A rapid assessment of wastewater for genomic surveillance of SARS-CoV-2 variants at sewershed scale in Louisville, KY

In this communication, we report on the genomic surveillance of SARS-CoV-2 using wastewater samples in Jefferson County, KY. In February 2021, we analyzed seven wastewater samples for SARS-CoV-2 genomic surveillance. Variants observed in smaller catchment areas, such as neighborhood manhole locations, were not necessarily consistent when compared to associated variant results in downstream treatment plants, suggesting catchment size or population could impact the ability to detect diversity.

Ubiquilin1 represses migration and epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition of human non-small cell lung cancer cells

Ubiquilin1 (UBQLN1) is a ubiquitin-like domain and a ubiquitin-associated domain containing protein that has been reported to be involved in shuttling proteins to the proteasome, especially during endoplasmic reticulum-associated protein degradation (ERAD). Thus, UBQLN1 function has been shown to be critical for combating a number of neurological disorders caused by protein aggregation, such as Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), Alzheimer’s disease and Huntington’s disease. A role for UBQLN1 in regulating processes involved in tumorigenesis has not been demonstrated. Herein, we show that loss of UBQLN1 causes increased cell migration and invasion, actin cytoskeleton reorganization and induction of epithelial mesenchymal transition (EMT). Loss of UBQLN1 results in a significant decrease in the expression of epithelial markers including E-cadherin and claudin1, whereas expression of mesenchymal markers including Vimentin, Snail and ZEB1 are significantly elevated. Interestingly, we found that ZEB1 is required for induction of mesenchymal-like properties following loss of UBQLN1 and ZEB1 is capable of repressing expression of UBQLN1, suggesting a physiological, reciprocal regulation of EMT by UBQLN1 and ZEB1. Further, we find evidence for a role for UBQLN2 in also regulating EMT and cell migration. These observations have potential clinical relevance because the UBQLN1 gene is lost and under-expressed in a large percentage of human cancer cell lines and primary human lung cancer samples and recurrent mutations in both all five Ubiquilin family members have been identified in human lung cancers. Taken together, our results suggest for the first time a role for Ubiquilin family members in cancer biology.

Gingival epithelial cells heterozygous for Toll-like receptor 4 polymorphisms Asp299Gly and Thr399ile are hypo-responsive to Porphyromonas gingivalis

The Toll-like receptor (TLR)4 is the major sensor for bacterial lipopolysaccharide and its two common co-segregating polymorphisms, Asp299Gly and Thr399Ile, which occur at a frequency of between 6 and 10%, have been associated with infectious diseases, LPS hypo-responsiveness and cardiovascular disease. Porphyromonas gingivalis is a Gram-negative bacterium implicated in chronic periodontitis and is a known TLR4 and TLR2 agonist. We obtained two gingival epithelial cell primary cultures from subjects heterozygous for the TLR4 polymorphism Asp299Gly and compared response characteristics with similar cells from patients (four) with the wild-type TLR4 genes. Cytokine responses and transcriptome profiles of gingival epithelial cell primary culture cells to TNFalpha challenge were similar for all primary epithelial cell cultures. P. gingivalis challenge, however, gave markedly different responses for Asp299Gly heterozygous and wild-type epithelial cell cultures. The epithelial cells heterozygous for the TLR4 polymorphism Asp299Gly were functionally hypo-responsive, evidenced by differences in BD-2 mRNA expression, mRNA response profile by microarray analysis and by pro-inflammatory and chemokine cytokines at the protein and mRNA level. These findings emphasize variance in human epithelial cell TLRs, linked with Asp299Gly carriage, which results in a hypo-responsive epithelial cell phenotype less susceptible to Gram-negative diseases and associated systemic conditions.