Research Spotlight

Conley, K. and A. L. Juergens (2020). Leech Bite. StatPearls. Treasure Island (FL), StatPearls Publishing

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Leeches are hermaphroditic parasites of phylum Annelida and class Hirudinea. There are over 600 species of leeches. A minority of these are sanguinivorous and the cause of human morbidity. Historically, leeches have been used for medicinal purposes with the earliest recorded being 1500 BC. Leeches have continued to be used throughout history and most recently have been used in modern medicine primarily for reconstructive surgery. Leeches live by ingesting blood or bodily fluid. An adult leech can ingest 1 milliliter per minute of blood, and the area of attachment can bleed for 10 hours to as long as 7 days in some instances. Land leeches can penetrate thick skin, while aquatic leeches attach to mucous membranes leading to prolonged bleeding.

Christine, C. W., P. Auinger, N. Saleh, M. Tian, T. Bottiglieri, E. Arning, N. K. Tran, P. M. Ueland and R. Green (2020). “Relationship of Cerebrospinal Fluid Vitamin B12 Status Markers With Parkinson’s Disease Progression.” Mov Disord May 14. [Epub ahead of print].

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BACKGROUND: Using blood specimens from untreated early Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients from the DATATOP trial, we found that subjects in the low serum vitamin B12 tertile experienced greater annualized change in ambulatory capacity score, whereas those with moderately elevated (>15 μmol/L) total homocysteine had greater annualized declines in the Mini-Mental State Exam. METHODS: In this this study we sought to determine whether levels of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) B12 markers were also associated with progression of PD. RESULTS: The annualized change in the UPDRS “walking” item, a component of the ambulatory capacity score, was worse in the low B12 tertile. No association with change in the Mini-Mental State Exam was seen for those 7% with the highest baseline CSF total homocysteine. CONCLUSIONS: In these untreated early-PD subjects, low CSF B12 predicted greater worsening of the UPDRS “walking” item, whereas CSF total homocysteine was not associated with progression of cognitive impairment. These findings extend and partially support our findings in serum.

Chen, X., J. Gu, A. F. Neuwald, L. Hilakivi-Clarke, R. Clarke and J. Xuan (2020). “BICORN: An R package for integrative inference of de novo cis-regulatory modules.” Sci Rep 10(1): 7960.

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Genome-wide transcription factor (TF) binding signal analyses reveal co-localization of TF binding sites based on inferred cis-regulatory modules (CRMs). CRMs play a key role in understanding the cooperation of multiple TFs under specific conditions. However, the functions of CRMs and their effects on nearby gene transcription are highly dynamic and context-specific and therefore are challenging to characterize. BICORN (Bayesian Inference of COoperative Regulatory Network) builds a hierarchical Bayesian model and infers context-specific CRMs based on TF-gene binding events and gene expression data for a particular cell type. BICORN automatically searches for a list of candidate CRMs based on the input TF bindings at regulatory regions associated with genes of interest. Applying Gibbs sampling, BICORN iteratively estimates model parameters of CRMs, TF activities, and corresponding regulation on gene transcription, which it models as a sparse network of functional CRMs regulating target genes. The BICORN package is implemented in R (version 3.4 or later) and is publicly available on the CRAN server at https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/BICORN/index.html.

Chalkley, R. A., W. C. Roberts, S. Patlolla, J. M. Schussler, R. W. Snyder, 2nd, R. L. Smith, 2nd, C. S. Roberts and D. M. Meyer (2020). “Giant Right Coronary Artery Aneurysms.” Am J Cardiol 125(10): 1599-1601.

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Described herein are 2 adults with right coronary artery aneurysms measuring ≥4.0 cm in maximal diameter. Each aneurysm contained huge intra-aneurysm thrombus and each coronary artery contained atherosclerotic plaques diffusely. Each aneurysm was resected without complication and each patient has resumed preoperative level of activities without limitations.

Cai, Q., D. L. Beckles and M. Ahmad (2020). “Three-dimensional echocardiography assessment of carcinoid valvular heart disease: Images of each and all.” Echocardiography 37(5): 791-793.

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A 54-year-old male was found to have neuroendocrine carcinoma with hepatic metastasis. Two-dimensional (2D) transthoracic echocardiography (TTE) demonstrated dilated right ventricle and right atrium, and severe tricuspid and pulmonary regurgitation. Three-dimensional (3D) TTE en-face views showed thickened, retracted, and fixed tricuspid valve and pulmonic valve which remained widely open throughout the cardiac cycle. 3D TTE, particularly en-face views, demonstrates incremental value over 2D TTE by providing precise valvular anatomic details comparable to surgical findings. 3D TTE also offers a unique opportunity to assess all four valves simultaneously with en-face views to delineate their relationships with surrounding structures.