Project description:Data from 59 whole blood samples from pregnant mothers, unexposed and exposed to the Rwandan genocide, was generated using Infinium MethylationEPIC BeadChip Kit.
Project description:Umbilical cord blood (UCB) is a donor source for haematopoietic stem cell transplantation but only HIV unexposed and uninfected cord blood has been used to date. HIV exposed and uninfected cord blood could potentially be considered as a donor source in HIV endemic countries, provided the functioning of these CD34+ Haematopoietic stem cells (HSPCs) is comparable to HIV unexposed cells. We performed gene expression analysis on umbilical cord blood CD34+ HSPCs to determine if any differences exist between HIV unexposed and HIV exposed cohorts with mothers taking newer antiretroviral drugs.
Project description:We provide quantitative maps of cytosine methylation at single base resolution by RRBS in E13.5 primordial germ cells and adult sperm purified from mice exposed to Vinclozolin. Pregnant F0 female mice were exposed to two doses (a low dose VD1=1 mg/kg bw/d and a high dose VD2=100mg/kg bw/d) of Vinclozolin in the drinking water during pregnancy. We isolated primordial germ cells at E13.5 and mature sperm from adult F1 males obtained from control and exposed mothers. For PGCs, we sequenced RRBS libraries prepared from one pool isolated from F1 embryos exposed to the low dose, one pool isolated from F1 embryos exposed to the high dose, and two control pools isolated from unexposed embryos. For sperm, we sequenced three RRBS libraries prepared from a pool of sperm isolated from F1 males exposed to the high dose, and five RRBS libraries prepared from control pools isolated from unexposed animals.
Project description:Peripheral whole blood transcriptome profiles of pregnant women enrolled in the “Vitamin D Antenatal Asthma Reduction Trial” (VDAART) at enrollment during early pregnancy, and again at 32-38 weeks of gestation. Mothers were enrolled in 2 treatment groups: Intervention group with 4400 IU vitamin D supplementation and Control group with 400 IU vitamin D supplementation. Comparing the whole blood (PAXgene) transcriptome profile of 30 mothers at enrollment during early pregnancy versus their matching individual profile at 32-38 weeks of gestation.
Project description:The discovery of fetal mRNA transcripts in maternal circulation holds great promise for noninvasive prenatal diagnosis. To identify potential fetal biomarkers, we studied whole blood and plasma transcripts common to term pregnant women and their newborns but reduced or absent in the postpartum mothers. In whole blood, 157 potentially-fetal transcripts were identified. RT-PCR confirmed the presence of specific transcripts, SNP analysis confirmed the presence of fetal transcripts in maternal circulation. Comparison of whole blood and plasma samples from the same women suggested that placental genes are more easily detected in plasma. We conclude that fetal and placental mRNA circulates in the blood of pregnant women. [I] We profiled whole antepartum (A), postpartum (P), and umbilical cord (U) blood samples from each of 9 mothers and their 10 newborns (1 set of twins, denoted as a and b after the sample names). [II] We also profiled plasma samples (A, P, and U) from three of those mothers to allow for a direct comparison between blood and plasma.
Project description:We are investigating the transcriptional response of newborns in response to prenatal arsenic exposure; We used microarrays to detail the global programme of gene expression response due to prenatal arsenic exposure Experiment Overall Design: cord blood was collected at birth from infants whose mothers were exposed or unexposed to arsenic
Project description:The discovery of fetal mRNA transcripts in maternal circulation holds great promise for noninvasive prenatal diagnosis. To identify potential fetal biomarkers, we studied whole blood and plasma transcripts common to term pregnant women and their newborns but reduced or absent in the postpartum mothers. In whole blood, 157 potentially-fetal transcripts were identified. RT-PCR confirmed the presence of specific transcripts, SNP analysis confirmed the presence of fetal transcripts in maternal circulation. Comparison of whole blood and plasma samples from the same women suggested that placental genes are more easily detected in plasma. We conclude that fetal and placental mRNA circulates in the blood of pregnant women.
Project description:Pregnant women and their fetuses are particularly susceptible to respiratory pathogens. How they respond to SARS-CoV-2 infection is still under investigation. Here, we studied the transcriptome and phenotype of umbilical cord blood cells in pregnant women infected or not with SARS-CoV-2. We found that symptomatic maternal COVID-19 was associated with a transcriptional erythroid cell signature as compared with asymptomatic and uninfected mothers. We observed an expansion of fetal hematopoietic progenitors skewed towards erythroid differentiation and displaying increased clonogenicity. We found no difference in inflammatory cytokines in the cord blood upon SARS-CoV-2 infection. Interestingly, we showed an activation of hypoxia pathway in cord blood cells from symptomatic COVID-19 mothers, suggesting that maternal hypoxia may be triggering this fetal stress erythropoiesis. Overall, these results show a fetal hematopoietic response to symptomatic COVID-19 in pregnant mothers in the absence of vertically transmitted SARS-CoV-2 infection, which is likely to be a mechanism of fetal adaptation to maternal infection and reduced oxygen supply.
Project description:We report that the DNA methylation profile of a child’s neonatal whole blood can be significantly influenced by his or her mother’s neonatal blood lead levels (BLL). We recruited 35 mother-infant pairs in Detroit and measured the whole blood lead (Pb) levels and DNA methylation levels at over 450,000 loci from current blood and neonatal blood from both the mother and the child. We found that mothers with high neonatal BLL correlate with altered DNA methylation at 564 loci in their children’s neonatal blood. Our results suggest that Pb exposure during pregnancy affects the DNA methylation status of the fetal germ cells, which leads to altered DNA methylation in grandchildren’s neonatal dried blood spots. This is the first demonstration that an environmental exposure in pregnant mothers can have an epigenetic effect on the DNA methylation pattern in the grandchildren.
Project description:We adopted an omics (transcriptome, proteome, and metabolome) approach to characterize the lens fiber cells extracted from control (CT) and cigarette smoke (CS) exposed mouse (C57BL/6) eyes. The eight pregnant female mice (gestation days 19-20) were placed in a whole-body exposure smoking chamber and served as a CS-exposed group. The mothers and newborn pups were exposed to CS for five hours/day, five days/week for 110 days. In parallel, age-matched mice were kept in normal cages and served as a control group. The ophthalmic examination revealed no sign of cataracts in CS-exposed and aged-matched CT mice. The ocular lenses were extracted and fiber cells (FC) were separated from the lens epithelium under a microscope. The CT and CS fiber cells were maintained in four biological replicates each consisting of a pool of lens fiber cells from four eyes. The eight biological replicates including four CT and four CS-exposed fiber cells were used for the next-generation-based transcriptome (RNA-Seq), mass-spectrometry-based proteome, and metabolome profiling. RNA-Seq analysis identified the expression (≥1.0 FPKM) of 9,590 and 9,531 genes in CT and CS-exposed fiber cells, respectively. The analysis identified 348 differentially expressed genes, including 186 downregulated and 162 upregulated genes in CS-exposed fiber cells. Proteome profiling revealed a total of 2,424 proteins in CT and CS exposed fiber cells. The analysis identified 42 downregulated and 59 upregulated proteins in CS exposed fiber cells. Metabolome profiling identified a total of 280 metabolites, marked with decreased levels of branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs)-related metabolites in CS exposed fiber cells. In conclusion, we have established a comprehensive omics profile of fiber cells from CS-exposed mice. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report investigating a comprehensive omics profile of fiber cells from CS-exposed mice.