Weekly KromoNews: Volume 4, Issue 18
Editor's Note
Back to school:
A big "Welcome Back" to all the school goers (on either side of the podium) - we have
a fair bit of population of both sides in the KromoNews subscriber base.
Pathology Central has now been expanded to include 512 pathologies.
We are continuing to make it the most comprehensive database for genetics of pathologies.
5th International Imaging Genetics Conference, in Irvine California is fast coming up on January 19th and 20th, 2009.
Check out the list of speakers below, and we hope to see you there!
Read our latest interview, with Anu Acharya, CEO of Ocimum Biosolutions here.
This Week in Genetics
"Friendly" Bacteria Protect Against Type 1 Diabetes
Sep 21, 2008
Researchers at Yale University and the University of Chicago showed that mice exposed to common stomach bacteria were protected against the development of Type I diabetes.
The findings support the so-called "hygiene hypothesis" – the theory that a lack of exposure to parasites, bacteria and viruses in the developed world may lead to increased risk of diseases like allergies, asthma, and other disorders of the immune system. The results also suggest that exposure to some forms of bacteria might actually help prevent onset of Type I diabetes, an autoimmune disease in which the patient’s immune system launches an attack on cells in the pancreas that produce insulin.
In the Nature paper, teams led by Li Wen at Yale and Alexander V. Chervonsky at the University of Chicago showed that Non-obese diabetic (NOD) mice deficient in innate immunity were protected from diabetes in normal conditions. However, if they were raised in a germ-free environment, lacking “friendly” gut bacteria, the mice developed severe diabetes. NOD mice exposed to harmless bacteria normally found in the human intestine were significantly less likely to develop diabetes, they reported.
Other institutions involved in the study were Washington University; The Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, Me.; Bristol University, United Kingdom; and the University of California-San Francisco.
[Nature]
Read Full Story
CSHL team traces extensive regulatory networks that help determine how certain RNA messages are alternatively "spliced"
Sep 19, 2008
Two professors at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) have succeeded in tracing intricate biochemical networks involving a class of proteins that enable genes to express themselves in specific tissues at particular moments in development.
Michael Q. Zhang, Ph.D. and Adrian R. Krainer, Ph.D., both professors at CSHL and heads of laboratories, are exploring a phenomenon that biologists and geneticists call RNA splicing. Splicing is a key step in the multi-step process that transmits a gene’s instructions to a cell, telling it how and when to manufacture specific protein molecules, and how much to produce.
Poorly understood until recently, the splicing machinery and the networks that control it are only now coming into clear view.
In this paper Drs. Zhang, Krainer, and colleagues from CSHL, Stony Brook University, and Rosetta Inpharmatics, reveal how two closely related proteins called Fox-1 and Fox-2, which are two among many splicing factors, control regulatory networks involving many other genes.
[Genes and Development]
Read Full Story
New Lab-on-chip technology micro-sizes genetics testing
Sep 18, 2008
Using new "lab on a chip" technology, James Landers hopes to create a hand-held device that may eventually allow physicians, crime scene investigators, pharmacists, even the general public, to quickly and inexpensively conduct DNA tests from almost anywhere, without need for a complex and expensive central laboratory.
"We are simplifying and miniaturizing the analytical processes so we can do this work in the field, away from traditional laboratories, with very fast analysis times, and at a greatly reduced cost," said Landers, a University of Virginia professor of chemistry and mechanical engineering and associate professor of pathology.
Landers published a review this month of his research and the emerging field of lab-on-a-chip technology in the journal Analytical Chemistry.
[- Other - ]
Read Full Story
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Ask a question about this test to a certified genetics counselor
Upcoming Genetics Event
Fifth Int'l Imaging Genetics Conference |
| When: | Mon Jan 19, 2009 to Tue Jan 20, 2009 |
| Title: | Fifth Int'l Imaging Genetics Conference |
| Description: | REGISTRATION FOR THE CONFENCE IS NOW OPEN. Please visit the conference website for a schedule of speakers and talk titles and to register. For more information, contact Liv Trondsen (liv@uci.edu).
Detailed program:
- Ole Andreassen: "Neurodevelopmental genes affect cortical structure – update from the TOP study."
MD,PhD, Department of Psychiatry, Ulleval University Hospital, University of Oslo, Norway
- Dan Geschwind: TBA
MD,PhD, Professor, Department of Neurology, Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles
- Alison Goate: "PIB retention, an imaging endophenotype for genetic studies of Alzheimer’s disease"
PhD, Samuel and Mae S. Ludwig Professor of Genetics in Psychiatry, Division of Biology and Biomedical Sciences, Washington University, St. Louis, MO
- Jingyu Liu: "Multivariate analyses on the associations between SNP array and neuroimaging endophenotypes"
PhD, Department of Psychology, University of New Mexico
- Fabio Macciardi: "Copy number variation in schizophrenia"
MD,PhD, Associate Professor of Medical Genetics, University of Milan, School of Medicine
- Jason H. Moore: "Embracing Complexity in the Genome-Wide Analysis of Neuroimaging Phenotypes"
PhD, Associate Professor of Genetics, Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology, Dartmouth College Harvard Medical School
- Hao Yang Tan: "Imaging dopaminergic gene interactions in the prefrontal cortical system"
MD, Fellow, Section on Clinical Studies, National Institute of Mental Health
- Duncan Thomas: "Relating ultra-high dimensional phenotypes to ultra-high dimensional genetic data: genome-wide scans for brain imaging data"
PhD, Professor, Preventative Medicine, Division of Biostatistics, University of Southern California
- Jessica Turner: "An initial imaging genetics analysis in schizophrenia: Combining structure and function."
PhD, Project Scientist, Function Biomedical Informatics Research Network (FBIRN) University of California, Irvine
- Daniel Weinberger: "Genes, dopamine, and cell growth and survival: The view from the MRI scanner."
MD, Director Genes, Cognition and Psychosis Program NIMH Division of Intramural Research Programs
|
| Where: | The Beckman Center of the National Academy of Sciences, Irvine, United States |
| Contact: | Liv Trondsen |
| Email: | liv@uci.edu |
| Website: | http://www.imaginggenetics.uci.edu |
Genetics Term of the Week: Silent Mutation
Silent mutation: Silent mutations are DNA mutations that do not result in a change to the amino acid sequence of a protein. They may occur in a non-coding region (outside of a gene or within an intron), or they may occur within an exon in a manner that does not alter the final amino acid sequence.
Read more
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