Project description:The geometric morphometric analysis of shape variation in complex biological structures such as the human skull poses a number of specific challenges: the registration of homologous morphologies, the treatment of bilateral symmetry, the graphical representation of form variability in three dimensions and the interpretation of the results in terms of differential growth processes. To visualize complex patterns of shape change, we propose an alternative to classical Cartesian deformation grids in the style of D'Arcy W. Thompson. Reference to the surface structures of the organism under investigation permits a comprehensive visual grasp of shape change and its tentative interpretation in terms of differential growth. The application of this method to the analysis of human craniofacial shape variation reveals distinct modes of growth and development of the neurocranial and viscerocranial regions of the skull. Our data further indicate that variations in the orientation of the viscerocranium relative to the neurocranium impinge on the shapes of the face and the cranial vault.
Project description:By using the 1.6 million single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) genotype data set from Perlegen Sciences [Hinds, D. A., Stuve, L. L., Nilsen, G. B., Halperin, E., Eskin, E., Ballinger, D. G., Frazer, K. A. & Cox, D. R. (2005) Science 307, 1072-1079], a probabilistic search for the landscape exhibited by positive Darwinian selection was conducted. By sorting each high-frequency allele by homozygosity, we search for the expected decay of adjacent SNP linkage disequilibrium (LD) at recently selected alleles, eliminating the need for inferring haplotype. We designate this approach the LD decay (LDD) test. By these criteria, 1.6% of Perlegen SNPs were found to exhibit the genetic architecture of selection. These results were confirmed on an independently generated data set of 1.0 million SNP genotypes (International Human Haplotype Map Phase I freeze). Simulation studies indicate that the LDD test, at the megabase scale used, effectively distinguishes selection from other causes of extensive LD, such as inversions, population bottlenecks, and admixture. The approximately 1,800 genes identified by the LDD test were clustered according to Gene Ontology (GO) categories. Based on overrepresentation analysis, several predominant biological themes are common in these selected alleles, including host-pathogen interactions, reproduction, DNA metabolism/cell cycle, protein metabolism, and neuronal function.
Project description:The genealogies of different genetic loci vary in depth. The deeper the genealogy, the greater the chance that it will include a rare event, such as the insertion of a mobile element. Therefore, the genealogy of a region that contains a mobile element is on average older than that of the rest of the genome. In a simple demographic model, the expected time to most recent common ancestor (TMRCA) is doubled if a rare insertion is present. We test this expectation by examining single nucleotide polymorphisms around polymorphic Alu insertions from two completely sequenced human genomes. The estimated TMRCA for regions containing a polymorphic insertion is two times larger than the genomic average (P < <10(-30)), as predicted. Because genealogies that contain polymorphic mobile elements are old, they are shaped largely by the forces of ancient population history and are insensitive to recent demographic events, such as bottlenecks and expansions. Remarkably, the information in just two human DNA sequences provides substantial information about ancient human population size. By comparing the likelihood of various demographic models, we estimate that the effective population size of human ancestors living before 1.2 million years ago was 18,500, and we can reject all models where the ancient effective population size was larger than 26,000. This result implies an unusually small population for a species spread across the entire Old World, particularly in light of the effective population sizes of chimpanzees (21,000) and gorillas (25,000), which each inhabit only one part of a single continent.
Project description:Gene methylation profiling of immortalized human mesenchymal stem cells comparing HPV E6/E7-transfected MSCs cells with human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT)- and HPV E6/E7-transfected MSCs. hTERT may increase gene methylation in MSCs. Goal was to determine the effects of different transfected genes on global gene methylation in MSCs. Overall design: Two-condition experiment, KP MSCs vs. 3A6 MSCs.
Project description:Gene methylation profiling of immortalized human mesenchymal stem cells comparing HPV E6/E7-transfected MSCs cells with human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT)- and HPV E6/E7-transfected MSCs. hTERT may increase gene methylation in MSCs. Goal was to determine the effects of different transfected genes on global gene methylation in MSCs. Two-condition experiment, KP MSCs vs. 3A6 MSCs.
Project description:Understanding the timing and character of the expansion of Homo sapiens out of Africa is critical for inferring the colonization and admixture processes that underpin global population history. It has been argued that dispersal out of Africa had an early phase, particularly ~130-90 thousand years ago (ka), that reached only the East Mediterranean Levant, and a later phase, ~60-50?ka, that extended across the diverse environments of Eurasia to Sahul. However, recent findings from East Asia and Sahul challenge this model. Here we show that H. sapiens was in the Arabian Peninsula before 85?ka. We describe the Al Wusta-1 (AW-1) intermediate phalanx from the site of Al Wusta in the Nefud desert, Saudi Arabia. AW-1 is the oldest directly dated fossil of our species outside Africa and the Levant. The palaeoenvironmental context of Al Wusta demonstrates that H. sapiens using Middle Palaeolithic stone tools dispersed into Arabia during a phase of increased precipitation driven by orbital forcing, in association with a primarily African fauna. A Bayesian model incorporating independent chronometric age estimates indicates a chronology for Al Wusta of ~95-86?ka, which we correlate with a humid episode in the later part of Marine Isotope Stage 5 known from various regional records. Al Wusta shows that early dispersals were more spatially and temporally extensive than previously thought. Early H. sapiens dispersals out of Africa were not limited to winter rainfall-fed Levantine Mediterranean woodlands immediately adjacent to Africa, but extended deep into the semi-arid grasslands of Arabia, facilitated by periods of enhanced monsoonal rainfall.
Project description:We tested the hypothesis that differential gene expression in whole blood will reveal candidate blood biomarkers for exposure to agricultural pesticides and herbicides. Blood gene expression in male Latino farmworkers, where chronic pesticide exposure is occupational, was compared to blood gene expression in age and gender matched Latino manual workers. We identified an expression signature for farmwork, differential expression in genes that correlated with levels of urinary pesticide metabolites, alterations in axonal guidance pathways and statistical models that link farmworker differential expression to Parkinson's disease. Case control, 20 male Latino farmworkers compared to 20 age matched male Latino manual workers.
Project description:Investigations aimed at defining the 3D configuration of eukaryotic chromosomes have consistently encountered an endogenous population of chromosome-derived circular genomic DNA, referred to as extrachromosomal circular DNA (eccDNA). While the production, distribution, and activities of eccDNAs remain understudied, eccDNA formation from specific regions of the linear genome has profound consequences on the regulatory and coding capabilities for these regions. Here, we define eccDNA distributions in Caenorhabditis elegans and in three human cell types, utilizing a set of DNA topology-dependent approaches for enrichment and characterization. The use of parallel biophysical, enzymatic, and informatic approaches provides a comprehensive profiling of eccDNA robust to isolation and analysis methodology. Results in human and nematode systems provide quantitative analysis of the eccDNA loci at both unique and repetitive regions. Our studies converge on and support a consistent picture, in which endogenous genomic DNA circles are present in normal physiological states, and in which the circles come from both coding and noncoding genomic regions. Prominent among the coding regions generating DNA circles are several genes known to produce a diversity of protein isoforms, with mucin proteins and titin as specific examples.
Project description:Kynureninase is a member of a large family of catalytically diverse but structurally homologous pyridoxal 5'-phosphate (PLP) dependent enzymes known as the aspartate aminotransferase superfamily or alpha-family. The Homo sapiens and other eukaryotic constitutive kynureninases preferentially catalyze the hydrolytic cleavage of 3-hydroxy-l-kynurenine to produce 3-hydroxyanthranilate and l-alanine, while l-kynurenine is the substrate of many prokaryotic inducible kynureninases. The human enzyme was cloned with an N-terminal hexahistidine tag, expressed, and purified from a bacterial expression system using Ni metal ion affinity chromatography. Kinetic characterization of the recombinant enzyme reveals classic Michaelis-Menten behavior, with a Km of 28.3 +/- 1.9 microM and a specific activity of 1.75 micromol min-1 mg-1 for 3-hydroxy-dl-kynurenine. Crystals of recombinant kynureninase that diffracted to 2.0 A were obtained, and the atomic structure of the PLP-bound holoenzyme was determined by molecular replacement using the Pseudomonas fluorescens kynureninase structure (PDB entry 1qz9) as the phasing model. A structural superposition with the P. fluorescens kynureninase revealed that these two structures resemble the "open" and "closed" conformations of aspartate aminotransferase. The comparison illustrates the dynamic nature of these proteins' small domains and reveals a role for Arg-434 similar to its role in other AAT alpha-family members. Docking of 3-hydroxy-l-kynurenine into the human kynureninase active site suggests that Asn-333 and His-102 are involved in substrate binding and molecular discrimination between inducible and constitutive kynureninase substrates.