Article
Medicine, General & Internal
Laura Heath, Susan A. Jebb, Paul Aveyard, Carmen Piernas
Summary: Controversial evidence suggests that obesity may not pose a risk to health if a person leads a healthy lifestyle and does not have any metabolic complications. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between adherence to healthy lifestyle recommendations and the absence of metabolic complications in relation to cardiovascular disease and mortality rates based on different body mass index (BMI) categories. The findings suggest that meeting healthy lifestyle recommendations or not having metabolic complications can partially offset the risk of developing cardiovascular disease and premature mortality in overweight or obese individuals. Therefore, offering support to achieve and maintain a healthy weight and adopt healthy behaviors is crucial in preventive healthcare.
Article
Nutrition & Dietetics
Inken Behrendt, Mathias Fasshauer, Gerrit Eichner
Summary: The study shows that there is an association between gluten intake and markers of metabolic health, but all associations are weak and not clinically meaningful. Therefore, limiting gluten intake is unlikely to provide metabolic health benefits for the overall population.
EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF NUTRITION
(2021)
Article
Endocrinology & Metabolism
Louisa Gnatiuc Friedrichs, Eirini Trichia, Diego Aguilar-Ramirez, David Preiss
Summary: The metabolomic profiles of liver fat in the UK Biobank were investigated, and multiple metabolites were found to be positively associated with liver fat, including lipoprotein particle concentrations, triglycerides, fatty acids, and amino acids. Metabolite principal components showed a significant improvement in risk prediction for liver fat compared to conventional markers.
Article
Endocrinology & Metabolism
Filip Morys, Alain Dagher
Summary: Prior studies have linked obesity and components of metabolic health like hypertension or inflammation to increased hospitalizations and mortality in COVID-19 patients. Investigating over 1,000 individuals from the UK Biobank, researchers found that individuals with worse metabolic health are at increased risk of COVID-19-related death, with factors such as increased serum glucose levels, systolic blood pressure, and waist circumference contributing to this increased mortality.
FRONTIERS IN ENDOCRINOLOGY
(2021)
Article
Oncology
Andrew R. Marley, Ming Li, Victoria L. Champion, Yiqing Song, Jiali Han, Xin Li
Summary: High citrus consumption may increase melanoma risk, and a genome-wide analysis was conducted to study gene-citrus consumption interactions. Several genetic loci were identified that may elucidate the association between citrus consumption and melanoma risk, requiring further studies to confirm these findings.
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF CANCER
(2022)
Article
Multidisciplinary Sciences
Sofia Christakoudi, Elio Riboli, Evangelos Evangelou, Konstantinos K. Tsilidis
Summary: This study demonstrates associations between metabolic biomarkers and body shape as measured by waist and hip size, while inflammatory biomarkers were only associated with waist size. This suggests that different mechanistic pathways may contribute to body shape.
SCIENTIFIC REPORTS
(2022)
Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Desmond Zeya Chen, Delnaz Roshandel, Zhong Wang, Lei Sun, Andrew D. Paterson
Summary: The UK Biobank has been widely used for genome-wide association studies (GWAS), but the study of the X chromosome has been limited. Recent research has found significant differences in minor allele frequencies on the X chromosome, particularly at the boundaries between the pseudo-autosomal regions and the non-pseudo-autosomal regions. Additionally, a small fraction of sex chromosomes and some autosomal SNPs also showed significant differences in minor allele frequencies.
HUMAN MOLECULAR GENETICS
(2023)
Article
Nutrition & Dietetics
Fang Shao, Yina Chen, Hongyang Xu, Xin Chen, Jiawei Zhou, Yaqian Wu, Yingdan Tang, Zhongtian Wang, Ruyang Zhang, Theis Lange, Hongxia Ma, Zhibin Hu, Hongbing Shen, David C. Christiani, Feng Chen, Yang Zhao, Dongfang You
Summary: Metabolically healthy obesity and overweight individuals have a lower risk of developing lung cancer, while metabolically unhealthy underweight individuals have a higher risk. Mendelian randomization analysis did not show any genetic association between metabolic obesity phenotypes and lung cancer risk.
Article
Endocrinology & Metabolism
Sofia Christakoudi, Konstantinos K. Tsilidis, Evangelos Evangelou, Elio Riboli
Summary: Obesity is associated with low-grade inflammation and increased risk of venous thromboembolism, but the associations with platelet count and body shape are unclear. This study used different body shape indices to evaluate the associations of body mass index (BMI), allometric body shape index (ABSI), and hip index (HI) with platelet count and size. The results showed that the associations vary between different groups and factors such as sex, age, alcohol consumption, and smoking play a role.
BIOLOGY OF SEX DIFFERENCES
(2023)
Article
Medicine, General & Internal
Snehal M. Pinto Pereira, Victoria Garfield, Aliki-Eleni Farmaki, David J. Tomlinson, Thomas Norris, Ghazaleh Fatemifar, Spiros Denaxas, Chris Finan, Rachel Cooper
Summary: This study aimed to investigate the causal links between adiposity and grip strength. The findings suggest that higher body fat percentage (BF%) and waist-hip-ratio (WHR) are associated with weaker grip strength, while higher body mass index (BMI) and waist circumference (WC) are associated with stronger grip strength, particularly in males. The associations were weaker for BMI and WC at older ages. In females, higher BF% was associated with weaker grip and higher WC was associated with stronger grip.
Article
Medicine, General & Internal
Jessica Gong, Katie Harris, Sanne A. E. Peters, Mark Woodward
Summary: The study found that several mid-life cardiovascular risk factors were associated with dementia similarly in women and men, but there was a difference in the effect of raised blood pressure between the sexes. Future bespoke blood pressure-lowering trials are needed to understand its role in cognitive decline restriction and to clarify any sex differences.
Article
Genetics & Heredity
Elena Bernabeu, Oriol Canela-Xandri, Konrad Rawlik, Andrea Talenti, James Prendergast, Albert Tenesa
Summary: Sex-stratified GWAS analyses of 530 traits within 452,264 individuals of European ancestry from the UK Biobank provide insights into the scope of genotype by sex interactions and the genetics of sex differences. Small yet widespread differences in genetic architecture across traits were found, emphasizing the importance of considering sex-aware analyses in future studies to understand sex-specific molecular mechanisms.
Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Irina Milanova, Nikita L. Korpel, Felipe Correa-da-Silva, Eline Berends, Samar Osman, Susanne E. la Fleur, Eric Fliers, Andries Kalsbeek, Chun-Xia Yi
Summary: The study found that microglial insulin signaling plays a role in the control of systemic energy balance and this function is sex-dependent. Lack of microglial InsR can lead to increased plasma insulin levels and insulin resistance in female obese mice.
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF MOLECULAR SCIENCES
(2022)
Article
Cardiac & Cardiovascular Systems
Tae-Min Rhee, Kyung-Yeon Lee, Jungmin Choi, Eue-Keun Choi, Hyo-Jeong Ahn, So-Ryoung Lee, Seil Oh, Gregory Y. H. Lip
Summary: This study evaluated the association between neuroticism and long-term risk of sudden cardiac death (SCD). The results showed that a high neuroticism score was significantly associated with a lower risk of SCD, especially in women.
CLINICAL RESEARCH IN CARDIOLOGY
(2023)
Article
Medicine, General & Internal
Solange Parra-Soto, Emma S. Cowley, Leandro F. M. Rezende, Catterina Ferreccio, John C. Mathers, Jill P. Pell, Frederick K. Ho, Carlos Celis-Morales
Summary: This study investigated the associations of six adiposity markers with incidence and mortality from 24 cancers, finding that regardless of the marker used, adiposity was associated with an increased risk in 10 cancer sites. The linear associations were observed for most cancer types, indicating a consistent relationship between adiposity and cancer risk.
Article
Oncology
Guy Kelman, Nadav Brandes, Michal Linial
Summary: This article presents a new cancer portal that quantifies and presents gene selection in tumors across 33 cancer types and pan-cancer based on the biochemical functional effects of mutations at the protein level. Users can view known and overlooked cancer genes through the portal's simple visual interface.
Article
Immunology
Danielle Klinger, Brian L. Hill, Noam Barda, Eran Halperin, Ofer N. Gofrit, Charles L. Greenblatt, Nadav Rappoport, Michal Linial, Herve Bercovier
Summary: BCG treatment in bladder cancer patients is associated with a significantly reduced risk of developing Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease, especially in the elderly population aged 75 years or older. This beneficial effect may be attributed to the activation of long-term nonspecific immune effects.
Article
Oncology
Roni Rasnic, Michal Linial
Summary: This study utilized a machine learning algorithm to accurately detect chromoanagenesis and analyze specific characteristics of this phenomenon in different types of cancer, revealing prominent genes affected and showing a mutual exclusivity relationship between genes impaired in chromoanagenesis versus non-chromoanagenesis tumorigenesis. These findings provide potential targets for cancer diagnostic and therapeutic purposes.
Article
Immunology
Orna Mor, Michal Mandelboim, Shay Fleishon, Efrat Bucris, Dana Bar-Ilan, Michal Linial, Ital Nemet, Limor Kliker, Yaniv Lustig, Ella S. Mendelson, Neta S. Zuckerman
Summary: The study identified a new variant B.1.362+L452R of SARS-CoV-2, carrying the L452R mutation associated with increased infection and reduced neutralization. This variant infected hundreds of individuals in Israel but declined due to the dominance of the Alpha variant, highlighting the importance of routine surveillance and detection of novel variants in preventing disease spread.
Article
Immunology
Neta S. Zuckerman, Shay Fleishon, Efrat Bucris, Dana Bar-Ilan, Michal Linial, Itay Bar-Or, Victoria Indenbaum, Merav Weil, Yaniv Lustig, Ella Mendelson, Michal Mandelboim, Orna Mor, Neta Zuckerman
Summary: Routine monitoring for sequencing is necessary for a novel local Israeli variant with a non-synonymous mutation in the spike protein, which was successfully neutralized by sera from fully vaccinated individuals.
Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Keren Zohar, Elyad Lezmi, Tsiona Eliyahu, Michal Linial
Summary: The compound ladostigil has been shown to alleviate cell damage induced by oxidation, inhibit microglial activation, and improve learning deficits under conditions of chronic oxidative stress in the aging brain.
Article
Biochemical Research Methods
Nadav Brandes, Dan Ofer, Yam Peleg, Nadav Rappoport, Michal Linial
Summary: Self-supervised deep language modeling has achieved unprecedented success with natural language tasks, and the authors introduce a new deep language model called ProteinBERT specifically designed for proteins, which efficiently handles long sequences and achieves near or even better performance than other methods, providing an effective framework for rapid training of protein predictors.
Article
Virology
Rachel Shirazi, Paolo Pozzi, Yael Gozlan, Marina Wax, Yaniv Lustig, Michal Linial, Ella Mendelson, Svetlana Bardenstein, Orna Mor
Summary: In Israel, although the seroprevalence of HEV in humans is around 10% and camels and swine have high rates of HEV infection, no cases of chronic HEV infection have been reported. Despite two HEV-RNA positive patients, only one was confirmed to have acute HEV-1 infection.
Article
Health Care Sciences & Services
Ido Blass, Tali Sahar, Adi Shraibman, Dan Ofer, Nadav Rappoport, Michal Linial
Summary: This study aimed to develop a model for endometriosis based on the UK-biobank data and re-assess the contribution of known risk factors to this condition. By using machine learning algorithms, an effective prediction model was achieved. The study found that women diagnosed with endometriosis had more diagnoses of other diseases prior to the diagnosis. Using the explainable AI tool SHAP, informative features related to endometriosis were identified.
JOURNAL OF PERSONALIZED MEDICINE
(2022)
Review
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Naomi van Wijk, Keren Zohar, Michal Linial
Summary: This review article discusses the role of mature microRNAs (miRNAs) in post-transcriptional regulation and their involvement in key cellular processes. It emphasizes the importance of miRNA storage and translocation in regulating cellular responses to stress and changing conditions. The article also highlights the shared principles of miRNA regulation in oxidative stress, tumorigenesis, viral infection, and synaptic plasticity.
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF MOLECULAR SCIENCES
(2022)
Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Keren Zohar, Eliran Giladi, Tsiona Eliyahu, Michal Linial
Summary: Neurodegenerative disorders, brain injury, and aging lead to reduced ability of brain cells to cope with oxidative stress and inflammation. This study focused on the response to oxidative stress in SH-SY5Y cells and identified several differentially expressed lncRNAs associated with redox homeostasis, energy metabolism, and neurodegenerative diseases. The impact of ladostigil, an antioxidant and anti-inflammatory agent, on lncRNA expression levels was also examined. These findings suggest that lncRNAs may play a role in cellular homeostasis and could be potential targets for drugs that impact cell viability.
Article
Genetics & Heredity
Roei Zucker, Michael Kovalerchik, Michal Linial
Summary: Hypertension is a polygenic disease that affects a large number of adults worldwide. Although the heritability of hypertension is high, our understanding of its underlying mechanisms is limited. In this study, we compared the findings from genome-wide association studies and proteome-wide association studies in patients with essential hypertension. We identified a number of associated genes, many of which were only significant in the gene-based approach. Furthermore, we found that the genetic effects of hypertension are sex-dependent, with stronger effects in females. Our study provides insights into the biology of hypertension and highlights the importance of considering sex-dependent genetic effects.
Article
Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
Keren Zohar, Elyad Lezmi, Fanny Reichert, Tsiona Eliyahu, Shlomo Rotshenker, Marta Weinstock, Michal Linial
Summary: This study found that the combination of bzATP and LPS can induce a sustained and robust inflammatory response in neonatal microglial cells, characterized by the release of pro-inflammatory cytokines and the induction of long noncoding RNAs. Analyzing the transcriptional profile and related signaling pathways, the researchers suggest that neonatal glial cells exhibit a distinctive expression program in which inflammatory-related genes are significantly upregulated.
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF MOLECULAR SCIENCES
(2023)
Article
Genetics & Heredity
Tair Shauli, Nadav Brandes, Michal Linial
Summary: This study introduces human-specific amino acid substitution matrices based on genetic variations in the modern human population, which are fundamentally different from classic cross-species matrices. Moreover, the study also proposes a purifying selection signal in the human proteome.
NAR GENOMICS AND BIOINFORMATICS
(2021)