by Hanane Merhmi  , Maria Zerkaoui  , Abdelhafid Natiq  , Aziza Sbiti  , Thonas Liehr  and Abdelaziz Sefiani

Received: 25 July 2018;  Published: 22 July 2019;  doi: 10.21926/obm.genet.1903085

Small supernumerary marker chromosomes (sSMCs), a major problem in clinical cytogenetics, are too small to be characterized for their chromosomal origin by cytogenetic banding techniques. Most sSMCs have not yet been correlated with a specific clinical syndrome, and genotype-phenotype correlation in sSMC-patients is still in major parts under development. In this paper we report two new Moroccan cases with a polymalformative syndrome, in which we identified similar but not identical sSMCs derived from chromosome 14 [...]

by Georgia Kakourou  , Thalia Mamas  , Christina Vrettou  and Jan Traeger-Synodinos

Received: 03 June 2019;  Published: 22 July 2019;  doi: 10.21926/obm.genet.1903084

Preimplantation Genetic Testing for HLA-matching (PGT-HLA) has been one of the most controversial PGT applications, first reported in 2001. The procedure aims to identify an embryo that is not only healthy but also HLA-matched with a sibling in the family in need of haematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT), considering that sibling HSCT stands the highest chance of success in comparison to alternative approaches. HLA-typing can be performed with or without PGT-M for the exclusion of a single-gene disorder. T [...]

by Luis Delaye

Received: 05 May 2019;  Published: 11 July 2019;  doi: 10.21926/obm.genet.1903083

Background: Phylogenetic analyses shows that Pneumocystis species have coevolved with their mammalian hosts for millions of years. As a result, infection by Pneumocystis is species specific (i.e. a given Pneumocystis species can infect only a single species of host). This specificity suggests the existence of a Red-Queen dynamic between Pneumocystis and its host. Evidence of this dynamic is provided by the molecular diversity and the elevated rate of non-synonymous versus synonymous (dN/dS) codon substitutions amon [...]

by Theresa Mayo  , Barbara Schuster  , Anna Ellmann  , Manfred Schmidt  , Rainer Fietkau  and Luitpold V. Distel

Received: 27 July 2018;  Published: 26 June 2019;  doi: 10.21926/obm.genet.1902082

Background: It is known that radiosensitivity is very individual. This can influence the tumor response and side effects in normal tissue after radiotherapy of cancer. Therefore we analyzed the sensitivity of a lung cancer cohort to see if they display a similar radiosensitivity distribution if compared to a healthy individuals and a rectal cancer patients cohort. Methods: Blood samples of 282 individuals were irradiated ex vivo and chromosomes # 1, 2 and 4 were stained by the 3-color fluorescence in situ hybridiza [...]

by Abdulsamad Wafa  , Manar As’sad  , Thomas Liehr  , Adnan Ikhtiar  and Walid AL -ACHKAR

Received: 14 August 2018;  Published: 20 June 2019;  doi: 10.21926/obm.genet.1902081

(1) Background: T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (T-ALL) is an aggressive malignancy of thymocytes with multiple genetic abnormalities, accounting for 15% and 25% of newly diagnosed cases of ALL in children and adults, respectively. Notably, T-ALL has a 3-fold higher incidence in males. Cytogenetically detectable structural or numerical chromosomal abnormalities are detected in ~50% of ALL cases. Such aberrations have a prognostic significance. High hyperdiploidy (51–65 chromosomes, HeH) is an established geneti [...]

by Laurence Pougnet  , Gilles Nevez  and Solène Le Gal

Received: 17 December 2018;  Published: 22 May 2019;  doi: 10.21926/obm.genet.1902080

Pneumocystis pneumonia (PCP) is still the most frequent AIDS-defining disease in developed countries and also concerns patients with other immunodeficiencies not associated with HIV. Experimental studies on rodent models carried out in the early eighties have showed that Pneumocystis sp. can be transmitted by the airborne route. Unfortunately, this mode of acquisition and transmission has long been ignored by physicians, specifically because PCP in immunosuppressed patients was considered to result from reactivatio [...]

by Boel De Paepe

Received: 28 February 2019;  Published: 16 May 2019;  doi: 10.21926/obm.genet.1902079

In order to successfully recover from damage, skeletal muscle tissue requires proper activation of a tightly orchestrated repair program. To this complex process of demolition and rebuilding, non-coding RNAs actively participate. In this review, the contribution of dysregulated non-coding RNA expression to disease-associated pathological changes is explored in the hereditary muscular dystrophies and the idiopathic inflammatory myopathies. Disturbances in spatiotemporal expression of non-coding RNAs appear key facto [...]

by Christine Demanche  , Jacques Guillot  and Magali Chabé

Received: 22 February 2019;  Published: 15 May 2019;  doi: 10.21926/obm.genet.1902078

At the end of the 20th century, the notion of a unique species in the genus Pneumocystis (i.e. Pneumocystis carinii) was challenged and our understanding of the natural history of pneumocystosis was drastically changed. It is now accepted that the Pneumocystis genus comprises multiple stenoxenic biological entities that are widely distributed in ecosystems, airborne transmitted and closely adapted to the mammalian species they colonize. This article provides an opportunity to review one of the atypical features of [...]

by Hagit Daum  , Simcha Yagel  and Mordechai Shohat

Received: 11 March 2019;  Published: 15 May 2019;  doi: 10.21926/obm.genet.1902077

Fetal exome sequencing is becoming a crucial modality for genetic investigation whenever fetal malformations are documented in the context of normal chromosomal microarray analysis (CMA). When ultrasound findings are non-specific, the robustness of exome sequencing may be the only way to achieve a molecular diagnosis during pregnancy. We describe a case of multiple non-specific fetal findings with the eventual diagnosis of fetal Kabuki syndrome by exome sequencing (due to a deleterious mutation in KMT2D). This cas [...]

by Yuri B. Yurov  , Svetlana G. Vorsanova  and Ivan Y. Iourov

Received: 06 February 2019;  Published: 30 April 2019;  doi: 10.21926/obm.genet.1902076

The human brain has been repeatedly shown to exhibit intercellular/somatic genomic variations at chromosomal level, which are involved in neuronal diversity in health and disease. Brain-specific chromosomal mosiacism (aneuploidy) and chromosome instability play a role in normal and pathological neurodevelopment, neurodegeneration and aging of the central nervous system. Regardless of achievements in somatic cell (single-cell) genomics, there is still no consensus on the amounts of chromosomally abnormal cells in th [...]