Chromosomal imbalances in malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumor detected by metaphase and microarray comparative genomic hybridization

Respiratory immune status and microbiome in recovered COVID-19 patients revealed by metatranscriptomic analyses

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is currently a severe threat to global public health, and the immune response to COVID-19 infection has been widely investigated. However, the immune status and microecological changes in the respiratory systems of patients with COVID-19 after recovery have rarely been considered. We selected 72 patients with severe COVID-19 infection, 57 recovered from COVID-19 infection, and 65 with non-COVID-19 pneumonia, for metatranscriptomic sequencing and bioinformatics analysis. Accordingly, the differentially expressed genes between the infected and other groups were enriched in the chemokine signaling pathway, NOD-like receptor signaling pathway, phagosome, TNF signaling pathway, NF-kappa B signaling pathway, Toll-like receptor signaling pathway, and C-type lectin receptor signaling pathway. We speculate that IL17RD, CD74, and TNFSF15 may serve as disease biomarkers in COVID-19. Additionally, principal coordinate analysis revealed significant differences between groups. In particular, frequent co-infections with the genera Streptococcus, Veillonella, Gemella, and Neisseria, among others, were found in COVID-19 patients. Moreover, the random forest prediction model with differential genes showed a mean area under the curve (AUC) of 0.77, and KCNK12, IL17RD, LOC100507412, PTPRT, MYO15A, MPDZ, FLRT2, SPEG, SERPINB3, and KNDC1 were identified as the most important genes distinguishing the infected group from the recovered group. Agrobacterium tumefaciens, Klebsiella michiganensis, Acinetobacter pittii, Bacillus sp. FJAT.14266, Brevundimonas naejangsanensis, Pseudopropionibacterium propionicum, Priestia megaterium, Dialister pneumosintes, Veillonella rodentium, and Pseudomonas protegens were selected as candidate microbial markers for monitoring the recovery of COVID patients. These results will facilitate the diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis of COVID patients recovering from severe illness.

PICT1 expression is a poor prognostic factor in non-small cell lung cancer

PICT1 is a key regulator of the MDM2–TP53 pathway. High mRNA expression levels of PICT1 are associated with poor prognosis in several cancers with wild-type TP53. In this study, we identified the PICT1 protein expression profile in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with wild-type TP53 in the nucleolus and cytoplasm, and revealed the relationship between PICT1 expression and patient clinicopathological factors. PICT1 expression in the tumor cells of 96 NSCLC patients with wild-type TP53 was evaluated by immunohistochemistry. Forty-three of 96 (44.8%) NSCLC samples were positive for nucleolar PICT1, while 40/96 (41.7%) NSCLC samples were positive for cytoplasmic PICT1. There was no correlation between nucleolar PICT1 expression and clinicopathological factors. However, cytoplasmic PICT1 expression was significantly correlated with sex, smoking history, differentiation, lymphatic invasion and pathological stage. In multivariate analysis, lymphatic invasion was significantly associated with cytoplasmic PICT1 expression (hazard ratio: 5.02, P = 0.026). We scrutinized PICT1 expression in samples of NSCLC with wild-type TP53, and showed a correlation between cytoplasmic PICT1 expression and several clinicopathological factors in these patients. Our results indicate that cytoplasmic PICT1 expression is a poor prognostic factor and is associated with tumor progression via lymphatic invasion in these patients.