Study questions the medical privacy of forensic samples

SF State researchers say databases used by law enforcement could contain private information about individuals, including crime victims

Peer-Reviewed Publication

SAN FRANCISCO STATE UNIVERSITY

Watch any episode of “CSI,” and a character will use forensic DNA profiling to identify a criminal. A new study from San Francisco State University suggests that these forensic profiles may indirectly reveal medical information — perhaps even those of crime victims — contrary to what the legal field has believed for nearly 30 years. The findings could have ethical and legal implications.

“The central assumption when choosing those [forensic] markers was that there wouldn’t be any information about the individuals whatsoever aside from identification. Our paper challenges that assumption,” said first author Mayra Bañuelos (B.S., ’19), who started working on the project as a San Francisco State undergraduate and is now a Ph.D. student at Brown University.

Law enforcement uses the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS), a system organizing criminal justice DNA databases that uses specific genetic markers to identify individuals. Crime labs from national, state and local levels contribute to these databases and provide profiles from samples collected from crime scene evidence, convicted offenders, felony arrestees, missing persons and more. Law officials can use the database to try to match samples found in an investigation to profiles already stored in the database.

CODIS profiles consist of an individual’s genetic variants as a set of short tandem repeats (STRs), sequences of DNA that repeat at various frequencies among individuals. Since the ’90s, 20 STRs have been chosen for forensic CODIS profiling specifically because it was believed they did not relay medical information. If these profiles contained any trait information, then there could be issues about medical privacy.

“But that assumption hasn’t had much investigation in a long time, and we know a lot more about the genome now than we did back then,” explained SF State Associate Professor of Biology Rori Rohlfs, who led this project.

The assumption that only criminals are sampled is also not completely accurate. “It actually also includes victims of crime and people that may have been at crime scenes. You have these huge databases including a lot of people that are not necessarily criminals,” Bañuelos said. “I believe also that accessibility to these databases varies a lot according to a jurisdiction.”

The researchers explained that other papers have found associations between other (non-CODIS) STRs and disease or gene expression. With that in mind, the SF State team wanted to understand the relationship between the CODIS STR markers and gene expression.

Rohfls’ lab used publicly available data (1000 Genome Project) and genetic models to investigate the relationship between CODIS markers and gene expression. Of the 20 CODIS markers, they found six associations between CODIS markers and gene expression of nearby genes in white blood cell lines from more than 400 unrelated individuals in the database.

“In some genes, gene expression change has been associated with medical conditions,” Bañuelos explained, citing prior research. “[In this study,] we indirectly know there is an association between these CODIS genotypes and some change in genes that can lead to illness.”

The authors note three associations to genes (CSF1R, LARS2, KDSR) that were particularly interesting. Prior literature shows that mutations and changes in gene expression of CSF1R can be tied to psychiatric conditions (depression and schizophrenia). Mutations and gene expression changes in the other genes have been connected to Perrault syndrome, MELAS syndrome, severe skin and platelet conditions and more, the scientists note in the PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) paper. If CODIS markers can be connected to the expression of genes linked to disease and health, then it means that the data in the CODIS database could compromise an individual’s medical privacy.

“Our paper in some ways is like the tip of the iceberg,” Rohlfs said, admitting that she was surprised to find associations in a relatively small sample size. The project itself simply started as an undergraduate exploration project. Eight of the 11 authors were, like Bañuelos, undergraduates at SF State when the project began.

“It raises the question: If we did a more expansive [genetic] study, would we find even more information that would be revealed by CODIS profiles?” Rohlfs asked.

Bañuelos and Rohlfs are curious to know what they’d find if they looked at a larger dataset of more diverse populations — their current dataset is predominantly European. Their analysis was also limited to white blood cells. What relationships would they find if they looked in other tissues?

These are important lines of inquiry because the current dataset doesn’t represent the general population. Furthermore, Latino and African American communities are overrepresented in these CODIS databases, Bañuelos explained.

Additional studies are needed to better flush out the relationship between CODIS and medical information. However, the researchers point out that if CODIS profiles contain medical information, there could be major implications.

“If [these CODIS profiles] contain medical information, then their treatment would need to be consistent with the way we protect medical information in the United States. We would have to have policies that regulate the seizure, storage and sharing of these profiles,” Rohlfs added.

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JOURNAL

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

DOI

10.1073/pnas.2121024119 

ARTICLE TITLE

Associations between forensic loci and expression levels of neighboring genes may compromise medical privacy

Variation in Research Experiences and Publications During Medical School by Sex and Race and Ethnicity

Mytien Nguyen, MS¹; Sarwat I. Chaudhry, MD²; Emmanuella Asabor, MPhil¹; et alMayur M. Desai, PhD, MPH³; Elle Lett, PhD, MA^4,5; Jose E. Cavazos, MD, PhD⁶; Hyacinth R. C. Mason, PhD⁷; Dowin Boatright, MD, MBA, MHS⁸

Author Affiliations Article Information

JAMA Netw Open. 2022;5(10):e2238520. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.38520

Original Investigation 

Medical Education

October 25, 2022

Key Points

Question  Are student sex and racial and ethnic identity associated with publication rate during medical school?

Findings  This cohort study of 31 474 medical school graduates found a significant disparity in publication rates across sex and race and ethnicity, with women and Black and Hispanic students reporting lower publication rates compared with men and White students. Sex and racial and ethnic disparities in research persisted at both National Institutes of Health top 40 and non–top 40 research-intensive schools.

Meaning  These findings suggest that inequities in the physician-scientist workforce began early in training, as exposure to research and research productivity are critical for a successful career as a physician-scientist.

Abstract

Importance  Diverse research teams are critical to solving complex health problems and producing high-quality medical research.

Objective  To examine the associations of student sex and racial and ethnic identity with publication rates during medical school.

Design, Setting, and Participants  This cohort study assessed individual-level data of US MD graduates from medical school who matriculated in academic years 2014 to 2015 and 2015 to 2016. Data were obtained from the Association of American Medical Colleges and analyzed from October 2021 to January 2022.

Main Outcomes and Measures  Outcomes of interest included students’ self-reported participation in unique research experiences, number of publications, and computed publications per research experience. Poisson regressions were constructed to determine the association of sex and racial and ethnic identity with research outcomes using adjusted rate ratios (aRRs).

Results  Among 31 474 graduates, 15 159 (48.2%) identified as women and 4344 (13.8%) identified as underrepresented in medicine by race and ethnicity (URIM; including American Indian, Alaska Native, Black, Hawaiian Native, Hispanic/Latinx, and Pacific Islander individuals). Students who attended National Institutes of Health (NIH) top 40 research-ranked schools reported higher number of research experiences and publication counts, resulting in a higher publication rate compared with students from non–top 40 schools (median [IQR] 1.60 [1.00-3.00] vs 1.25 [0.50-2.33]; P < .001). Women reported a higher number of research experiences than men but a significantly lower number of publications (top 40 schools: aRR, 0.89; 95% CI, 0.87-0.90; non–top 40 schools: aRR, 0.93; 95% CI, 0.92-0.95). This resulted in a significantly lower publication rate among women (top 40 schools: aRR, 0.85; 95% CI, 0.83-0.86; non–top 40 schools: aRR, 0.91; 95% CI, 0.90-0.92). Compared with White students, Asian students had higher publication rates at both NIH top 40 schools (aRR, 1.10; 95% CI, 1.08-1.12) and non–top 40 schools (aRR, 1.07; 95% CI, 1.05-1.08), while lower publication rates were reported among Black students (top 40 schools: aRR, 0.83; 95% CI, 0.80-0.86; non–top 40 schools: aRR, 0.88; 95% CI, 0.85-0.95) and Hispanic students attending non–top 40 schools (aRR, 0.93; 95% CI, 0.90-0.95).

Conclusions and Relevance  These findings illustrate that inequities in the physician-scientist workforce began early in training and highlight key areas for intervention, such as funding support and mentorship training during undergraduate medical education, that may promote the future success of a diverse physician-scientist workforce.

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Current FDA oversight of vaping industry likely to have minimal impact

It’s failing to target key players and products most popular with young people

Peer-Reviewed Publication

BMJ

Current Food and Drug Administration (FDA) oversight of the vaping industry in the US is likely to have minimal impact, suggests an analysis of the regulator’s warning letters for marketing violations, published online in the journal Tobacco Control.

The regulator is failing to target the key players or the products most popular with young people, the analysis suggests, with over 90% of warnings sent to small online retailers rather than leading tobacco companies, and a focus on refillable devices.

While the prevalence of vaping among US adults remains low, at just under 4% in 2020, it is four times higher among young people.

In 2016 the FDA announced plans to regulate the vaping industry, including a requirement for the manufacturers of e-cigarettes to obtain pre-market approval (PMTA) to ensure that their products protect public health.

In 2017, the regulator began sending warning letters to manufacturers, retailers, and distributors for potential violations, such as advertising to young people, selling to minors, packaging or labelling that contravened regulations, and failure to apply for a PMTA.

But little is known about who received these letters, the types of product they concerned, or details of the violations and their consequences.

To try and find out, the authors from non-profit tobacco control organisation, Truth Initiative, assessed the content and recipients of publicly available FDA warning letters issued in 2020 and 2021. In total, the FDA issued 303 warnings:126 in 2020 and 177 up to 9 September 2021.

The analysis revealed that in 2021, over 98% of all the targeted companies fulfilled all three roles (manufacturer, distributor and retailer). 

But nearly all the letters (97%) were sent to small online retailers, none of which was a large company with measurable market share, as evidenced by sales data. 

Companies were cited for between one and three infractions. Most involved failure to obtain a PMTA. In 2020 and 2021, respectively, 56% and 99%+ of the infractions concerned a PMTA violation.

And more than 90% of the products cited–880 different ones in total–were flavoured refillable e-cigarette liquids, rather than the disposable vaping devices (‘pod mods’) which the evidence indicates are most popular with young people.

Penalties ranged in severity from product detention to product seizure and fines. But loss of tobacco distributor licence and criminal charges appeared less frequently in both years than these other consequences.

At the time of the review, most (72%) of the websites cited for 2020 infractions were still operating, as were 29% of websites cited for 2021 infractions.

And as the authors note, it was impossible to find out how the targeted companies responded, and whether the FDA followed through with the consequences cited in the warning letters, because that information isn’t publicly available.

“While current research estimates that online sales comprise around one-third of the marketplace, data tell us that most young people get their products from friends (32.3%), buy them from another person (21.5%), or purchase from a vape shop (22.2%),” note the authors.

“Prioritising the products most accessed by youth which are made available from a variety of sources will be important to curb youth use,” they add.

And they emphasise:“Strong, impactful and transparent consequences need to be in place to prevent the sale of products that violate regulations necessary in protecting the health of adult users of e-cigarettes and preventing youth use alike.”

“The FDA should use its enforcement powers to target the manufacturing, distribution, and sellers of the tobacco products that have the greatest impact on youth and products that provide no public health benefit,” they conclude. 

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JOURNAL

Tobacco Control

DOI

10.1136/tobaccocontrol-2022-057359 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Analysis of e-cigarette warning letters issued by the Food and Drug Administration in 2020 and 2021

New research shows e-cigarettes cause cardiac arrhythmias

Some cardiac effects of e-cigarette ingredients are similar to or worse than conventional cigarettes

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF LOUISVILLE

 

IMAGE: ALEX CARLL, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR IN THE UOFL DEPARTMENT OF PHYSIOLOGY, FRONT, WITH MATTHEW NYSTORIAK, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF MEDICINE. view more 

CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF LOUISVILLE PHOTO

A new study from University of Louisville researchers in the Christina Lee Brown Envirome Institute has found that exposure to e-cigarette aerosols can cause heart arrhythmias in animal models — both in the form of premature and skipped heart beats. The study findings, published Oct. 25 in Nature Communications, suggest exposure to specific chemicals within e-cigarette liquids (e-liquids) promote arrhythmias and cardiac electrical dysfunction.

“Our findings demonstrate that short-term exposure to e-cigarettes can destabilize heart rhythm through specific chemicals within e-liquids,” said Alex Carll, assistant professor in the UofL Department of Physiology who led the study. “These findings suggest that e-cigarette use involving certain flavors or solvent vehicles may disrupt the heart’s electrical conduction and provoke arrhythmias. These effects could increase the risk for atrial or ventricular fibrillation and sudden cardiac arrest.”

The researchers tested the cardiac impacts of inhaled e-cigarette aerosols solely from the main two ingredients in e-liquids (nicotine-free propylene glycol and vegetable glycerin) or from flavored retail e-liquids containing nicotine. They found that for all e-cigarette aerosols, the animals’ heart rate slowed during puff exposures and sped up afterwards as heart rate variability declined, indicating fight-or-flight stress responses. In addition, e-cigarette puffs from a menthol-flavored e-liquid or from propylene glycol alone caused ventricular arrhythmias and other conduction irregularities in the heart.

Conducted in collaboration with Daniel Conklin and Aruni Bhatnagar, professors in the UofL Division of Environmental Medicine, this work adds to a growing body of research on the potential toxicity and health impacts of e-cigarettes reported by the American Heart Association Tobacco Regulation and Addiction Center, for which UofL serves as the flagship institute.

"The findings of this study are important because they provide fresh evidence that the use of e-cigarettes could interfere with normal heart rhythms -- something we did not know before," Bhatnagar said. "This is highly concerning given the rapid growth of e-cigarette use, particularly among young people."

As e-cigarette use has grown nationwide, the potential advantages and harms of vaping have been debated. Since vaping does not involve combustion, it exposes users and bystanders to little if any carbon monoxide, tar or cancer-causing nitrosamines compared with conventional cigarettes. However, e-cigarettes can deliver aldehydes, particles and nicotine at levels comparable to combustible cigarettes. Vaping might help smokers quit combustible cigarettes, but the appeal and addictiveness of e-cigarettes may encourage youth to vape amidst unknown long-term risks or take up smoking. More than 25% of high schoolers and 10% of middle schoolers in the U.S. reported using e-cigarettes before the pandemic.

Additional research by Carll and Matthew Nystoriak, an associate professor of medicine at UofL, to determine the effects of vape flavorings on the heart recently received $3.6 million in research funding from the National Institutes of Health.

“Our team’s findings that specific ingredients in e-cigarette liquids promote arrhythmias indicates there is an urgent need for more research into the cardiac effects of these components in both animals and humans,” Carll said.

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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-33203-1

Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Heart, Lung, And Blood Institute (NHLBI) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Center for Tobacco Products (CTP) under Award Number R01HL147353 (A.P.C.), R01HL163818 (A.P.C. and M.A.N.), U54HL120163 (A.B.), and R01HL122676 (D.J.C.), the National Institute of General Medical Sciences of the NIH under Award Number P30GM127607 (A.B.), the Jewish Heritage Fund for Excellence (M.A.N. and A.P.C.), a Fellowship from the American Heart Association (AHA) Tobacco Regulation and Addiction Center (AHA FX-ATRAC-UL1-05; A.P.C.), and the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - Brasil (CAPES) Scholarship - Process no {88881.131525/2016-01} (C.A. and R.S.). Research reported in this publication was supported by NHLBI and FDA Center for Tobacco Products (CTP). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the NIH, the FDA, or the AHA.

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JOURNAL

Nature Communications

DOI

10.1038/s41467-022-33203-1 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

E-cigarettes and Their Lone Constituents Induce Cardiac Arrhythmia and Conduction Defects in Mice

New data on how intermittent fasting affects female hormones

New evidence comes from study of pre- and post-menopausal obese women on the “warrior diet”

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS CHICAGO

Intermittent fasting has been shown to be an effective way to lose weight, but critics have worried that the practice may have a negative impact on women’s reproductive hormones. Now, a team of University of Illinois Chicago researchers has published a study in Obesity that brings new evidence to the table. 

The researchers, led by Krista Varady, UIC professor of nutrition, followed a group of pre- and post-menopausal obese women for a period of eight weeks on the “warrior diet” method of intermittent fasting.

The warrior diet prescribes a time-restricted feeding window of four hours per day, during which dieters can eat without counting calories before resuming a water fast until the next day. 

They measured the differences in hormone levels, obtained by analyzing blood sample data, in groups of dieters who stuck to four- and six-hour feeding windows against a control group that followed no diet restrictions. 

Varady and her team found that levels of sex-binding globulin hormone, a protein that carries reproductive hormones throughout the body, was unchanged in the dieters after eight weeks. The same held true for both testosterone and androstenedione, a steroid hormone that the body uses to produce both testosterone and estrogen.

However, dehydroepiandrosterone or DHEA, a hormone that fertility clinics prescribe to improve ovarian function and egg quality, was significantly lower in both pre-menopausal and post-menopausal women at the end of the trial, dropping by about 14%.  

While the drop in DHEA levels was the most significant finding of the study, in both pre- and post-menopausal women, DHEA levels remained within the normal range by the end of the eight-week period.

“This suggests that in pre-menopausal women, the minor drop in DHEA levels has to be weighed against the proven fertility benefits of lower body mass,” Varady said. “The drop in DHEA levels in post-menopausal women could be concerning because menopause already causes a dramatic drop in estrogen, and DHEA is a primary component of estrogen. However, a survey of the participants reported no negative side effects associated with low estrogen post-menopause, such as sexual dysfunction or skin changes.“

As an added benefit, since high DHEA has been linked to breast cancer risk, Varady said a moderate drop in levels might be helpful in reducing that risk for both pre- and post-menopausal women. 

The study measured levels of estradiol, estrone and progesterone — all hormones vital to pregnancy — as well, but only in post-menopausal women, due to the changing levels of these hormones throughout pre-menopausal women’s menstrual cycles. Among post-menopausal women, there was no change in these hormones at the end of eight weeks. 

Women in both the four-hour and six-hour dieting groups experienced weight loss of 3% to 4% of their baseline weight throughout the course of the study, compared with the control group, which had almost no weight loss. The dieters also saw a drop in insulin resistance and in biomarkers of oxidative stress. 

Perimenopausal women, who are typically in their 40s, were excluded from the study. 

Still, Varady said, “I think this is a great first step. We’ve observed thousands of pre- and post-menopausal women through different alternate-day fasting and time-restricted eating strategies. All it’s doing is making people eat less. By shortening that eating window, you’re just naturally cutting calories. Much of the negative information on intermittent fasting reported has come from studies on mice or rats. We need more studies to look at the effects of intermittent fasting on humans.”

The study, “Effect of time-restricted eating on sex hormone levels in premenopausal and postmenopausal females” was supported by a grant (R01DK119783) from the National Institutes of Health.

Co-authors of the study are Faiza Kalam, Rand Akasheh, Sofia Cienfuegos, Aparna Ankireddy, Kelsey Gabel, Mark Ezpeleta, Shuhao Lin, Chandra Tamatam, Sekhar Reddy, Bonnie Spring and Seema Khan.

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JOURNAL

Obesity

DOI

10.1002/oby.23562 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Randomized controlled/clinical trial

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Effect of time-restricted eating on sex hormone levels in premenopausal and postmenopausal females

ARTICLE PUBLICATI

VLA finds cosmic rays driving galaxy's winds

Peer-Reviewed Publication

NATIONAL RADIO ASTRONOMY OBSERVATORY

 

IMAGE: ARTIST'S ILLUSTRATION OF COSMIC RAY DRIVEN WINDS (BLUE AND GREEN) SUPERIMPOSED ON A VISIBLE-LIGHT IMAGE OF THE TRIANGULUM GALAXY M33 (RED AND WHITE) OBSERVED WITH VLT SURVEY TELESCOPE AT ESO’S PARANAL OBSERVATORY IN CHILE. view more 

CREDIT: INSTITUTE FOR RESEARCH IN FUNDAMENTAL SCIENCES- IPM & EUROPEAN SOUTHERN OBSERVATORY (ESO).

Astronomers using the National Science Foundation's Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) have discovered an important new clue about how galaxies put the brakes on vigorous episodes of star formation. Their new study of the neighboring galaxy M33 indicates that fast-moving cosmic ray electrons can drive winds that blow away the gas needed to form new stars.

Such winds are responsible for slowing the rate of star formation as galaxies evolve over time. However, shock waves from supernova explosions and energetic, black hole-powered jets of material coming from galactic cores have been considered the primary drivers of those winds. Cosmic rays were thought to be minor contributors, particularly in galaxies like M33 that have regions of prolific star formation.

"We have seen galactic winds driven by cosmic rays in our own Milky Way and the Andromeda galaxy, which have much weaker rates of star formation, but not before in a galaxy such as M33," said Fatemah Tabatabaei, of the Institute for Research in Fundamental Sciences in Iran. 

Tabatabaei and an international team of scientists made detailed, multi-wavelength VLA observations of M33, a spiral galaxy nearly 3 million light-years away and part of the Local Group of galaxies that includes the Milky Way. They also used data from previous observations with the VLA, the Effelsberg radio telescope in Germany, and millimeter-wave, visible-light, and infrared telescopes.

Stars much more massive than our Sun speed through their life cycles, ultimately exploding as supernovae. The explosive shock waves can accelerate particles to nearly the speed of light, creating cosmic rays. Enough of these cosmic rays can build pressure that drives winds carrying away the gas needed to continue forming stars.

"The VLA observations indicated that cosmic rays in M33 are escaping the regions where they are born, making them able to drive more extensive winds," said William Cotton, of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory.

Based on their observations, the astronomers concluded that the numerous supernova explosions and supernova remnants in M33's giant complexes of prolific star formation made such cosmic ray-driven winds more likely.

"This means that cosmic rays probably are a more general cause of galactic winds, particularly at earlier times in the universe's history, when star formation was happening at a much higher rate," Tabatabaei said. She added, "This mechanism thus becomes a more important factor in understanding the evolution of galaxies over time."

Tabatabaei, Cotton and their colleagues are reporting their findings in the 25 October issue of the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

The National Radio Astronomy Observatory is a facility of the National Science Foundation, operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc.

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JOURNAL

Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Cloud-scale Radio Surveys of Star Formation and Feedback in Triangulum: VLA Observations

Virginia Tech researchers address the grand challenges of pandemic prediction and prevention

Grant and Award Announcement

VIRGINIA TECH

 

IMAGE: PREDICTIVE INTELLIGENCE FOR PANDEMIC PREVENTION GRANT TEAM MEMBERS (FROM LEFT) INCLUDE X.J. MENG, NEETI GANDHI, T.M. MURALI, BLESSY ANTONY, PADMA RAJAGOPALAN, ANDREW CHAN, SARAH GOUGER, LISA M. LEE, AND JIE BU. NOT PICTURED ARE SANKET DESHMUKH, KATHY HOSIG, LAURA HUNGERFORD, ANUJ KARPATNE, PAUL SKOLNIK, JAMES WEGER-LUCARELLI, KRISTINA JILES, CHARLIE PLATE, NURE TASNINA, AND KATIE TILLER. view more 

CREDIT: VIRGINIA TECH

Complex, ill-structured, and thorny challenges require a convergence of expertise to advance beyond disciplinary boundaries and develop new frameworks for problem-solving.

One such challenge continues to loom large on the global stage: SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

While COVID-19 is only one among many zoonotic viral diseases (those transmissible between animals and humans), its spread to pandemic proportions has highlighted important scientific, societal, and ethical aspects that require consideration for the successful prediction and prevention of further pandemics.

T.M. Murali, a professor in the Department of Computer Science, along with several colleagues from across Virginia Tech, has received a $1 million National Science Foundation grant to tackle grand challenges in the prediction and prevention of infectious disease pandemics. The award comes from the Predictive Intelligence for Pandemic Prevention (PIPP) program, which provides an opportunity for multidisciplinary teams to work across scientific and other disciplinary divides to implement an effective approach to pandemic predictive intelligence.

Murali, principal investigator in the grant, and the research team use the convergent power of their expertise to identify expedient, efficient, cost-effective options for the prevention and containment of zoonotic viruses.

“Virginia Tech is a great place to do this research,” said Murali. “It is challenging and exciting and all of the researchers are eager to work together to see how they can contribute value.”

X.J. Meng, co-principal investigator, University Distinguished Professor of Molecular Virology at the Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine and professor of internal medicine at the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine, said the university is well positioned to meet this challenge, citing the interdisciplinary and collaborative research taking place in the Center for Emerging, Zoonotic, and Arthropod-borne Pathogens (CeZAP), one of the four core centers within the Fralin Life Sciences Institute.

“With the establishment of CeZAP in 2020, and now with this PIPP Phase I center award on pandemic prevention led by Dr. Murali, Virginia Tech is on an upward trajectory to become a leader in infectious disease research and pandemic prevention,” said Meng.

Over the next 18 months, this team of experts will be scaling up coordination and mapping convergence opportunities to build the research capacity that will make Virginia Tech highly competitive for a national-level center. With the goal of predicting and preventing future pandemics using novel approaches to research and transdisciplinary problem-solving, the team will use its professional and technical expertise to develop a common discourse and shared research agenda across three cross-cutting themes. The work conducted in each theme will inform and be informed by the discoveries in the other themes.

Theme 1: Computational prediction of viral adaptation to human cells

James Weger-Lucarelli, an assistant professor in the Department of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology in the Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, and Anuj Karpatne, an assistant professor in the Department of Computer Science, will lend their expertise to developing computational and experimental methods to analyze the genomic sequences of viruses that currently infect animals. Determining how those viruses evolve in order to cross species barriers will lead to the development of predictive, science-guided machine learning models necessary for the effective development of interventions.

Critical to the development of these predictive models of zoonotic viral behaviors is work conducted by Padma Rajagopalan, the Robert E. Hord, Jr. professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering, a fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering, and the program director for the interdisciplinary graduate program on Computational Tissue Engineering.  Rajagopalan shares her expertise in 3D tissues, also known as organoids. “These organoids are lab-assembled and comprise almost all the cells found in a specific tissue,” she said. “We need these kind of tissues because they are the closest we can get before doing animal testing. Because they are 3D in nature, they can provide knowledge and insight as to what happens inside the body.”

Theme 2: Rapid repurposing and redesign of drugs to prevent viral replication

Determining the evolutionary behaviors of viruses that move between animal and human hosts and their subsequent actions on tissues provides foundational data to support the identification, repurposing, and redesign of existing drugs that may be used in the prevention and replication of zoonotic viruses.

Sanket Deshmukh, an associate professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering; Laura Hungerford, professor of veterinary public health and epidemiology and the department head for the Department of Population Health Sciences in the Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine; and Paul R. Skolnik, infectious disease physician and professor at the Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine, all contribute their expertise to explore the appropriateness of existing drug compounds, chemistry, design, and effectiveness to prevent viruses from evolving and/or replicating. 

Theme 3: Community-informed research

Despite the successful development and approval of multiple effective vaccines against SARS-CoV-2, the adoption of new pharmaceutical interventions has proven to be a barrier.

Specifically in the United States, societal resistance to vaccination has considerably hindered the ability of public health agencies to curb infections. Murali believes that one of the distinctive factors setting Virginia Tech’s proposal apart from its peers was the deep integration of community engagement.

“What we realized in the COVID-19 pandemic is that health professionals have to build trust with the community and scientists need to be informed about what the concerns are,” said Murali. As such, the investigators will engage with the community at large to develop an understanding of societal and ethical concerns of the research.

For Kathy Hosig, an associate professor in the Department of Population Health Sciences and director of the Virginia Tech Center for Public Health Practice and Research, this work is vitally important to public health, particularly for alleviating health inequities. “Bringing transdisciplinary teams together to tackle public health issues such as pandemic prediction and prevention will build capacity for both researchers and communities to efficiently and effectively address current and future health threats,” she said.

Murali; Hosig;h Lisa Lee, a research professor in the Department of Population Health Sciences, associate vice president for research and innovation, and director of the Division of Scholarly Integrity and Research Compliance; and Kristina Jiles, research assistant professor and public health extension specialist in the Center for Public Health Practice and Research, will lead community engagement studios between researchers and group members. The studios provide an atmosphere where researchers can describe their project in lay terms to patients, community members, and health care professionals with trained facilitators to moderate the discussion. The studios will launch later this fall or during the spring 2023 semester.

The success of interdisciplinary research programs and centers at Virginia Tech is evidence of the university’s commitment to becoming a global leader for the improvement of the quality of life and the human condition by inspiring and empowering people to learn, innovate, and serve beyond boundaries. Hosig credits this success to the passionate researchers, such as Murali, who are committed to transdisciplinary research and rigorous training for students to tackle sticky issues. She also acknowledges the Virginia Tech Graduate School and its support and flexibility to establish creative graduate certificates and to develop new strategies for training graduate students.

Vaginal immune activity increases after first-time intercourse

A study suggests the immune system in the vagina becomes more active after young women start having intercourse, which may increase or decrease sexually transmitted infection risk.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

ELIFE

The changes detected may have important implications for sexually transmitted infection (STI) risk. But the authors do not yet know if the changes increase or decrease the risk of acquiring an STI. 

Girls and young women between the ages of 15 and 24 have a higher risk of acquiring an STI than older women. However, it has not been determined if riskier behavioural choices or physiological factors may explain the increased risk. 

“We measured immune changes in young women before and after initiating sex to determine if immune changes may play a role in increased STI vulnerability,” says lead author Sean Hughes, a research scientist in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle, US.

Hughes and colleagues compared vaginal samples collected from 95 adolescent women in Kenya before or after they began having sexual intercourse. They found a sharp increase in proteins that control the immune response, including IL-1β, IL-2, and CXCL8, during the first year after the participants became sexually active. These changes were confirmed to not be due to pregnancy or having an STI.

The team reviewed data collected in two other studies to verify the result. One included 93 young women in Belgium, and another included 19 participants in the US. The combined data from those two studies also showed elevated levels of immune-controlling proteins, including IL-1β, IL-2, and CXCL8, after participants became sexually active. 

“The initiation of sexual activity was associated with higher levels of immune mediators, but we don’t know for sure if the start of sexual activity caused the changes,” says co-senior Florian Hladik, professor in the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Division at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, Seattle, Washington. “Other factors associated with the timing of sex initiation, such as socioeconomic status, could have contributed to immune system changes.”

The consequences of this immune activation are also not clear. The immune changes detected in the study may help boost fertility or may be a protective defence against sexually transmitted infections. If it is an attempt at defence, it may inadvertently increase young women’s vulnerability to HIV infection by recruiting the CD4 T immune cells targeted by the virus to the vagina. More studies are needed to confirm the connection between the start of sexual activity and these immune changes and understand their consequences for young women’s sexual health. 

“More research on the immune changes associated with the initiation of sexual activity may help us understand the elevated STI risk in young women,” says co-senior author Alison Roxby, Associate Professor of Infectious Disease and Global Health at the University of Washington School of Medicine. “It may also help us identify new ways to prevent STIs in this vulnerable population.” 

 

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JOURNAL

eLife

DOI

10.7554/eLife.78565 

ARTICLE TITLE

Starting to have sexual intercourse is associated with increases in cervicovaginal immune mediators in young women: a prospective study and meta-analysis