Project description:A major reservoir for spread of the emerging pathogen Acinetobacter baumannii is hopsital surfaces, where bacteria persist in a desiccated state. To identify gene products influencing desiccation survival, a transposon sequencing (Tn-seq) screen was performed. Using this approach, we identified genes both positively and negatively impacting the desiccation tolerance of A. baumannii.
Project description:Primary objectives: The primary objective is to investigate circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) via deep sequencing for mutation detection and by whole genome sequencing for copy number analyses before start (baseline) with regorafenib and at defined time points during administration of regorafenib for treatment efficacy in colorectal cancer patients in terms of overall survival (OS).
Primary endpoints: circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) via deep sequencing for mutation detection and by whole genome sequencing for copy number analyses before start (baseline) with regorafenib and at defined time points during administration of regorafenib for treatment efficacy in colorectal cancer patients in terms of overall survival (OS).
Project description:The bacterial pathogen, Acinetobacter baumannii, is a leading cause of drug-resistant infections. Here, we investigated the potential of developing nanobodies that specifically recognize A. baumannii over other Gram-negative bacteria. Through generation and panning of a synthetic nanobody library, we identified several potential lead candidates. We demonstrate how incorporation of next generation sequencing analysis can aid in selection of lead candidates for further characterization. Using monoclonal phage display, we validated the binding of several lead nanobodies to A. baumannii. Subsequent purification and biochemical characterization revealed one particularly robust nanobody that broadly and specifically bound A. baumannii compared to other common drug resistant pathogens. These findings support the potentially for nanobodies to selectively target A. baumannii and the identification of lead candidates for possible future diagnostic and therapeutic development.
Project description:YerA41 is a myoviridae bacteriophage that was originally isolated due its ability to infect Yersinia ruckeri bacteria, the causative agent of enteric redmouth disease of salmonid fish. Several attempts to determine its genomic DNA sequence using traditional and next generation sequencing technologies failed, indicating that the phage genome is modified such way that it is an unsuitable template for PCR amplification and sequencing. To determine the YerA41 genome sequence we isolated RNA from phage-infected Y. ruckeri cells at different time points post-infection, and sequenced it. The host-genome specific reads were substracted and de novo assembly was performed on the unaligned reads.
Project description:The increasing rate of antibiotic-resistant bacteria has become a serious health threat. Thus, it is important to discover, characterize, and optimize new molecules to overcome infections caused by these bacteria. It is known that Acinetobacter baumannii has a high capacity to avoid antibacterial drugs. Consequently, these bacteria have emerged as one of responsible for hospital and community-acquired infections. However, how this pathogen infects and survives inside the host cell is unknown. Here we analyze the time-resolved transcriptional profile changes on human epithelial HeLa cells after A. baumannii. Our results show how A.baumannii can survive in host cells and starts replication at 4 hours post infection. We sequenced RNA to obtain a set of differentially expressed gen (DEGs) used for a Gene Ontology (GO) and KEGG pathway analysis. The results show us how host bacteria is altering the host cells environment for their own benefit. We also determine chromosomal regions affected by our set of genes. Furthermore, we obtain protein-protein networks that reveal highly interacted proteins. The combination of these results will pave the way to discover new antimicrobial candidates for multidrug-resistant bacteria.
Project description:Whole-genome sequencing is an important way to understand the genetic information, gene function, biological characteristics, and living mechanisms of organisms. There is no difficulty to have mega-level genomes sequenced at present. However, we encountered a hard-to-sequence genome of Pseudomonas aeruginosa phage PaP1. The shotgun sequencing method failed to dissect this genome. After insisting for 10 years and going over 3 generations of sequencing techniques, we successfully dissected the PaP1 genome with 91,715 bp in length. Single-molecule sequencing revealed that this genome contains lots of modified bases, including 51 N6-methyladenines (m6A) and 152 N4-methylcytosines (m4C). At the same time, further investigations revealed a novel immune mechanism of bacteria, by which the host bacteria can recognize and repel the modified bases containing inserts in large scale, and this led to the failure of the shotgun method in PaP1 genome sequencing. Strategy of resolving this problem is use of non-library dependent sequencing techniques or use of the nfi- mutant of E. coli DH5M-NM-1 as the host bacteria to construct the shotgun library. In conclusion, we unlock the mystery of phage PaP1 genome hard to be sequenced, and discover a new mechanism of bacterial immunity in present study. Methylation profiling of Pseudomonas aeruginosa phage PaP1 using kinetic data generated by single-molecule, real-time (SMRT) sequencing on the PacBio RS.
Project description:The naked mole-rat (NMR; Heterocephalus glaber) has recently gained considerable attention in the scientific community for its unique potential to unveil novel insights in the fields of medicine, biochemistry, and evolution. NMRs exhibit unique adaptations that include protracted fertility, cancer resistance, eusociality, and anoxia. This suite of adaptations is not found in other rodent species, suggesting that interrogating conserved and accelerated regions in the NMR genome will find regions of the NMR genome fundamental to their unique adaptations. However, the current NMR genome assembly has limits that make studying structural variations, heterozygosity, and non-coding adaptations challenging. We present a complete diploid naked-mole rat genome assembly by integrating long-read and 10X-linked read genome sequencing of a male NMR and its parents, and Hi-C sequencing in the NMR hypothalamus (N=2). Reads were identified as maternal, paternal or ambiguous (TrioCanu). We then polished genomes with Flye, Racon and Medaka. Assemblies were then scaffolded using the following tools in order: Scaff10X, Salsa2, 3d-DNA, Minimap2-alignment between assemblies, and the Juicebox Assembly Tools. We then subjected the assemblies to another round of polishing, including short-read polishing with Freebayes. We assembled the NMR mitochondrial genome with mitoVGP. Y chromosome contigs were identified by aligning male and female 10X linked reads to the paternal genome and finding male-biased contigs not present in the maternal genome. Contigs were assembled with publicly available male NMR Fibroblast Hi-C-seq data (SRR820318). Both assemblies have their sex chromosome haplotypes merged so that both assemblies have a high-quality X and Y chromosome. Finally, assemblies were evaluated with Quast, BUSCO, and Merqury, which all reported the base-pair quality and contiguity of both assemblies as high-quality. The assembly will next be annotated by Ensembl using public RNA-seq data from multiple tissues (SRP061363). Together, this assembly will provide a high-quality resource to the NMR and comparative genomics communities.