Notes

[Aberrant Activation Procedure involving TGF-β Signaling throughout Epithelial-mesenchymal Transition].
Identifying correlates of brain response to food cues and taste provides critical information on individual differences that may influence variability in eating behavior. However, few studies examine how brain response changes over repeated exposures and the individual factors that are associated with these changes. Using functional MRI, we examined how brain response to a palatable taste and proceeding cues changed over repeated exposures and how individual differences in weight, familial obesity risk, dietary restraint, and reward-responsiveness correlate with these changes. In healthy-weight adolescents (n=154), caudate and posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) response increased with repeated cue presentations, and oral somatosensory cortex and insula response increased with repeated milkshake tastes. The magnitude of increase over exposures in the left PCC to cues was positively associated with BMI-percentile (r=0.18, p=0.026) and negatively associated with dietary restraint scores (r=-0.24, p=0.003). Adolescents with familial obesity risk showed higher cue-evoked caudate response across time, compared to the low risk group (r=0.12, p=0.035). Reward-responsiveness positively correlated with right oral somatosensory cortex/insula response to milkshake over time (r=0.19, p=0.018). Results show that neural responses to food cues and taste change over time, and that individual differences related to weight gain are correlated with these changes.The relative importance of introgression for diversification has long been a highly disputed topic in speciation research and remains an open question despite the great attention it has received over the past decade. Gene flow leaves traces in the genome similar to those created by incomplete lineage sorting (ILS), and identification and quantification of gene flow in the presence of ILS is challenging and requires knowledge about the true phylogenetic relationship among the species. We use whole nuclear, plastid and organellar genomes from 12 species in the rapidly radiated, ecologically diverse, actively hybridizing genus of peatmoss (Sphagnum) to reconstruct the species phylogeny and quantify introgression using a suite of phylogenomic methods. We found extensive phylogenetic discordance among nuclear and organellar phylogenies, as well as across the nuclear genome and the nodes in the species tree, best explained by extensive ILS following the rapid radiation of the genus rather than by post-speciation introgression. Our analyses support the idea of ancient introgression among the ancestral lineages followed by ILS, whereas recent gene flow among the species is highly restricted despite widespread interspecific hybridization known in the group. Our results contribute to phylogenomic understanding of how speciation proceeds in rapidly radiated, actively hybridizing species groups, and demonstrate that employing a combination of diverse phylogenomic methods can facilitate untangling complex phylogenetic patterns created by ILS and introgression.Endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) can perturb the hypothalamic-pituitary-thyroid axis affecting human and wildlife health. Thyroid hormones (TH) are crucial regulators of metabolism, growth, and differentiation. The perinatal stage is most reliant on TH, thus vulnerable to TH disrupting chemicals. A-366 nmr Dysregulation of TH signaling during perinatal development can weaken T cell function in maturity, raising the question of whether TH disrupting chemicals can perturb thymocyte development. Using Xenopus laevis tadpoles as model, we determined TH disrupting effects and thymocyte alterations following exposure to a mixture of common waterborne TH disrupting chemicals at concentrations similar to those found in contaminated water. This mixture included naphthalene, ethylene glycol, ethoxylated nonylphenol, and octylphenol, which have documented TH disrupting activity. Besides hypertrophy-like pathology in the thyroid gland and delayed metamorphosis, exposure to the mixture antagonized TH receptor-induced transcription of the Krüppel-like factor 9 transcription factor and significantly raised thyroid-stimulating hormone gene expression in the brain, two genes that modulate thymocyte differentiation. Importantly, exposure to this mixture reduced the number of Xenopus immature cortical thymocyte-specific-antigen (CTX+) and mature CD8+ thymocytes, whereas co-exposure with exogenous TH (T3) abolished the effect. When each chemical of the mixture was individually tested, only ethylene glycol induced significant antagonist effects on brain, thymic gene expression, and CD8+ thymocytes. These results suggest that EDCs in mixture are more potent than each chemical alone to perturb thymocyte development through TH-dependent pathway, and provide a starting point to research TH influence on thymocyte development.Vitamin A deficiency remains prevalent in parts of Asia, Latin America, and sub-Saharan Africa where maize (Zea mays) is a food staple. Extensive natural variation exists for carotenoids in maize grain. Here, to understand its genetic basis, we conducted a joint linkage and genome-wide association study of the US maize nested association mapping panel. Eleven of the 44 detected quantitative trait loci (QTL) were resolved to individual genes. Six of these were correlated expression and effect QTL (ceeQTL), showing strong correlations between RNA-seq expression abundances and QTL allelic effect estimates across six stages of grain development. These six ceeQTL also had the largest percentage of phenotypic variance explained, and in major part comprised the three to five loci capturing the bulk of genetic variation for each trait. Most of these ceeQTL had strongly correlated QTL allelic effect estimates across multiple traits. These findings provide an in-depth genome-level understanding of the genetic and molecular control of carotenoids in plants. In addition, these findings provide a roadmap to accelerate breeding for provitamin A and other priority carotenoid traits in maize grain that should be readily extendable to other cereals.
Symptom intensity during a common cold is highly variable, particularly after the illness peaks, contributing to delay in recovery. Rhinoviruses frequently cause colds and, during acute infections, generate leukotriene B4 and prostaglandin E2 (PGE2). PGE2 is known to initiate oxylipin class switching and resolution of acute inflammation. Thus, we hypothesized that during acute rhinovirus colds, oxylipins with pro-resolving capabilities reduce symptom severity and speed recovery.

Four groups of healthy volunteers were inoculated with placebo or 3 different doses of rhinovirus A16. Participants kept daily records of symptoms and contributed serial nasal lavage fluid samples. We collected semi-quantitative mass spectrometry data for 71 oxylipins in these acute samples from all participants. An ensemble analysis approach was used to further reduce this dataset.

Levels of 15-keto-PGE2 at day 3 of the cold were consistently among the top candidates in these models of recovery symptoms. 15-keto-PGE2 was the only oxylipin with an interaction between inoculum dose and time.
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