Notes

Rhizobial peptidase HrrP cleaves host-encoded signaling peptides and mediates symbiotic if it is compatible.
Frailty leaves older adults vulnerable to adverse health outcomes. Frailty assessment is recommended by multiple COVID-19 guidelines to inform care and resource allocation. We aimed to identify, describe, and synthesize studies reporting the association of frailty with outcomes (informed by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement's Triple Aim [health, resource use, and experience]) in individuals with COVID-19.

Systematic review and meta-analysis.

Studies reporting associations between frailty and outcomes in the setting of COVID-19 diagnosis.

Adults with COVID-19.

Following review of titles, abstracts and full text, we included 52 studies that contained 118,373 participants with COVID-19. Risk of bias was assessed using the Quality in Prognostic studies tool. Our primary outcome was mortality, secondary outcomes included delirium, intensive care unit admission, need for ventilation and discharge location. Where appropriate, random-effects meta-analysis was used to pool adjusted and unadjusted effee overview of outcomes relevant to older adults.
Frailty is associated with a substantial increase in mortality risk in COVID-19 patients, even after adjustment. Delirium risk is also increased. Frailty assessment may help to guide prognosis and individualized care planning, but data relating frailty status to patient-reported outcomes are urgently needed to provide a more comprehensive overview of outcomes relevant to older adults.Colonization along ubiquitous gradients of growing season length should require adaptation of phenological traits, driven by natural selection. Although phenology often varies with season length and genetic differentiation in phenological traits sometimes seems adaptive, few studies test whether natural selection is responsible for these patterns. The annual plant Rhinanthus minor is genetically differentiated for phenology across a 1000-m elevational gradient of growing season length in the Canadian Rocky Mountains. We estimated phenotypic selection on five phenological traits for three generations of naturally occurring individuals at 12 sites (n = 10,112), and two generations of genetically and phenotypically more variable transplanted populations at nine of these sites (n = 24,611). Selection was weak for most traits, but consistently favored early flowering across the gradient rather than only under short seasons. There was no evidence that apparent selection favoring early reproduction arose from failure to consider all components of fitness, or variation in other correlated phenological traits. Instead, selection for earlier flowering may be balanced by selection for strong cogradient phenological plasticity that indirectly favors later flowering. However, this probably does not explain the consistency of selection on flowering time across this steep, elevational gradient of growing season length.https//doi.org/10.1016/j.febslet.2013.04.002 The above article from FEBS Letters by Qifeng Li, Ke Shen, Yang Zhao, Xiaoguang He, Chenkai Ma, Lin Wang, Baocheng Wang, Jianwen Liu, Jie Ma, published online on 12 April 2013, in Wiley Online Library (https//doi.org/10.1016/j.febslet.2013.04.002), has been retracted by agreement between the authors, the journal Managing Editor, Felix Wieland, and John Wiley & Sons. The retraction has been agreed due to the identification of duplications in Figures 1D, 3B, and 4A-C. The authors were unable to provide the raw data underlying these figure panels. As a result, the journal cannot independently verify the conclusions of the article. All authors have agreed to the retraction of this paper and regret any inconvenience caused.
Hepatitis delta virus (HDV) infection is the most aggressive form of chronic viral hepatitis. Response rates to therapy with 1- to 2-year courses of pegylated interferon alpha (peginterferon) treatment are suboptimal.

To evaluate the long-term outcomes of patients with chronic hepatitis D after an extended course of peginterferon.

Patients were followed after completion of trial NCT00023322 and classified based on virological response defined as loss of detectable serum HDV RNA at last follow-up. N6022 nmr During extended follow-up, survival and liver-related events were recorded.

All 12 patients who received more than 6months of peginterferon in the original study were included in this analysis. The cohort was mostly white (83%) and male (92%) and ranged in age from 18 to 58years (mean=42.6). Most patients had advanced but compensated liver disease at baseline, a median HBV DNA level of 536IU per mL and median HDV RNA level of 6.86 log
genome equivalents per mL. The treatment duration averaged 6.1years (range 0.8-14.3) with a total follow-up of 8.8years (range 1.7-17.6). At last follow-up, seven (58%) patients had durable undetectable HDV RNA in serum, and four (33%) cleared HBsAg. Overall, one of seven (14%) responders died or had a liver-related event vs four of five (80%) non-responders.

With further follow-up, an extended course of peginterferon therapy was found to result in sustained clearance of HDV RNA and favourable clinical outcomes in more than half of patients and loss of HBsAg in a third.
With further follow-up, an extended course of peginterferon therapy was found to result in sustained clearance of HDV RNA and favourable clinical outcomes in more than half of patients and loss of HBsAg in a third.Concurrent-chains preference assessments have been used to assess preferences for leisure activities, teaching strategies, behavioral interventions, and other protracted events. This assessment model involves presenting an array of representative stimuli (e.g., pictures or colored cards), providing participants with an opportunity to select a representative stimulus from the array, arranging access to the associated activity, and then rank-ordering activities based upon their accumulated selection frequency across trials. The predominant model for presenting stimuli has been one in which all stimuli are presented in arrays simultaneously (i.e., a multiple-stimulus model). Activities selected repeatedly are identified as highly preferred and are then sequentially removed from the array to determine a preference hierarchy. The current study compared this approach with an alternative in which representative stimuli were presented to participants in paired arrays. Assessments conducted in the paired-array format were completed more rapidly than the multiple-stimulus format with a high degree of correspondence between preference rankings generated by both approaches.The zinc uptake regulator (Zur) is a member of the Fur (ferric uptake regulator) family transcriptional regulators that plays important roles in zinc homeostasis and virulence of bacteria. Upon zinc perception, Zur binds to the promoters of zinc responsive genes and controls their transcription. However, the mechanism underlying zinc-mediated Zur activation remains unclear. Here we report a 2.2-Å crystal structure of apo Zur from the phytopathogen Xanthomonas campestris pv. campestris (XcZur), which reveals the molecular mechanism that XcZur exists in a closed inactive state before regulatory zinc binding. Subsequently, we present a 1.9-Å crystal structure of holo XcZur, which, by contrast, adopts an open state that has enough capacity to bind DNA. Structural comparison and hydrogen deuterium exchange mass spectrometry (HDX-MS) analyses uncover that binding of a zinc atom in the regulatory site, formed by the hinge region, the dimerization domain and the DNA binding domain, drives a closed-to-open conformational change that is essential for XcZur activation. Moreover, key residues responsible for DNA recognition are identified by site-directed mutagenesis. This work provides important insights into zinc-induced XcZur activation and valuable discussions on the mechanism of DNA recognition.The hexanucleotide repeat expansion, GGGGCC (G4C2), within the first intron of the C9orf72 gene is known to be the most common genetic cause of both amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and frontotemporal dementia (FTD). The G4C2 repeat expansions, either DNA or RNA, are able to form G-quadruplexes which induce toxicity leading to ALS/FTD. Herein, we report a novel crystal structure of d(G4C2)2 that self-associates to form an eight-layer parallel tetrameric G-quadruplex. Two d(G4C2)2 associate together as a parallel dimeric G-quadruplex which folds into a tetramer via 5'-to-5' arrangements. Each dimer consists of four G-tetrads connected by two CC propeller loops. Especially, the 3'-end cytosines protrude out and form C·C+•C·C+/ C·C•C·C+ quadruple base pair or C•C·C+ triple base pair stacking on the dimeric block. Our work sheds light on the G-quadruplexes adopted by d(G4C2) and yields the invaluable structural details for the development of small molecules to tackle neurodegenerative diseases, ALS and FTD.This report provides perspectives concerning dual roles of serum ferritin as a measure of both iron status and inflammation. We suggest benefits of a lower range of serum ferritin as has occurred for total serum cholesterol and fasting blood glucose levels. Observations during a prospective randomized study using phlebotomy in patients with peripheral arterial disease offered unique insights into dual roles of serum ferritin both as an iron status marker and acute phase reactant. Robust positive associations between serum ferritin, interleukin 6 [IL-6], tissue necrosis factor-alpha, and high sensitivity C-reactive protein were discovered. Elevated serum ferritin and IL-6 levels associated with increased mortality and with reduced mortality at ferritin levels less then 100 ng mL-1. Epidemiologic studies demonstrate similar outcomes. Extremely elevated ferritin and IL-6 levels also occur in individuals with high mortality due to SARS-CoV-2 infection. Disordered iron metabolism reflected by a high range of serum ferritin level signals disease severity and outcomes. Based upon experimental and epidemiologic data, we suggest testing the hypotheses that optimal ferritin levels for cardiovascular mortality reduction range from 20 to 100 ng mL-1 with % transferrin levels from 20 to 50%, to ensure adequate iron status and that ferritin levels above 194 ng mL-1 associate with all-cause mortality in population cohorts.
Myofascial trigger point diagnosis is a clinical palpatory skill dependent on the patient's subjective response. The inter- and intra-rater reliability of trigger point physical evaluation in the lower leg muscles has rarely been reported. Previous reliability studies suffered from the Kappa paradox.

To evaluate the inter- and intra-rater reliability of trigger point recognition in the lower leg muscles implying a specific method to overcome the 1st Kappa paradox.

A reliability study with pre-second examiner exclusion to correct prevalence index.

Physical therapy outpatient clinic, Beer-Sheva, Israel.

86 soldiers aged 18-30 referred for physical therapy with a diagnosis of musculoskeletal pain consented to take part in this study. 26 were excluded for lacking trigger points, leaving 60 subjects for analysis (31 women, 29 men).

Both legs were evaluated, and the results were analyzed separately for symptomatic (N = 87) and asymptomatic legs (N = 31).Each subject was evaluated three times, twice by one examiner, and once by a second examiner.
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