Borrelia recurrentis employs a novel multifunctional surface protein with anti-complement, anti-opsonic and invasive potential to escape innate immunity

Borrelia recurrentis, the etiologic agent of louse-borne relapsing fever in humans, has evolved strategies, including antigenic variation, to evade immune defence, thereby causing severe diseases with high mortality rates. Here we identify for the first time a multifunctional surface lipoprotein of B. recurrentis, termed HcpA, and demonstrate that it binds human complement regulators, Factor H, CFHR-1, and simultaneously, the host protease plasminogen. Cell surface bound factor H was found to retain its activity and to confer resistance to complement attack. Moreover, ectopic expression of HcpA in a B. burgdorferi B313 strain, deficient in Factor H binding proteins, protected the transformed spirochetes from complement-mediated killing. Furthermore, HcpA-bound plasminogen/plasmin endows B. recurrentis with the potential to resist opsonization and to degrade extracellular matrix components. Together, the present study underscores the high virulence potential of B. recurrentis. The elucidation of the molecular basis underlying the versatile strategies of B. recurrentis to escape innate immunity and to persist in human tissues, including the brain, may help to understand the pathological processes underlying louse-borne relapsing fever

Search for new phenomena in final states with an energetic jet and large missing transverse momentum in pp collisions at √ s = 8 TeV with the ATLAS detector

Results of a search for new phenomena in final states with an energetic jet and large missing transverse momentum are reported. The search uses 20.3 fb−1 of √ s = 8 TeV data collected in 2012 with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. Events are required to have at least one jet with pT > 120 GeV and no leptons. Nine signal regions are considered with increasing missing transverse momentum requirements between Emiss T > 150 GeV and Emiss T > 700 GeV. Good agreement is observed between the number of events in data and Standard Model expectations. The results are translated into exclusion limits on models with either large extra spatial dimensions, pair production of weakly interacting dark matter candidates, or production of very light gravitinos in a gauge-mediated supersymmetric model. In addition, limits on the production of an invisibly decaying Higgs-like boson leading to similar topologies in the final state are presente

Water relations of evergreen and drought-deciduous trees along a seasonally dry tropical forest chronosequence

Seasonally dry tropical forests (SDTF) are characterized by pronounced seasonality in rainfall, and as a result trees in these forests must endure seasonal variation in soil water availability. Furthermore, SDTF on the northern Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico, have a legacy of disturbances, thereby creating a patchy mosaic of different seral stages undergoing secondary succession. We examined the water status of six canopy tree species, representing contrasting leaf phenology (evergreen vs. drought-deciduous) at three seral stages along a fire chronosequence in order to better understand strategies that trees use to overcome seasonal water limitations. The early-seral forest was characterized by high soil water evaporation and low soil moisture, and consequently early-seral trees exhibited lower midday bulk leaf water potentials (ΨL) relative to late-seral trees (−1.01 ± 0.14 and −0.54 ± 0.07 MPa, respectively). Although ΨL did not differ between evergreen and drought-deciduous trees, results from stable isotope analyses indicated different strategies to overcome seasonal water limitations. Differences were especially pronounced in the early-seral stage where evergreen trees had significantly lower xylem water δ18O values relative to drought-deciduous trees (−2.6 ± 0.5 and 0.3 ± 0.6‰, respectively), indicating evergreen species used deeper sources of water. In contrast, drought-deciduous trees showed greater enrichment of foliar 18O (∆18Ol) and 13C, suggesting lower stomatal conductance and greater water-use efficiency. Thus, the rapid development of deep roots appears to be an important strategy enabling evergreen species to overcome seasonal water limitation, whereas, in addition to losing a portion of their leaves, drought-deciduous trees minimize water loss from remaining leaves during the dry season

Charge density wave memory in a cuprate superconductor

Although CDW correlations are a ubiquitous feature of the superconducting cuprates, their disparate properties suggest a crucial role for pinning the CDW to the lattice. Here, we report coherent resonant X-ray speckle correlation analysis, which directly determines the reproducibility of CDW domain patterns in La1.875Ba0.125CuO4 (LBCO 1/8) with thermal cycling. While CDW order is only observed below 54 K, where a structural phase transition creates inequivalent Cu-O bonds, we discover remarkably reproducible CDW domain memory upon repeated cycling to far higher temperatures. That memory is only lost on cycling to 240(3) K, which recovers the four-fold symmetry of the CuO2 planes. We infer that the structural features that develop below 240 K determine the CDW pinning landscape below 54 K. This opens a view into the complex coupling between charge and lattice degrees of freedom in superconducting cuprates

Understanding the management of electronic test result notifications in the outpatient setting

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Notifying clinicians about abnormal test results through electronic health record (EHR) -based "alert" notifications may not always lead to timely follow-up of patients. We sought to understand barriers, facilitators, and potential interventions for safe and effective management of abnormal test result delivery via electronic alerts.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We conducted a qualitative study consisting of six 6-8 member focus groups (N = 44) at two large, geographically dispersed Veterans Affairs facilities. Participants included full-time primary care providers, and personnel representing diagnostic services (radiology, laboratory) and information technology. We asked participants to discuss barriers, facilitators, and suggestions for improving timely management and follow-up of abnormal test result notifications and encouraged them to consider technological issues, as well as broader, human-factor-related aspects of EHR use such as organizational, personnel, and workflow.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Providers reported receiving a large number of alerts containing information unrelated to abnormal test results, many of which were believed to be unnecessary. Some providers also reported lacking proficiency in use of certain EHR features that would enable them to manage alerts more efficiently. Suggestions for improvement included improving display and tracking processes for critical alerts in the EHR, redesigning clinical workflow, and streamlining policies and procedures related to test result notification.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Providers perceive several challenges for fail-safe electronic communication and tracking of abnormal test results. A multi-dimensional approach that addresses technology as well as the many non-technological factors we elicited is essential to design interventions to reduce missed test results in EHRs.</p

Author Correction: Comprehensive molecular characterization of mitochondrial genomes in human cancers

Correction to: Nature Genetics, published online 05 February 2020. In the published version of this paper, the members of the Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium were listed in the Supplementary Information; however, these members should have been included in the main paper. The original Article has been corrected to include the members and affiliations of the PCAWG Consortium in the main paper; the corrections have been made to the HTML version of the Article but not the PDF version. Additional corrections to affiliations have been made to the PDF and HTML versions of the original Article for consistency of information between the PCAWG list and the main paper

Author Correction: The landscape of viral associations in human cancers

Correction to: Nature Genetics https://doi.org/10.1038/s41588-019-0558-9, published online 05 February 2020