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Anaplasma phagocytophilum and Anaplasma ovis–Emerging Pathogens in the German Sheep Population
(2021)
Knowledge on the occurrence of pathogenic tick-borne bacteria Anaplasma phagocytophilum and Anaplasma ovis is scarce in sheep from Germany. In 2020, owners from five flocks reported ill thrift lambs and ewes with tick infestation. Out of 67 affected sheep, 55 animals were clinically examined and hematological values, blood chemistry and fecal examinations were performed to investigate the underlying disease causes. Serological tests (cELISA, IFAT) and qPCR were applied to all affected sheep to rule out A. phagocytophilum and A. ovis as a differential diagnosis. Ticks were collected from selected pastures and tested by qPCR. Most animals (n = 43) suffered from selenium deficiency and endoparasites were detected in each flock. Anaplasma spp. antibodies were determined in 59% of examined sheep. Seventeen animals tested positive for A. phagocytophilum by qPCR from all flocks and A. phagocytophilum was also detected in eight pools of Ixodes ricinus. Anaplasma phagocytophilum isolates from sheep and ticks were genotyped using three genes (16S rRNA, msp4 and groEL). Anaplasma ovis DNA was identified in six animals from one flock. Clinical, hematological and biochemical changes were not significantly associated with Anaplasma spp. infection. The 16S rRNA analysis revealed known variants of A. phagocytophilum, whereas the msp4 and groEL showed new genotypes. Further investigations are necessary to evaluate the dissemination and health impact of both pathogens in the German sheep population particularly in case of comorbidities.
Objektive Eingruppierung sequenzierter Tollwutisolate mithilfe des Affinity Propagation Clusterings.
(2018)
Das International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) reguliert die Nomenklatur von Viren sowie die Entstehung neuer Taxa (dazu gehören: Ordnung, Familie, Unterfamilie, Gattung und Art/Spezies). Dank dieser Anstrengungen ist die Einteilung für verschiedenste Viren in diese Kategorien klar und transparent nachvollziehbar. In den vergangenen Jahrzehnten sind insgesamt mehr als 21.000 Datensätze der Spezies „rabies lyssavirus“ (RABV) sequenziert worden. Eine weiterführende Unterteilung der sequenzierten Virusisolate dieser Spezies ist bislang jedoch nicht einheitlich vorgeschlagen. Die große Anzahl an sequenzierten Isolaten führte auf Basis von phylogenetischen Bäumen zu uneindeutigen Ergebnissen bei der Einteilung in Cluster. Inhalt meiner Dissertation ist daher ein Vorschlag, diese Problematik mit der Anwendung einer partitionierenden Clusteringmethode zu lösen. Dazu habe ich erstmals die Methodik des affinity propagation clustering (AP) für solche Fragestellungen eingesetzt. Als Datensatz wurden alle verfügbaren sequenzierten Vollgenomisolate der Spezies RABV analysiert. Die Analysen des Datensatzes ergaben vier Hauptcluster, die sich geographisch separieren ließen und entsprechend als „Arctic“, „Cosmopolitain“, „Asian“ und „New World“ bezeichnet wurden. Weiterführende Analysen erlaubten auch eine weitere Aufteilung dieser Hauptcluster in 12-13 Untercluster. Zusätzlich konnte ich einen Workflow generieren, der die Möglichkeit bietet, die mittels AP definierten Cluster mit den Ergebnissen der phylogenetischen Auswertungen zu kombinieren. Somit lassen sich sowohl Verwandtschaftsverhältnisse erkennen als auch eine objektive Clustereinteilung vornehmen. Dies könnte auch ein möglicher Analyseweg für weitere Virusspezies oder andere vergleichende Sequenzanalysen sein.
Simple Summary
Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) ranks second among the leading causes of cancer-related death. Since current therapeutic options are very limited, a deeper understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying the tumor onset and progression of HCC holds great potential for improved therapeutic options. Although it has been shown that deleted in liver cancer 1 (DLC1) acts as a tumor suppressor whose allele is lost in 50% of liver cancers, alterations in gene expression initiated by DLC1 loss have not yet been the primary focus of liver cancer research. To identify novel gene targets that allow for a personalized medicine approach for HCC therapy, we performed gene expression profiling for HepG2 cells stably expressing DLC1shRNA. We provide evidence that TSPAN5 is required for HCC growth, migration and invasion, and dissected the underlying molecular mechanisms involving myocardin-related transcription factors. Thus, TSPAN5 represents a novel therapeutic target for the treatment of HCC characterized by DLC1 loss.
Abstract
Human hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is among the most lethal and common cancers in the human population, and new molecular targets for therapeutic intervention are urgently needed. Deleted in liver cancer 1 (DLC1) was originally identified as a tumor suppressor gene in human HCC. DLC1 is a Rho-GTPase-activating protein (RhoGAP) which accelerates the return of RhoGTPases to an inactive state. We recently described that the restoration of DLC1 expression induces cellular senescence. However, this principle is not amenable to direct therapeutic targeting. We therefore performed gene expression profiling for HepG2 cells depleted of DLC1 to identify druggable gene targets mediating the effects of DLC1 on senescence induction. This approach revealed that versican (VCAN), tetraspanin 5 (TSPAN5) and N-cadherin (CDH2) were strongly upregulated upon DLC1 depletion in HCC cells, but only TSPAN5 affected the proliferation of HCC cells and human HCC. The depletion of TSPAN5 induced oncogene-induced senescence (OIS), mediated by the p16INK4a/pRb pathways. Mechanistically, silencing TSPAN5 reduced actin polymerization and thereby myocardin-related transcription factor A- filamin A (MRTF-A-FLNA) complex formation, resulting in decreased expression of MRTF/SRF-dependent target genes and senescence induction in vitro and in vivo. Our results identify TSPAN5 as a novel druggable target for HCC.