New scientific evidence of sexual transmission of the Zika virus

An analysis has shown 100% genetic correlation between the form of the virus present in a man who contracted the virus in Brazil and that of a woman who had never travelled in the epidemic area, but who had sexual relations with him.

A study by researchers from Inserm, the Paris Public Hospitals (Bichat Hospital, AP-HP), Aix-Marseille University, and the National Reference Centre for Arboviruses confirms that the ZIKA virus can be transmitted sexually. Their analyses have shown 100% genetic correlation between the form of the virus present in a man who contracted the virus in Brazil and that of a woman who had never travelled in the epidemic area, but who had sexual relations with him. These results are published in The New England Journal of medicine.

The ZIKA virus, a member of the Flavivirus family, is almost exclusively transmitted to humans by Aedes mosquitoes. Although Zika infection usually causes mild symptoms, it can be responsible for severe neurological complications, particularly in the infant of a woman infected while pregnant. Some indications of possible sexual transmission of the virus have been reported before now.

For the first time, and to take things further, French researchers have been able to culture the infecting virus from two people seeking a consultation for suspected ZIKA infection. Specimens of urine, saliva and blood were taken from a man who returned from Brazil, and had contracted the virus there. The same specimens were taken from a sick woman who had sexual relations with this man, but who had never travelled to an epidemic area.

While the virus was detected in the urine and saliva of the woman, analysis of the specimens showed that it was absent from the blood and saliva of the man, making it unlikely that transmission occurred by these routes. The researchers then tested his semen for the virus, and detected high viral loads at 15 days and at 3 weeks after the patient's return from Brazil (approximately 300 million copies/ml).

The virus from both persons was individually sequenced (using a saliva sample from the woman and a semen sample from the man) for genetic analysis. Examination showed 100% correlation between the two genetic sequences. Apart from 4 mutations, all of them "synonymous," the nucleotide sequences both encoded an identical form of the virus.

"Our work confirms, using molecular analyses, that sexual transmission of the ZIKA virus exists, and should be taken into consideration when making recommendations, due to its persistence in the semen several weeks after infection. The period for which men should systematically have protected sexual relations (even oral) needs to be defined," explains Yazdan Yazdanpanah.

source: sciencedaily.com 

   

 

 

 

 

Researchers uncover earliest events following HIV infection, before virus is detectable

When researchers exposed rhesus monkeys to SIV and conducted analyses of the animals on days 0, 1, 3, 7 and 10 following exposure, they found that SIV could disseminate rapidly through the body, with viral RNA (SIV's genetic material) present in at least one tissue outside the reproductive tract in most monkeys analyzed 24 hours after exposure. (stock image)

New research in monkeys exposed to SIV, the animal equivalent of HIV, reveals what happens in the very earliest stages of infection, before virus is even detectable in the blood, which is a critical but difficult period to study in humans. The findings, published online today in the journal Cell, have important implications for vaccine development and other strategies to prevent infection.

"The events during the first few days after exposure to the virus and prior to the initial detection of virus in the blood are critical in determining the course of infection, but this period is essentially impossible to study in humans," said lead author Dan Barouch, MD, PhD, Director of the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) and Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. "Our study is the most comprehensive evaluation of acute HIV/SIV infection to date."

The study was initiated as part of the National Institutes of Health-funded Consortium for AIDS Vaccine Research and involved multiple collaborating laboratories, including those headed by Rafick-Pierre Sekaly, PhD, of Case Western Reserve University and Jeffrey Lifson, MD, of the Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research.

When Barouch and his colleagues exposed 44 rhesus monkeys to SIV and conducted analyses of the animals on days 0, 1, 3, 7 and 10 following exposure, they found that SIV could disseminate rapidly through the body, with viral RNA (SIV's genetic material) present in at least one tissue outside the reproductive tract in most monkeys analyzed 24 hours after exposure.

"In addition to rapid viral dissemination, the virus triggered a local inflammatory response that appears to suppress antiviral innate and adaptive immunity, thus potentially augmenting its own replication," explained Barouch. "These data provide important insights into the earliest events of infection."

The inflammatory response occurred in virus-infected tissues soon after exposure to SIV, and increasing amounts of viral RNA correlated with rising amounts of a host protein called NLRX1, which inhibits antiviral immune responses. In addition, the TGF-beta cell-signaling pathway, which suppresses adaptive immune responses, was triggered and correlated with lower levels of antiviral T immune cell responses, as well as higher levels of SIV replication. The researchers observed elevated expression of genes in the TGF-beta pathway in tissues that contained viral RNA as early as day 1 after exposure to the virus.

The findings suggest that there may be a very narrow window of opportunity to contain or eliminate the virus. HIV prevention strategies should take these factors into account. "We believe that these insights into early HIV/SIV infection will be critical for the development of interventions to block infection, such as vaccines, antibodies, microbicides and drugs," Barouch said. "The next step in this line of research is to evaluate how various interventions may impact these early events."

source: sciencedaily.com

Liver disease risk increased by type 2 diabetes

People with type 2 diabetes are at greater risk of serious liver disease than those without the condition, new research has shown.

Researchers warn that hospital admissions and deaths caused by liver disease are likely to rise if cases of type 2 diabetes continue to increase at current rates.

The team, involving researchers from the Universities of Southampton and Edinburgh, examined cases of liver diseases among people with diabetes from anonymised, securely linked hospital records and death records in Scotland over a 10 year period.

They found that most cases of liver disease in people with type 2 diabetes are not alcohol-related but caused by a build-up of fat within liver cells -- a condition known as non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD).

NAFLD is commonly linked to obesity, which is also a risk factor for type 2 diabetes.

Most people can avoid getting these conditions by following a healthy diet and taking regular exercise.

The research team found that men with type 2 diabetes are three times more likely to suffer from NAFLD than men without diabetes.

There are fewer cases of type 2 diabetes and liver disease amongst women but having type 2 diabetes increases the risk of NAFLD by five times, the study found.

Treatment options for NAFLD -- which increases the risk of life-threatening complications such as cirrhosis and liver cancer -- are limited.

source: sciencedaily.com

Gestational diabetes: A diabetes predictor in fathers

Gestational diabetes, a type of diabetes that occurs during pregnancy, affects between three and 20 per cent of pregnant women. Those who develop gestational diabetes are 7 times as likely to eventually develop type 2 diabetes in the years following pregnancy. Now, in a large study analyzing 20 years of data from Quebec, a team from the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre (RI-MUHC) has demonstrated that gestational diabetes signals future diabetes risk not only in mothers, but also in fathers. The study was recently published in Diabetes Care.

"We observed that the incident of diabetes was 33% greater in men whose partner has gestational diabetes compared with men whose partners did not have gestational diabetes," says the lead author of the study, Dr. Kaberi Dasgupta, endocrinologist at the MUHC and an associate professor of Medicine at McGill University. "This is the first study to demonstrate a link between gestational diabetes in mothers and diabetes incidence in fathers."
Prior studies have shown partners to be similar in their weight and physical activity. Moreover, Dr. Dasgupta's team has shown evidence in a study conducted in 2014 that spousal diabetes was a diabetes risk factor. Then the researchers hypothesized that gestational diabetes in mothers signals a possible diabetes incidence in fathers. Gestational diabetes occurs when couples are in young to middle adulthood. Diabetes risk factors in these years are of high importance as they offer an opportunity for long term prevention.
The researchers randomly selected singleton live births from 1990 to 2007 with a positive diagnosis for gestational diabetes in mothers and matched controls without gestational diabetes from health administrative, birth and death registry data from the province of Quebec. Then, they identified fathers with type 2 diabetes from the time of the mother's post-delivery discharge from the hospital to the father's departure from Quebec, death or end of the study period (March 31, 2012). Overall, 70,890 fathers were evaluated (half with partners with gestational diabetes).
"Our analysis suggests that couples share risk partly because of their shared social and cultural environment, which may contribute to health behaviours and attitudes," explains Dr. Dasgupta. "The study reinforces the findings of our previous study on shared risk for diabetes in spouses, and prior studies indicating that less healthy eating habits and low physical activity could be shared within a household. Our data suggest that gestational diabetes could be leveraged as a tool to enhance diabetes detection and prevention in fathers.''

source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/08/150813123428.htm

Potential biomarker for pre-diabetes discovered

Virginia Tech researchers have identified a biomarker in pre-diabetic individuals that could help prevent them from developing Type II diabetes.

Publishing in Clinical Epigenetics, the researchers discovered that pre-diabetic people who were considered to be insulin resistant -- unable to respond to the hormone insulin effectively -- also had altered mitochondrial DNA.
Researchers made the connection by analyzing blood samples taken from 40 participants enrolled in the diaBEAT-it program, a long-term study run by multiple researchers in the Fralin Translational Obesity Research Center and funded by a grant from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK).
Participants did not have diabetes or cardiovascular disease, but were pre-diabetic and showed signs of insulin resistance.
Blood samples revealed participants had lower amounts of mitochondrial DNA with a higher amount of methylation -- a process that can change the expression of genes and mitochondrial copy numbers in cells -- than healthy people.
Mitochondrion is responsible for converting chemical energy from food into energy that cells can use.
"If the body is insulin resistant, or unable to respond properly to insulin, it could affect a person's mitochondrial function and overall energy levels," said Zhiyong Cheng, an assistant professor of human, nutrition, foods, and exercise in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and a Fralin Life Science Institute affiliate. "Mitochondrial alterations have previously been observed in obese individuals, but this is the first time we've made the molecular link between insulin resistance and mitochondrial DNA changes."
Cheng and collaborator Fabio Almeida, an assistant professor of human nutrition, foods and exercise in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and a Fralin Life Science Institute affiliate, think this link could be important for treating pre-diabetic individuals to prevent Type 2 Diabetes.
According to the NIDDK, more than 2 out of 3 adults are considered overweight and more than 1 out of 3 adults are considered obese. The growing epidemic of obesity is largely attributed to energy overconsumption -- taking in more food calories than the body burns through physical activity.
"There is no known cure for Type 2 diabetes, and early diagnosis and intervention is critical to prevent this disease," said Almeida. "Discovery of the biomarker in obese, pre-diabetic individuals advances our understanding of how diabetes develops and provides evidence important for future diagnosis and intervention."

source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/08/150820125408.htm

Air pollution linked to children low academic achievement

A University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) study on children's health has found that fourth and fifth graders who are exposed to toxic air pollutants at home are more likely to have lower GPAs.

UTEP researchers analyzed academic performance and sociodemographic data for 1,895 fourth and fifth grade children living in El Paso, Texas that were attending the El Paso Independent School District (EPISD).

They used the Environmental Protection Agency's National Air Toxics Assessment to estimate children's exposure to toxic air pollutants, such as diesel exhaust, around the location of their homes.

Children who were exposed to high levels of motor vehicle emissions from cars, trucks and buses on roads and highways were found to have significantly lower GPAs, even when accounting for other factors known to influence school performance. The results of the study were published in the academic journal Population and Environment.

Reference :

1. Stephanie E. Clark-Reyna, Sara E. Grineski, Timothy W. Collins. Residential exposure to air toxics is linked to lower grade point averages among school children in El Paso, Texas, USA. Population and Environment, 2015; DOI: 10.1007/s11111-015-0241-8

cocoa could help prevent obesity, diabetes

Improved thinking. Decreased appetite. Lowered blood pressure. The potential health benefits ofcocoa keep piling up, and scientists are now homing in on what ingredients in cocoa might help prevent obesity, as well as type-2 diabetes. They found that one particular type of antioxidant in cocoa prevented laboratory mice from gaining excess weight and lowered their blood sugar levels. The report appears in ACS' Journal of Agricultural & Food Chemistry.

Andrew P. Neilson and colleagues explain that cocoa, is one of the most flavanol-rich foods around. That's good for chocolate lovers because previous research has shown that flavanols in other foods such as grapes and tea can help fight weight gain and type-2 diabetes. But not all flavanols, which are a type of antioxidant, are created equal. Cocoa has several different kinds of these compounds, so Neilson's team decided to tease them apart and test each individually for health benefits.

The scientists fed groups of mice different diets, including high-fat and low-fat diets, and high-fat diets supplemented with different kinds of flavanols. They found that adding one particular set of these compounds, known as oligomeric procyanidins (PCs), to the food made the biggest difference in keeping the mice's weight down if they were on high-fat diets. They also improved glucose tolerance, which could potentially help prevent type-2 diabetes. "Oligomeric PCs appear to possess the greatest antiobesity and antidiabetic bioactivities of the flavanols in cocoa, particularly at the low doses employed for the present study," the researchers state.

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Journal Reference:

1. Melanie R. Dorenkott, Laura E. Griffin, Katheryn M. Goodrich, Katherine A. Thompson-Witrick, Gabrielle Fundaro, Liyun Ye, Joseph R. Stevens, Mostafa Ali, Sean F. O’Keefe, Matthew W. Hulver, Andrew P. Neilson. Oligomeric Cocoa Procyanidins Possess Enhanced Bioactivity Compared to Monomeric and Polymeric Cocoa Procyanidins for Preventing the Development of Obesity, Insulin Resistance, and Impaired Glucose Tolerance during High-Fat Feeding. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 2014; 62 (10): 2216 DOI: 10.1021/jf500333y