leadership with dynamic colleagues. That dichotomy was well-encapsulated in a famous exchange between basketball players Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant regarding there "being no 'I' in team". In our view, there is nothing more satisfying than collaborating with a team of people and publishing impactful papers or making key discoveries.

Training of Administrative Chief Residents: Report of The Association of Program Directors in Surgery Chief Resident Workshop.

Objective: Surgical administrative chief residents (ACRs) play essential roles in residency training programs, including resident advocates, conflict negotiators, and scheduling managers. Despite their varied and important jobs, surgical ACRs receive very little training or introduction to the role.

Design: We describe here the creation and implementation of an Administrative Chief Resident Workshop developed for the Association of Program Directors in Surgery (APDS) to familiarize chief residents with their roles in scheduling and conflict negotiation.

Trends and disparities in alcohol screening and brief counseling following the U.S. Affordable Care Act.

Background: U.S. health reforms increased primary care access for underserved groups and provided support for alcohol screening and brief counseling (ASBC) in primary care.

Mouse models of Kaposi sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV).

Infection with Kaposi sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV) is a prerequisite for the development of several human cancers, including Kaposi sarcoma and primary effusion lymphoma. Efficient long-term infection with KSHV and subsequent virally induced cell transformation is limited to humans, resulting in a lack of small animal models for KSHV-driven malignancies. Various attempts to create a mouse model for KSHV include infection of humanized mice, generating transgenic mice that ectopically express viral proteins, and grafting KSHV-infected tumor, primary, or immortalized cells onto immunodeficient mice.

Zymomonas mobilis: bringing an ancient human tool into the genomic era.

Zymomonas mobilis is an ethanologenic bacterium that has been used for over 1500 years to produce alcoholic beverages. Recently, this microbe has become a top candidate for biofuel production due to its efficient metabolism. Z.

Innovations in intestinal organoid technology featuring an open apical surface.

Since the development of the three-dimensional (3D) "mini-gut" culture system, adult stem cell-derived organoid technology has rapidly advanced, providing in vitro models that replicate key cellular, molecular, and physiological properties of multiple organs. The 3D intestinal organoid system has resolved many long-standing challenges associated with immortalized or cancer cell cultures, offering unparalleled capabilities for modeling gastrointestinal development and diseases. However, significant limitations remain, including restricted accessibility to the epithelial apical surface for studying host-microbe interactions, interruptions in modeling chronic gastrointestinal diseases due to frequent passaging and dissociation, and the absence of mechanical cues such as peristalsis and luminal flow, which are critical for organ development and function.

Relationship between trait mindfulness and physical activity among emerging adults: The mediating roles of exercise-related cognitive errors and trait self-control.

Objective: Exercise-related cognitive errors (ECEs) is a significant factor that can negatively influence physical activity (PA) engagement among emerging adults, whereas mindfulness interventions may be beneficial for promoting PA. Against this background, we investigated the potential association between trait mindfulness and PA levels among emerging adults and determined whether trait self-control and ECEs serve as mediators.

Method: 328 Chinese participants (61.

Temperate grassland conversion to conifer forest destabilises mineral soil carbon stocks.

Tree-planting is increasingly presented as a cost-effective strategy to maximise ecosystem carbon (C) storage and thus mitigate climate change. Its success largely depends on the associated response of soil C stocks, where most terrestrial C is stored. Yet, we lack a precise understanding of how soil C stocks develop following tree planting, and particularly how it affects the form in which soil C is stored and its associated stability and resistance to climate change.

A generalizable normative deep autoencoder for brain morphological anomaly detection: application to the multi-site StratiBip dataset on bipolar disorder in an external validation framework.

The heterogeneity of psychiatric disorders makes researching disorder-specific neurobiological markers an ill-posed problem. Here, we face the need for disease stratification models by presenting a generalizable multivariate normative modelling framework for characterizing brain morphology, applied to bipolar disorder (BD). We used deep autoencoders in an anomaly detection framework, combined for the first time with a confounder removal step that integrates training and external validation.

Cardiovascular Complications During Delivery Hospitalization in Patients With Psoriasis.

Background: Psoriasis in pregnancy is associated with adverse maternal outcomes. However, there are limited data on this subject.

Objectives: The purpose of our study was to investigate the association between psoriasis and related cardiovascular complications during delivery.

Air pollution, metabolic signatures, and the risk of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.

Air pollution has been associated with a higher incidence of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), yet this metabolic mechanism remains unclear. 185,865 participants were included in the UK Biobank. We estimated air pollution exposure using the bilinear interpolation approach, including fine particle matter with diameter < 2.

Audible tremor: Analysis of the validity of audible information in assessing tremor severity.

Introduction: Assessing the severity of kinetic tremor is important in clinical and research settings. Archimedes spirals are often used to assess tremor severity. Rating tremor from spirals has been based solely on visual information.

A Systematic Approach to Prioritise Diagnostically Useful Findings for Inclusion in Electronic Health Records as Discrete Data to Improve Clinical Artificial Intelligence Tools and Genomic Research.

Aims: The recent widespread use of electronic health records (EHRs) has opened the possibility for innumerable artificial intelligence (AI) tools to aid in genomics, phenomics, and other research, as well as disease prevention, diagnosis, and therapy. Unfortunately, much of the data contained in EHRs are not optimally structured for even the most sophisticated AI approaches. There are very few published efforts investigating methods for recording discrete data in EHRs that would not slow current clinical workflows or ways to prioritise patient characteristics worth recording.