Review
Neurosciences
Areez Shafqat, Ibrahem Albalkhi, Hamzah M. Magableh, Tariq Saleh, Khaled Alkattan, Ahmed Yaqinuddin
Summary: Poor axonal regeneration and functional recovery after SCI is not primarily due to the injury scar, but rather a failure to stimulate axon growth adequately. Targeting neuroinflammation and glial scarring may not be as effective as neuron-directed approaches. This raises questions about the viability of these translational avenues.
FRONTIERS IN CELLULAR NEUROSCIENCE
(2023)
Article
Biochemical Research Methods
Angelo Fortunato, Diego Mallo, Shawn M. Rupp, Lorraine M. King, Timothy Hardman, Joseph Y. Lo, Allison Hall, Jeffrey R. Marks, E. Shelley Hwang, Carlo C. Maley
Summary: A new bioinformatic pipeline was developed to accurately identify somatic single nucleotide variants (SNVs) from archival FFPE samples of breast cancers, resulting in a significant improvement in SNV detection compared to existing tools. The method demonstrated increased accuracy and efficiency in detecting mutations, particularly in comparing different stages of breast cancer.
BRIEFINGS IN BIOINFORMATICS
(2021)
Article
Chemistry, Analytical
Daniel C. Castro, Karl W. Smith, Miles D. Norsworthy, Stanislav S. Rubakhin, Chad R. Weisbrod, Christopher L. Hendrickson, Jonathan V. Sweedler
Summary: The mammalian brain contains a wide variety of lipid species, which play important roles in its structure and function. Changes in lipid profiles can affect cell function and phenotype. However, comprehensive lipid profiling of individual cells is challenging due to the limited sample material and diverse chemical composition of lipids.
ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY
(2023)
Article
Biochemical Research Methods
Salvatore Milite, Riccardo Bergamin, Lucrezia Patruno, Nicola Calonaci, Giulio Caravagna
Summary: CONGAS is a Bayesian probabilistic method that can determine the composition of tumor subclones and differentiate RNA expression differences by jointly identifying clusters of single cells. It has important implications for cancer research.
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Yupu Wang, Ruiling Zhang, Sihao Huang, Parisa Tajalli Tehrani Valverde, Meike Lobb-Rabe, James Ashley, Lalanti Venkatasubramanian, Robert A. Carrillo
Summary: Neuronal death and brain dysfunction are characteristics of aging and neurodegeneration. This study demonstrates that healthy neurons can compensate for the death of their neighbors through cross-neuron plasticity in the Drosophila larval neuromuscular system. The Draper engulfment receptor and the Shark kinase are found to be essential for this compensation, and overexpression of the Draper-I isoform enhances cross-neuron plasticity. These findings provide insights into how healthy bystander neurons respond to the loss of neighboring neurons.
NATURE COMMUNICATIONS
(2023)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Duc Tran, Bang Tran, Hung Nguyen, Tin Nguyen
Summary: The novel imputation method, scISR, reliably recovers dropout values in scRNA-seq data, improving the quality of expression profile analysis.
SCIENTIFIC REPORTS
(2022)
Review
Neurosciences
Manasi Agrawal, Kristy Welshhans
Summary: Recent research has shown significant progress in understanding mRNA localization and local translation in axons and dendrites. It has been discovered that these processes are essential for neural development and play a crucial role in mediating structural and functional changes during synaptogenesis. Further studies are needed to explore the functional significance of mRNA localization and local translation in various stages of neural development.
FRONTIERS IN MOLECULAR NEUROSCIENCE
(2021)
Article
Medicine, Research & Experimental
Jin Young Hong, Junseon Lee, Hyun Kim, Changhwan Yeo, Wan-Jin Jeon, Yoon Jae Lee, In- Hyuk Ha
Summary: Spinal cord injury often leads to the formation of glial scar tissue, hindering neural regeneration. This study demonstrates that Shinbaro2 (Sh2) can ameliorate glial scars and promote axon growth after spinal cord injury. Sh2 reduces inflammation, inhibits scar formation, and enhances motor function recovery.
BIOMEDICINE & PHARMACOTHERAPY
(2023)
Article
Anatomy & Morphology
Gloria Astolfi, Carmen Ciavarella, Sabrina Valente, Chiara Coslovi, Danilo Iannetta, Luigi Fontana, Gianandrea Pasquinelli, Piera Versura
Summary: The aim of this study was to optimize a coculture in vitro model between human Muller glial cells and human umbilical vein endothelial cells to mimic the inner blood-retinal barrier and assess its resistance to oxidative stress-induced damage. The coculture maintained distinct cell types and tight cell-cell junctions up to the 8th passage, but only acquired a slight resistance to oxidative stress induction over passages. The MIO-M1/HUVECs coculture is a simple, reproducible, and affordable model for studying oxidative stress-induced retinal damages in vitro.
MICROSCOPY RESEARCH AND TECHNIQUE
(2023)
Article
Materials Science, Biomaterials
Sven A. Saemundsson, Saheli Ganguly, Shane D. Curry, Andrew P. Goodwin, Jennifer N. Cha
Summary: The role of stromal and immune cells in transforming the tumor microenvironment is important for understanding tumor cell behavior and drug development. In this study, the researchers used DNA hybridization to modulate the interactions between cancer cells and fibroblasts and achieved a uniform distribution of the two cell types in 3D coculture tumor spheroids. The distribution of heterotypic cells within the spheroids influenced the production of extracellular matrix protein, which can affect tumor progression, metastasis, and drug resistance.
ACS BIOMATERIALS SCIENCE & ENGINEERING
(2023)
Article
Chemistry, Multidisciplinary
Pascal Achenbach, Laura Hillerbrand, Joseï L. Gerardo-Nava, Axel Dievernich, Dorothee Hodde, Antonio S. Sechi, Paul D. Dalton, Andrij Pich, Joachim Weis, Haktan Altinova, Gary A. Brook
Summary: Schwann cell transplantation is hindered by barrier formation between grafted cells and reactive astrocytes, limiting axonal regeneration. A cell confrontation assay revealed that oriented poly(& epsilon;-caprolactone) nanofibers reduced astrocyte reactivity and facilitated intermingling between Schwann cells and astrocytes, promoting neurite outgrowth. These findings have important implications for the design of biomaterial-based scaffolds for nervous tissue repair.
Article
Neurosciences
Cody J. Smith
Summary: This article discusses the evolutionary conservation and essential roles of glial cells in the nervous system. The author introduces glia in non-mammalian model systems, summarizes important findings using these models, and highlights new questions in glial cell biology.
CURRENT OPINION IN NEUROBIOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Biophysics
David S. Tourigny, Arthur P. Goldberg, Jonathan R. Karr
Summary: Stochasticity from gene expression in single cells drives metabolic heterogeneity at the level of cellular populations, with important consequences for microbial drug tolerance and treatment of human diseases like cancer. Computational methods can bridge the gap in characterizing single-cell metabolism and contribute to a systems understanding of single-cell biology.
BIOPHYSICAL JOURNAL
(2021)
Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Jason Dang, Shashi Kant Tiwari, Kriti Agrawal, Hui Hui, Yue Qin, Tariq M. Rana
Summary: By utilizing human cerebral organoids and single-cell RNA sequencing, the study found that METH exposure during prenatal development affects fetal brain development by influencing neural stem cell proliferation, differentiation, and cell death, and induces neuroinflammation. These findings suggest that human cerebral organoids can serve as a model system to study drug-induced neuroinflammation at single-cell resolution.
MOLECULAR PSYCHIATRY
(2021)
Article
Chemistry, Multidisciplinary
Xingxiu Chen, Zongkai Peng, Zhibo Yang
Summary: Cell-cell interactions are crucial for cell signaling and maintaining normal functions. Metabolomics studies provide insights into cell-cell communication. This study utilized single cell mass spectrometry analysis to explore the effects of cell-cell interactions on metabolites. Drug-sensitive cancer cells exhibited significantly increased drug resistance and altered metabolites through interactions with drug-resistant cells.