1,268 research outputs found
HFE C282Y homozygosity is associated with an increased risk of total hip replacement for osteoarthritis
No full textAbstract not availableYuanyuan Wang, Lyle C. Gurrin, Anita E. Wluka, Nadine A. Bertalli, Nicholas J. Osborne, Martin B. Delatycki, Graham G. Giles, Dallas R. English, John L. Hopper, Julie A. Simpson, Stephen Graves, Katrina J. Allen, Flavia M. Cicuttin
Joe Piehuta
No full textJoe Piehuta oral history interview as conducted by Mark Madison and Flavia Rutkosky.
Joe is a first generation American from Polish parents. He attended school in small town in PA, and attended a prep-school in California run by Catholic brothers. He held various jobs and schools until joining the Department of Interior and eventually the Fish and Wildlife Service. Mr. Piehuta worked in the Office of the Secretary-Supervisory Training, for Fish and Wildlife Service-Training Officer, and as the National Conservation Training Center liaison for Washington D.C.
Organization: FWS
Name: Joe Piehuta
Years: 1978-1988, 1994-2009
Program: Office of the Secretary, Director of Training
Keywords: Biography, Employees (USFWS), History, Coastal restoration, Conservation, Environmental education, Environments (Natural), Ecosystem recovery, Management, Training, Wildlife impacts, Wildlife refuges, Training1
Oral History Cover Sheet
Name: Joe Piehuta
Date of Interview: June 25, 2008
Location of Interview: NCTC
Interviewer: Mark Madison and Flavia Rutkosky
Approximate years worked for Fish and Wildlife Service: 30+
Offices and Field Stations Worked, Positions Held: Office of the Secretary- Supervisory Training, Fish and Wildlife Services- Director of Training, Fish and Wildlife service’s Arlington Office
Most Important Projects: Eco-System approach, Ocean and Coast initiative
Colleagues and Mentors: Dr.Fineburg, Murray Bowen, John Kamesta, Frank Peckeridge, Mona Wolmack, Dale Hall, Rick Lemon, Dr. Sayle
Keywords: Wildlife impacts, Eco-system, Training, Organizational management, Traveling, Wildlife refuges, Coastal Restoration, Conservation, Environmental Education, Environments
Brief Summary of Interview: first generation American from Polish parents; school in small town in PA; attended a prep-school in California run by Catholic brothers; various jobs and schools until joining the Department of Interior and eventually the Fish and Wildlife Service.
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Mark Madison – Alright. Today is June 25th 2008. We’re at NCTC at Shepherdstown, West Virginia. And we have Mark Madison and Flavia Rutkosky doing the interview. And the interview subject is Joe Piehuta. And we’re just going to go around and spell our names – say our name and spell our name.
Joe Piehuta – Joe – J O E, of course, and then Piehuta – P I E H U T A.
Flavia Rutkosky – Flavia Rutkosky – F L A V, as in Victor, I A. Rutkosky – R U T K O S K Y.
Mark Madison – And Mark Madison – M A R K M A D I S O N. And Flavia, we’ll let you ask the first question, since you go back the furthest.
Flavia Rutkosky – Joe, when you and I traveled from NCTC to Arlington, I was mesmerized at the story you told me. You began telling me about growing up in Sheffield, which is in Warren County, Pennsylvania. Begin there for us.
Joe Piehuta – Okay. I was born back there in 1935. It’s a very interesting town, ‘cause it… during the… it probably at the turn of the century… very much of a lumbering town, ‘cause it’s in the heart of the Allegheny national forest. and growing up around all that natural resources, and woods and trees and so forth, I think probably had a deep impact on me, in what I’m doing today. Born of parents… I consider myself to be first generation American, in a sense, ‘cause my father was born in Poland and came over here at 14 years of age. And my mother’s family was born and raised and so forth in Poland. They had four kids, and then the year they moved over here, my mother was then the first person born, first child born in the United States. So I… basically, she was very much Polish. So I consider myself the first generation Polish in this country. And what else did you ask? I forgot. Just….
Flavia Rutkosky – That’s it. Tell me about what you did when you were growing up in that town.
Joe Piehuta – Well, that town is very interesting to me. A very small town, only 1800 people. Wasn’t an awful lot to do. And of course, being born in ’35, I remember the end of the War a little bit – ’43, ’44, ’45 – very strongly. And I can 3
honestly remember, not Pearl Harbor, but I can remember the day after Pearl Harbor, that my mother was hanging clothes in the yard talking to the lady next door. And she was hanging clothes… they were talking about war, and people fighting. And I was… can remember asking them about – how could people hurt one another, or kill one another. To me that was a real mysterious thing. And I guess, at six years of age, that was probably very mysterious to me as a child. But, anyhow, growing up, the only thing that town was noted for, after being a lumbering town, was being a glass factory in that town. But then, I went on to high school there. Graduated. And… end up at the bottom of my high school class. [Indecipherable] didn’t do much studying. I barely made it through school. Had to change to… [chuckles]… I had to change to industrial arts, because, for the guys who weren’t performing in high school, they were like D- students, C+ students…. I had to change to industrial arts to get enough credits. See, you got twice the amount of credits if you took industrial arts. So I got out of high school… pretty much without reading a book or anything, ‘cause I copied everything. And I… when you’re in a small town like that, you sit next to the same person for 12 years. So you could develop all kinds of signals about how to cheat on test. And I was real good on that. This lady could just move her fingers… and she got me through grade school and high school. Little Sylvia. So, anyway, I graduated from there, and then went on… and because I had a little bit of drafting experience, I was able to work for an oil… fabrication… made fabricated steel tanks, and so forth, for refineries. I got a job with them as an apprentice draftsman. And so I stayed with them for several years and moved on from there.
Flavia Rutkosky – Where did you move on to?
Joe Piehuta – Well, I had two friends in high school, and both of those guys went on to… one went to Notre Dame in engineering, and one went to Penn State in electrical engineering. And they used to come back from college and talk to me about... oh, my god, what were they doing, and where they were going to go that summer for, you know, for a job, and what they were going to do. And I began to see that I really had to go to college, or do something. And so, there were two old ladies in town who… and one was a school teacher, said that, you know, they knew of some brothers, you know, religious… I’m catholic… and so they know of 4
some religious brothers who could maybe… have a little prep school. I could go there for a prep school. So, in preparation of that, I went and knocked on the doors of the old former principal and math teacher and literature teacher, and I… for about a year or so, I just asked them to review some high school subjects with me. That’s before I went. And then I left when I was about 21, 22, and joined up with these brothers. And became very much really, interested in religious life, at that time. I guess it was probably the influence of the brothers, maybe some things that were happening in my own life. I really started thinking a lot about religion at that time. But, anyhow, to make a long story short, the brothers ended up… I ended up moving to California ‘cause they had a little prep school out in California. So I stayed a year with them in California. And it was really a prep school… turned out to be almost sort of a little novitiate kind of stuff. So when I came back, I came back to Kings College… in what, ‘57 I guess, or something like that. And went to Kings College. And I got to tell you, I went there for the first two years, and I had a really difficult time. I was always at the mercy of my professors to give me a C or… just pass. So, I was just able to make it through those two years of college. and then I transferred down, and I got more involved with the religious people at that time, I transferred down to Catholic University. And then… that was the… everybody was taking philosophy at that group. So, took philosophy with ‘em. And I had one hell of a time understanding philosophy. It was very abstract. And some of the courses were in Latin and so forth. And I just had a terrible time. And so, I barely made it through college. You want to keep going?
Flavia Rutkosky – And that led to your first job after college, which….
Joe Piehuta – My first job after college… when I was looking for a job after college, I didn’t have any money at that time, and so forth, a friend of mine I was staying with, an older guy who was a psychologist, said hey, a friend of his was conducting some sleep and dream studies, down at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital, in Washington. And so, to make a long story short, I was able to get a job down there as an EEG technician. And… an EEG technician, basically, was on sleep and dream studies. and that was… if I look back on my career, that was probably the most interesting job I’ve ever had, because, there are only two places in the 5
world… three places in the world that were doing sleep and dream studies at that time, ‘cause it was really early in that… in the phases of understanding sleep… studies. One was in Chicago, and one was in Paris. And then the third was here in Washington. And I work with a Doctor Fineburg. And I was actually employed by the division of pharmacology, psycho-pharmacology, at NIH. And so, we were doing studies on sleep and dream. And, we were… most of the studies before that had only been done just for an overnight or something, but, because they had a full time young guy like me, very anxious to spend long hours, we started doing recordings, all night recordings with people [indecipherable] longitudinal studies. And so we and… there were three or four psychiatrists and psychologists, and myself, we started developing all kinds of ideas about what happened when you dream, you know. And one of the things we came up with was, going back to… I guess, Aristotle or somebody, Aristotle apparently had said that a person who hallucinated, or was schizophrenic, might be just dreaming while they were awake. Well, that’s a plausible kind of explanation. So… tested that out and it wasn’t true at all.
[General laughter]
Joe Piehuta – But, anyhow, so, make a long story short, over all that period of time we did longitudinal studies with patients. You know, by longitudinal study we mean a five week study of giving those drugs and placebos and everything else, to see how they record. And we were interested, in that time, not in interpreting dreams at all. We were just interested in the pure biology of dreaming: how much did you dream; when did you dream; what were the dream cycles like; and so forth. And so then, after that, I got out of that profession and went on… spent time… I was very much interested in theology. So I went into… up to east aurora, New York, and studied theology up there – Saint John Vianney.* And then, during the summers, I came back and worked in Washington for a year or two, doing these sleep and dream studies. I even came home at certain times on short vacations, two or three weeks, and did sleep and dream studies. But then, I moved to… down state medical center, in Brooklyn, and continued studies there – sleep and dream studies. And there’s where we started recording the whole life cycles of people. Putting small babies to bed – two, three 6
years old – all the way through different, you know, normal people now, we’re talking about normal people. And we’d do different ages, right up to old people who were in their ‘90s. ‘Cause we were interested in the whole sleep and dream cycle. How that may change over a long period of time as a person got… younger to older, and so forth.
Flavia Rutkosky – Hmm. And finally you got out of that profession…
Joe Piehuta – That’s right. Moved on, and went into the ministry for several years and…. Ahh, make a long story short on that, just lost interest in becoming a minister, you know. And… but, in the meantime, because of my background, I ended up back at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital again, and they asked me to head up a clinical pastor training program. And so we trained… it was a unique kind of program, because… in the program, there were not only ministers and priests and psychologist and social workers and – everybody. It was called an interdisciplinary approach… to mental health. And so, I went through that program for one year. And that was a very powerful program for me, because it turned out to be, in the long run, a program on groups. And how to run groups. So the program was basically divided. A third of the day you studied group dynamics, and all different kinds of groups. A third of the day you were in groups. You were in, you know, heart therapy groups or analytic groups or vocational education groups… vocational groups or whatever happened to be. And then a third of the day you actually ran groups. And you were supervised by a, you know, a group of people. And a part of that – being in those groups – you had to be in sensitivity groups. And so you were in sensitivity groups four to six hours a week. And that had a big impact on me, I think, that whole time, because, I had always been interested in psychology, and I’d taken a lot of psychology course in the meantime… had about the equivalent of a masters degree in psychology, in the sense of courses, but I never got a degree or anything like that. I’m great for doing that. Getting a lot of courses and not getting the degree. So, I ended up being on the faculty down there, because I was really interested in that. And at the time, I was also going to the department of psychiatry in Georgetown for two years, ‘cause starting… during this period, you know, I’m talking about the early… late ‘60s early ‘70s now… I went there for two years and studied under a… it was 7
pretty much a renowned army therapist named Murray Bowen. And Murray Bowen had his family’s systems approach to families. And Murray Bowen was a really interesting kind of guy, ‘cause he was anti-Freudian. And my early education in psychology and so forth was very Freudian. And Murray Bowen said that mental illness was really embedded in families, you know. He said… it’s what he called the multi-generational transmission process. That, if you really charted families… and that’s what he did, his therapy was basically looking, and bringing people in, and charting their whole family history, of who talked to who, who didn’t talk to who, who was born, when did baptisms occur, who died under what conditions, when did you fall down and break your arm, and all that stuff, and you begin to get all those patterns of, you know, neurotic people in the system. So, you begin to look at all that, you could then chart what the next generation was going to be. ‘cause he thought there was a family system here, and a family system here, and when you brought those family systems together… there were two systems, and out of that system became another system, when a husband and wife got married and had children. And then these children, in that system, were part of this multi-generational transmission process of mental illness, and how you acted, and your value system, and everything else. It was really an interesting approach. And that had a big impact on me. And that’s when I thought ‘man, I really want to be a family therapist.’ Of course, like, if you’re going to be a therapist, you got to go into therapy, you know. You went into therapy, you begin to see – this is not the business for me.
[General laughter]
Joe Piehuta – Anyway, I’m just talking. Ask me some other questions.
Flavia Rutkosky – And then that has led you to your… the beginning of your career with the federal government?
Joe Piehuta – I’m doing all these things simultaneously. I had a lot of energy then. And so, I got a job, part time, and I decided that the training aspect really interested me. so I ended up taking some time and getting the one degree I did get, beyond a bachelors, a degree in… basically training… human resource development through the George Washington University. And, again, I was 8
running short of money, living with somebody and things like that. So, I got a job, part time, with a contracting firm in town, and they were doing supervisory training with NASA. They had a contract with NASA. And I hooked up with a guy named John [indecipherable – ‘Kamesta’ ?] and he was really a dynamic kind of guy, and learned everything from him. And then, after teaching some courses there, I figured, hey, I got to get a job, you know, somewhere. So I ended up coming to Interior -- by luck. And I worked at the Office of the Secretary. And, at that time, I worked where all… the policy people were in the hallway up there. And… but they had one operational position, one operational position. And that one position was to conduct supervisory training. So, for the next five, six years, I was a stand up trainer. And, if you recall back in roughly ‘72, ‘73, that’s when the 48 hours of training was becoming very popular. I mean, people were just… loved that 48 hours of training. So my job was, for 35 weeks a year, to travel around the country… and this is for Interior… and conduct supervisory training. And so, I would publish my schedule ahead of time. Say, you know, I’m going to Denver, and then to Phoenix, and then to Albuquerque… ‘cause I went out in three weeks at a time. I went out three weeks; and then come back a week; and then go out for three weeks. And when I went to Denver, you know, you’d have 25 or 30 people there. Went to Albuquerque -- 25 / 30 people. And those people… it was really interesting, ‘cause those people were from Fish and Wildlife Service, they’re from BIA, they’re from Minerals Management. Not Minerals Management… they weren’t there at the time. But then Mines, or Park Service, or whoever happens to be. So, like, four or five people in each class, from these different Bureaus, so you really had a feel for what Interior was like as a Bureau, and the diversity of it. So I did that until about ‘78 or so. And then they… oh, what do you call it? They cut out the position. You know, it always comes back to funding. They cut out the position. I was left out in the lurch. But it turns out that there was a job opening up at Fish and Wildlife Service, as the Director of Training. So… ‘cause of my connections there, they said hey, you got the job. I moved to Fish and Wildlife Service in ‘78, and stayed there for about 10 years, as the training officer. One person operation. Sounds like a big job, but basically all you did… is you were concerned about training forms and make sure training forms were right. but on the other hand, what I also learned, and got involved with a lot in the later days, 9
when I was doing the 48 hours supervisory training, I worked a lot with a guy named Frank Peckeridge, from Bureau of Reclamation. And we were doing, at that time, I helped Frank do that, a lot of large scale organization development projects. And Frank… Frank was able to get 80 managers, three or four times a year, in a room, and conduct this managerial grid approach to organization development. And I was quite impressed with that. And I became a big organization development guru, at that time. That organizations… if you conducted organization development… that was sort of the messianic approach to organizational problems. And if you could do organizational development, you could solve all the problems. And I became a big believer in that. So, ended up doing a lot of team building and organization development work. So, when I was working with Fish and Wildlife during those ten years, I was not only concerned about training forms, but I found myself being asked more and more to do team building sessions, or retreats, for managers, in the Fish and Wildlife Service. And I guess, I look back over my career there, I guess maybe I did do a lot of that stuff. I was able to travel to all of the Regions. Did it with, probably, all the Regional Directors. And I’d say well, we called the Directorate today, to get a lot of Division Chiefs on the road, as well as different offices in Washington. So I did that ‘till ‘88. And then, at that time, I heard that they were starting to build this… this… they weren’t building it, they were… the concept of the new training center was coming about. And a position opened up. And I hadn’t worked with some other Bureaus, so I was very much interested in leaving Fish and Wildlife at that time, and then moving over and working with the Bureau of Land Management. So I went over there for three years. And then after a couple three years there, I went over for two years to the Bureau of Mines. That was sort of a… the death throes… the last days of Bureau of Mines, you know. They died about a year after that. The Bureau of Mines was in the dying stage for years. So, one day, I was working at Mines when I got a phone call, and it was from Mona Wolmack , who I had worked for, and with, in the past. And Mona says, ‘hey, we’re implementing this ecosystem approach at the Fish and Wildlife Service, and that’s going to involve a lot of team work and things like that, and you do a lot of teams. Hey, how about you coming back to the Fish and Wildlife Service?’ So I said ‘okay.’ And I was really looking forward to that, ‘cause I was looking forward to getting out of 10
Mines. So I came back. That was when the ecosystem approach was becoming very popular in the Fish and Wildlife Service. So then I spent, really the next year, year and a half, helping them in three Regions -- basically Region One Two and Four, in implementing the ecosystem approach. I remember it being Dale Hall. And I had met Dale prior to that, but I also met Dale in Region One when we were doin
Research Review: Social cognition and everyday social skills in children and adolescents with attention‐deficit/hyperactivity disorder: a meta‐analysis of case–control studies
No full textBackground: Previous studies that have assessed social cognition in Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) have produced inconsistent findings. To summarize these data and shed light upon moderators that may explain observed inconsistencies, we conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis exploring social cognition (Theory of Mind (ToM), Empathy, Facial and Non-Facial Emotion Recognition) and Everyday Social Skills in children and adolescents with ADHD. Methods: The current meta-analysis involved 142 studies including 652 effect sizes. These studies compared children and adolescents with ADHD (n = 8,300) and with typical development (n = 7,983). Results: Participants with ADHD exhibited moderate to very large deficits in ToM (SMD = 0.84, 95% CI = 0.68–0.99), Facial Emotion Recognition (SMD = 0.63, 95% CI = 0.46–0.81), and Everyday Social Skills (SMD = 1.23, 95% CI = 1.08–1.37). The magnitude of these impairments was similar when considering effect sizes adjusted for some covariates and the methodological quality of the studies. Few studies have investigated Empathy and Non-Facial Emotion Recognition, which precludes definitive conclusions. Conclusions: Children and adolescents with ADHD experience robust impairments in ToM, Facial Emotion Recognition and Everyday Social Skills. Future studies should explore whether these deficits are a consequence of difficulties in other areas of cognition (e.g., executive functioning). We have made all our raw data open access to facilitate the use of the present work by the community (e.g., clinicians looking for tools, assessing social impairments, or researchers designing new studies)
IL-6 regulates MCP-1, ICAM-1 and IL-6 expression in human myoblasts.
No full textThe inflammatory reaction in autoimmune polymyositis and rejection of transplanted myoblasts is characterized by mononuclear cell infiltration. In other settings monocytes are locally recruited by an IL-6-induced IL-8-to-MCP-1 switch. IL-6, upon binding to soluble gp80 (sIL-6R), can interact with membrane-bound ubiquitously expressed gp130 and activate virtually all cells (transsignaling). We found that human myoblasts could use transsignaling to produce IL-6, MCP-1 and ICAM-1; the addition of sIL-6R, binding to IL-1beta-induced IL-6, greatly increases IL-6 production. These in vitro data support the hypothesis that locally secreted IL-6 can target monocyte chemotaxis and leukocytes trafficking through an IL-6, MCP-1 and ICAM-1 modulation
[Book review] Chance encounters: a first course in data analysis and inference
No full textBook review of:
Chance Encounters: A First Course in Data Analysis and Inference by Christopher J. Wild and George A.F. Seber 2000, John Wiley & Sons Inc. Hard-bound, xviii + 612 pp ISBN 0-471-32936-
Consequences of Helicobacter pylori infection in children
No full textAlthough evidence is emerging that the prevalence of Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) is declining in all age groups, the understanding of its disease spectrum continues to evolve. If untreated, H. pylori infection is lifelong. Although H. pylori typically colonizes the human stomach for many decades without adverse consequences, children infected with H. pylori can manifest gastrointestinal diseases. Controversy persists regarding testing (and treating) for H. pylori infection in children with recurrent abdominal pain, chronic idiopathic thrombocytopenia, and poor growth. There is evidence of the role of H. pylori in childhood iron deficiency anemia, but the results are not conclusive. The possibility of an inverse relationship between H. pylori and gastroesophageal reflux disease, as well as childhood asthma, remains a controversial question. A better understanding of the H. pylori disease spectrum in childhood should lead to clearer recommendations about testing for and treating H. pylori infection in children who are more likely to develop clinical sequelae. © 2010 Baishideng. All rights reserved
The evolution of roman frontier defence systems and fortifications the lower danube provinces in the first and second centuries AD
Get PDFThe defence of the Roman Empire from barbarian attacks depended on two distinct but interrelated features: the actual fortifications on the borders of the imperial provinces and the troops that garrisoned them. The main aim of this dissertation is to provide a collective analysis of Roman defence systems on the Lower Danube region, i.e. the provinces of Pannonia Inferior, Moesia Superior, Moesia Inferior and Dacia. The period of study spans from the early first century to the middle of the second century AD, a period which corresponds to the gradual emergence and final consolidation of the Roman frontier defence systems in the area. On the basis of the physical evidence that has survived from the frontier fortifications of the Lower Danube area, this study attempts to present a reconstruction of the strategic and tactical situation on the frontier and to provide some fresh observations on the motives behind the creation, purpose and function of Roman frontiers during the early Principate. After a brief introduction on some of the views that have been put forward on the subject, the main part of the thesis is divided into four separate chapters, one for each of the provinces studied. These chapters study the fortifications themselves in order to establish their date and garrison so as to offer an evaluation of the characteristic features of the defensive system of each frontier sector. The last chapter brings together the above information in order to produce some conclusions on the defence systems in the area, especially in relation to the rationale behind their creation and subsequent development
Thermoregulatory correlates of nausea in rats and musk shrews
No full textNausea is a prominent symptom and major cause of complaint for patients receiving anticancer chemo- or radiation therapy. The arsenal of anti-nausea drugs is limited, and their efficacy is questionable. Currently, the development of new compounds with anti-nausea activity is hampered by the lack of physiological correlates of nausea. Physiological correlates are needed because common laboratory rodents lack the vomiting reflex. Furthermore, nausea does not always lead to vomiting. Here, we report the results of studies conducted in four research centers to investigate whether nausea is associated with any specific thermoregulatory symptoms. Two species were studied: the laboratory rat, which has no vomiting reflex, and the house musk shrew (Suncus murinus), which does have a vomiting reflex. In rats, motion sickness was induced by rotating them in their individual cages in the horizontal plane (0.75 Hz, 40 min) and confirmed by reduced food consumption at the onset of dark (active) phase. In 100% of rats tested at three centers, post-rotational sickness was associated with marked (~1.5°C) hypothermia, which was associated with a short-lasting tail-skin vasodilation (skin temperature increased by ~4°C). Pretreatment with ondansetron, a serotonin 5-HT3 receptor antagonist, which is used to treat nausea in patients in chemo- or radiation therapy, attenuated hypothermia by ~30%. In shrews, motion sickness was induced by a cyclical back-and-forth motion (4 cm, 1 Hz, 15 min) and confirmed by the presence of retching and vomiting. In this model, sickness was also accompanied by marked hypothermia (~2°C). Like in rats, the hypothermic response was preceded by transient tail-skin vasodilation. In conclusion, motion sickness is accompanied by hypothermia that involves both autonomic and thermoeffector mechanisms: tail-skin vasodilation and possibly reduction of the interscapular brown adipose tissue activity. These thermoregulatory symptoms may serve as physiological correlates of nausea
High-resolution melting analysis of the spa repeat region of Staphylococcus aureus
Get PDFThe staphylococcal protein A (spa) locus of Staphylococcus aureus contains a complex repeat structure and is commonly used for single-locus sequence-based genotyping. The real-time PCR platform supports genotyping methods that are single step and closed tube and potentially can be carried out simultaneously with diagnosis. We describe here a method for genotyping S. aureus using high-resolution melting (HRM) analysis of the spa polymorphic region X. METHODS: The conventional PCR spa assay was modified and optimized for the Rotor-Gene 6000 instrument (Corbett Life Science). HRM analysis on the Corbett Rotor-Gene 6000 instrument was used to test 22 known spa sequences obtained from 44 diverse methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA) isolates. Criteria for calling pairs of melting curves "same" or "different" were developed empirically by converting the data to difference graph format with one curve defined as the control. HRM curve comparison between runs was done to determine the portability of the method. The assay performance was assessed by genotyping uncharacterized isolates, carrying out blind trials, and comparing HRM profiles from different runs. RESULTS: HRM analysis of 44 diverse MRSA isolates generated 20 profiles from 22 spa sequence types. The 2 unresolved HRM spa types differed by only 1 bp. Two blind trials demonstrated complete reproducibility with respect to calling the different spa types. Interrun comparisons of HRM curves were successfully developed, indicating the robustness of the method. CONCLUSION: Analysis of the spa locus by HRM resolves spa sequence variants. This single- and closed-tube single-step method for S. aureus genotyping can be easily combined with the interrogation of other genetic markers
Transcriptomic profiling of cardiac tissues from SARS-CoV-2 patients identifies DNA damage
Get PDFFirst published: 15 September 2022The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is known to present with pulmonary and extra-pulmonary organ complications. In comparison with the 2009 pandemic (pH1N1), SARS-CoV-2 infection is likely to lead to more severe disease, with multi-organ effects, including cardiovascular disease. SARS-CoV-2 has been associated with acute and long-term cardiovascular disease, but the molecular changes that govern this remain unknown. In this study, we investigated the host transcriptome landscape of cardiac tissues collected at rapid autopsy from seven SARS-CoV-2, two pH1N1, and six control patients using targeted spatial transcriptomics approaches. Although SARS-CoV-2 was not detected in cardiac tissue, host transcriptomics showed upregulation of genes associated with DNA damage and repair, heat shock, and M1-like macrophage infiltration in the cardiac tissues of COVID-19 patients. The DNA damage present in the SARS-CoV-2 patient samples, were further confirmed by γ-H2Ax immunohistochemistry. In comparison, pH1N1 showed upregulation of interferon-stimulated genes, in particular interferon and complement pathways, when compared with COVID-19 patients. These data demonstrate the emergence of distinct transcriptomic profiles in cardiac tissues of SARS-CoV-2 and pH1N1 influenza infection supporting the need for a greater understanding of the effects on extra-pulmonary organs, including the cardiovascular system of COVID-19 patients, to delineate the immunopathobiology of SARS-CoV-2 infection, and long term impact on health.Arutha Kulasinghe, Ning Liu, Chin Wee Tan, James Monkman, Jane E. Sinclair, Dharmesh D. Bhuva, David Godbolt, Liuliu Pan, Andy Nam, Habib Sadeghirad, Kei Sato, Gianluigi Li Bassi, Ken O'Byrne, Camila Hartmann, Anna Flavia Ribeiro dos Santos Miggiolaro, Gustavo Lenci Marques, Lidia Zytynski Moura, Derek Richard, Mark Adams, Lucia de Noronha, Cristina Pellegrino Baena, Jacky Y. Suen, Rakesh Arora, Gabrielle T. Belz, Kirsty R. Short, Melissa J. Davis, Fernando Souza-Fonseca Guimaraes, John F. Frase
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