Role of TNFSF15 in the intestinal inflammatory response

Genetic, epigenetic and environmental factors in diverticular disease: systematic review

BACKGROUND

Diverticulosis is a normal anatomical variant of the colon present in more than 70% of the westernized population over the age of 80. Approximately 3% will develop diverticulitis in their lifetime. Many patients present emergently, suffer high morbidity rates and require substantial healthcare resources. Diverticulosis is the most common finding at colonoscopy and has the potential for causing a significant morbidity rate and burden on healthcare. There is a need to better understand the aetiology and pathogenesis of diverticular disease. Research suggests a genetic susceptibility of 40-50% in the formation of diverticular disease. The aim of this review is to present the hypothesized functional effects of the identified gene loci and environmental factors.

METHODS

A systematic literature review was performed using PubMed, MEDLINE and Embase. Medical subject headings terms used were: 'diverticular disease, diverticulosis, diverticulitis, genomics, genetics and epigenetics'. A review of grey literature identified environmental factors.

RESULTS

Of 995 articles identified, 59 articles met the inclusion criteria. Age, obesity and smoking are strongly associated environmental risk factors. Intrinsic factors of the colonic wall are associated with the presence of diverticula. Genetic pathways of interest and environmental risk factors were identified. The COLQ, FAM155A, PHGR1, ARHGAP15, S100A10, and TNFSF15 genes are the strongest candidates for further research.

CONCLUSION

There is increasing evidence to support the role of genomics in the spectrum of diverticular disease. Genomic, epigenetic and omic research with demographic context will help improve the understanding and management of this complex disease.

The Relation of VEGFA, VEGFR2, VEGI, and HIF1A Genetic Variants and Their Serum Protein Levels with Breast Cancer in Egyptian Patients

Breast cancer is the most common type of cancer in Egyptian females. Polymorphisms in the angiogenesis pathway have been implicated previously in cancer risk and prognosis. The aim of the current study was to determine whether certain polymorphisms in the genes of vascular endothelial growth factor A (VEGFA), vascular endothelial growth factor receptor 2 (VEGFR2), vascular endothelial growth inhibitor (VEGI), and hypoxia-inducible factor-1α (HIF1A) associated with breast cancer development. The study included 154 breast cancer patients and 132 apparently healthy age-matched females as a control group. VEGFA rs25648 genotyping was performed using (ARMS) PCR technique; while VEGFR2 rs2071559, VEGI rs6478106, and HIF-1α rs11549465 were genotyped by the PCR-RFLP method. Serum levels of VEGF, VEGFR2, VEGI, and HIF1A proteins in breast cancer patients and controls were measured by ELISA. There was a significant association between the VEGFA rs25648 C allele and breast cancer risk (OR 2.5, 95% CI 1.7-3.6, p < 0.001). VEGFA rs25648 C/C genotype was statistically significantly higher in breast cancer patients vs. control (p < 0.001). Participants with the T/T and T/C VEGFR2 rs2071559 genotypes had 5.46 and 5 higher odds, respectively, of having breast cancer than those with the C/C genotype. For the VEGI rs6478106 polymorphism, there was a higher proportion of C allele in breast cancer patients vs. control (p = 0.003). Moreover, the C/C genotype of VEGI rs6478106 was statistically significantly higher in breast cancer patients vs. control (p = 0.001). There was no significant difference in genotypes and allele frequencies of HIF1A rs11549465 polymorphism between breast cancer cases and control individuals (p > 0.05). Serum levels of VEGFA, VEGI, and HIF1A were considerably greater in women with breast cancer than in the control (p < 0.001). In conclusion, the genetic variants VEGFA rs25648, VEGFR2 rs2071559, and VEGI rs6478106 revealed a significant association with increased breast cancer risk in Egyptian patients.

Effects of Eimeria maxima infection doses on growth performance and gut health in dual-infection model of necrotic enteritis in broiler chickens

The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of the different doses of Eimeria maxima (EM) oocysts on growth performance and intestinal health in broiler chickens challenged with a dual infection model of necrotic enteritis (NE) using EM and NetB+ Clostridium perfringens (CP). A total of 432 fourteen-d-old male Cobb 500 broiler chickens were divided into 6 groups with 6 replicates each. The six different groups were as follows: Control, non-challenged; T0+, challenged with CP at 1 × 109 colony forming unit; T5K+, T0+ + 5,000 EM oocysts; T10K+, T0+ + 10,000 EM oocysts; T20K+; T0+ + 20,000 EM oocysts; and T40K+; T0+ + 40,000 EM oocysts. The challenge groups were orally inoculated with EM strain 41A on d 14, followed by NetB+ CP strain Del-1 on 4 days post inoculation (dpi). Increasing EM oocysts decreased d 21 body weight, body weight gain, feed intake (linear and quadratic, p < 0.001), and feed efficiency (linear, p < 0.001) from 0 to 7 dpi. Increasing EM oocysts increased jejunal NE lesion score and intestinal permeability on 5, 6, and 7 dpi (linear, p < 0.05). On 7 dpi, increasing the infection doses of EM oocysts increased jejunal CP colony counts (linear, p < 0.05) and increased fecal EM oocyst output (linear and quadratic, p < 0.001). Furthermore, increasing the infection doses of EM oocysts decreased the villus height to crypt depth ratios and the goblet cell counts (linear, p < 0.05) on 6 dpi. Increasing EM oocysts downregulated the expression of MUC2, B0AT, B0,+AT, PepT1, GLUT2, AvBD3 and 9, LEAP2, and TLR4, while upregulating CLDN1, CATHL3, IL-1β, IFN-γ, TNFSF15, TNF-α, IL-10, and Gam56 and 82 on 6 dpi (linear, p < 0.05). Additionally, increasing EM oocysts decreased Pielou's evenness and Shannon's entropy (linear, p < 0.01). In conclusion, increasing the infection doses of EM significantly aggravated the severity of NE and exerted negative impact on intestinal health from 5 to 7 dpi.

De novo identification of complex traits associated with asthma

Introduction

Asthma is a heterogeneous inflammatory disease often associated with other complex phenotypes. Identifying asthma-associated diseases and uncovering the molecular mechanisms mediating their interaction can help detangle the heterogeneity of asthma. Network analysis is a powerful approach for untangling such inter-disease relationships.

Methods

Here, we integrated information on physical contacts between common single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and gene expression with expression quantitative trait loci (eQTL) data from the lung and whole blood to construct two tissue-specific spatial gene regulatory networks (GRN). We then located the asthma GRN (level 0) within each tissue-specific GRN by identifying the genes that are functionally affected by asthma-associated spatial eQTLs. Curated protein interaction partners were subsequently identified up to four edges or levels away from the asthma GRN. The eQTLs spatially regulating genes on levels 0-4 were queried against the GWAS Catalog to identify the traits enriched (hypergeometric test; FDR ≤ 0.05) in each level.

Results

We identified 80 and 82 traits significantly enriched in the lung and blood GRNs, respectively. All identified traits were previously reported to be comorbid or associated (positively or negatively) with asthma (e.g., depressive symptoms and lung cancer), except 8 traits whose association with asthma is yet to be confirmed (e.g., reticulocyte count). Our analysis additionally pinpoints the variants and genes that link asthma to the identified asthma-associated traits, a subset of which was replicated in a comorbidity analysis using health records of 26,781 asthma patients in New Zealand.

Discussion

Our discovery approach identifies enriched traits in the regulatory space proximal to asthma, in the tissue of interest, without a priori selection of the interacting traits. The predictions it makes expand our understanding of possible shared molecular interactions and therapeutic targets for asthma, where no cure is currently available.

Neoantigen-specific CD8 T cell responses in the peripheral blood following PD-L1 blockade might predict therapy outcome in metastatic urothelial carcinoma

CD8⁺ T cell reactivity towards tumor mutation-derived neoantigens is widely believed to facilitate the antitumor immunity induced by immune checkpoint blockade (ICB). Here we show that broadening in the number of neoantigen-reactive CD8⁺ T cell (NART) populations between pre-treatment to 3-weeks post-treatment distinguishes patients with controlled disease compared to patients with progressive disease in metastatic urothelial carcinoma (mUC) treated with PD-L1-blockade. The longitudinal analysis of peripheral CD8⁺ T cell recognition of patient-specific neopeptide libraries consisting of DNA barcode-labelled pMHC multimers in a cohort of 24 patients from the clinical trial NCT02108652 also shows that peripheral NARTs derived from patients with disease control are characterised by a PD1⁺ Ki67⁺ effector phenotype and increased CD39 levels compared to bystander bulk- and virus-antigen reactive CD8⁺ T cells. The study provides insights into NART characteristics following ICB and suggests that early-stage NART expansion and activation are associated with response to ICB in patients with mUC.

Immune checkpoint blockade therapy is successful in a high proportion of cancer patients, but others remain unresponsive. Authors here show that therapeutic success might be predictable in metastatic bladder cancer by longitudinal analysis of the early neoantigen-specific CD8 T cell response in peripheral blood.

The Associations of Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms with Risk and Symptoms of Irritable Bowel Syndrome

Although several risk single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) have been found to play an important role in etiology of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), the findings are inconsistent. A descriptive correlational design was used to analyze the baseline data of a randomized controlled trial including participants with IBS and healthy controls (HC). Pain severity and interference, anxiety, sleep, and fatigue were measured using the Brief Pain Inventory (BPI) and patient-reported outcomes measurement information system (PROMIS). Fisher’s exact test and multivariate linear regression were used to investigate the associations between IBS risk alleles and IBS symptoms. Participants were predominantly female, white, and had an average age of 21.13 ± 2.42 years. Polymorphisms within TNFSF15 (rs4263839), SLC6A4 5-HTTLPR, HTR3A (rs1062613), and OXTR (rs2254298) were associated with IBS risk, and TNFSF15 (rs4263839), COMT (rs6269), SLC6A4 5-HTTLPR polymorphisms were associated with pain severity. TNFSF15 (rs4263839) and COMT (rs4680; rs4633) genotypes were associated with sleep disturbance, and the ADRA1D SNP rs1556832 was associated with fatigue in both IBS and HC groups. Genotypic differences were associated with IBS risk and symptoms including abdominal pain, sleep disturbance, and fatigue. Further investigation is warranted to reveal the mechanisms by which these genetic variations influence the dynamic nature of IBS symptoms over time.

Uncovering the pathophysiology of irritable bowel syndrome by exploring the gut-brain axis: a narrative review

Objective

To improve the pathophysiological understanding of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) by exploring the gut-brain axis.

Background

Disorders of gut-brain interaction (DGBIs) are gastrointestinal (GI) disorders in which alterations in bowel functions occur. IBS, which is one of the most studied DGBIs, is linked with abdominal distress or pain without obvious structural or biochemical anomalies.

Methods

The etiology of IBS has not been clearly described but is known to be multifactorial, involving GI motility changes, post-infectious reactivity, visceral hypersensitivity, gut-brain interactions, microbiota dysbiosis, small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, food sensitivity, carbohydrate malabsorption, and intestinal inflammation.

Conclusions

One of the main features of IBS is the occurrence of structural and functional disruptions in the gut-brain axis, which alter reflective and perceptual nervous system reactions. Herein, we provide a brief summary of this topic. Furthermore, we discuss animal models, which are important in the study of IBS, especially as it is linked with stressors. These animal models cannot fully represent the human disease but serve as important tools for understanding this complicated disorder. In the future, technologies, such as organ-on-a-chip models and metabolomics, will provide novel information regarding the pathophysiology of IBS, which will play an important role in treatment development. Finally, we take a brief glance at how acupuncture treatments may hold potential for patients with IBS.

DR3 stimulation of adipose resident ILC2s ameliorates type 2 diabetes mellitus

Disturbances in glucose homeostasis and low-grade chronic inflammation culminate into metabolic syndrome that increase the risk for the development of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). The recently discovered group 2 innate lymphoid cells (ILC2s) are capable of secreting copious amounts of type 2 cytokines to modulate metabolic homeostasis in adipose tissue. In this study, we have established that expression of Death Receptor 3 (DR3), a member of the TNF superfamily, on visceral adipose tissue (VAT)-derived murine and peripheral blood human ILC2s is inducible by IL-33. We demonstrate that DR3 engages the canonical and/or non-canonical NF-κB pathways, and thus stimulates naïve and co-stimulates IL-33-activated ILC2s. Importantly, DR3 engagement on ILC2s significantly ameliorates glucose tolerance, protects against insulin-resistance onset and remarkably reverses already established insulin-resistance. Taken together, these results convey the potent role of DR3 as an ILC2 regulator and introduce DR3 agonistic treatment as a novel therapeutic avenue for treating T2DM.

Colonic Diverticulosis. Is there a Genetic Component?

Diverticular disease is a common condition among the elderly, with a steady increase in prevalence over time. Also, it has a temporal, geographic, and ethnic variation in incidence and prevalence, the genetic component having only recently been studied. For many years, environmental factors were the main link to the etiology. Recent studies estimated the heritability in this disease and identified genetic variants associated with diverticulosis. The interaction between structural changes of the colonic wall, diet, lifestyle, and genetic factors results in the development of diverticular disease. The purpose of this article is to review the existing data about genetic influence in this disease.