Genomic Epidemiology of Imported Cases of COVID-19 in Guangdong Province, China, October 2020 - May 2021 / 生物医学与环境科学（英文）

Objective@#The pandemic of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has been engendering enormous hazards to the world. We obtained the complete genome sequences of SARS-CoV-2 from imported cases admitted to the Guangzhou Eighth People's Hospital, which was appointed by the Guangdong provincial government to treat coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). The SARS-CoV-2 diversity was analyzed, and the mutation characteristics, time, and regional trend of variant emergence were evaluated.@*Methods@#In total, 177 throat swab samples were obtained from COVID-19 patients (from October 2020 to May 2021). High-throughput sequencing technology was used to detect the viral sequences of patients infected with SARS-CoV-2. Phylogenetic and molecular evolutionary analyses were used to evaluate the mutation characteristics and the time and regional trends of variants.@*Results@#We observed that the imported cases mainly occurred after January 2021, peaking in May 2021, with the highest proportion observed from cases originating from the United States. The main lineages were found in Europe, Africa, and North America, and B.1.1.7 and B.1.351 were the two major sublineages. Sublineage B.1.618 was the Asian lineage (Indian) found in this study, and B.1.1.228 was not included in the lineage list of the Pangolin web. A reasonably high homology was observed among all samples. The total frequency of mutations showed that the open reading frame 1a (ORF1a) protein had the highest mutation density at the nucleotide level, and the D614G mutation in the spike protein was the commonest at the amino acid level. Most importantly, we identified some amino acid mutations in positions S, ORF7b, and ORF9b, and they have neither been reported on the Global Initiative of Sharing All Influenza Data nor published in PubMed among all missense mutations.@*Conclusion@#These results suggested the diversity of lineages and sublineages and the high homology at the amino acid level among imported cases infected with SARS-CoV-2 in Guangdong Province, China.

Expression of Death Associated Protein Kinase 1 in Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia / 中国实验血液学杂志

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To explore the expression of death-associated protein kinase 1(DAPK1) in chronic lymphocytic leukemia(CLL).</p><p><b>METHODS</b>The DAPK1 expression was studied by means of MEC1 cells and B lymphocytes from blood samples of the patients with CLL. The quantitative detection of mRNA and Western blot were used to detecte the expression of DAPK1 and autophagy-related genes at both mRNA and protein levels.</p><p><b>RESULTS</b>mRNA quantitative detection and Western blot displayed that the DAPK1 expression in the patients with CLL was silenced. So, the expression of DAPK1 and autophagy related genes in MEC1 cells was not significantly different, no matter the cells were treated with or without INF-γ.</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>Scilencing of DAPK1 expression in CLL results in abnormality of autophagy behavior, thus leading to the occurence of disease.</p>

PTK7 mRNA and protein expression level in serum of patients with acute lymphocytic leukemia and its clinical significance / 中国实验血液学杂志

The purpose of this study was to detect the serum PTK7 level of patients with acute lymphocytic leukemia, and to reveal its clinical value for diagnosis of diseases. A total of 136 patients diagnosed as acute lymphocytic leukemia from May 2012 to April 2014 in our hospital were enroled in this study and were divided into the L1 group (n = 42), L2 (n = 45) and L3 group (n = 49) according cytomorphology, and 48 normal children were selected as control group. Fluorescence quantitative PCR was used to detect mRNA level of PTK7 in peripheral blood mononuclear cells, and Western blot was used to detect PTK7 protein expression. The results showed that the PTK7 mRNA level in L1 group was significantly higher than that in normal group (P = 0.000) . The PTK7 mRNA level in L2 group was significantly higher than that in the L1 group (P = 0.000). The PTK7 mRNA level in L3 group and L2 group had not significantly different between each other (P = 0.123). Serum PTK7 protein level in L1 group was very significantly higher than that in normal group (P = 0.000) . The serum PTK7 protein level in L2 group were very significantly higher than that in the L1 group (P = 0.003) and serum PTK7 protein level in L3 and L2 group had no significance difference (P = 0.312) . It is concluded that the expression level of serum PTK7 protein has a potential clinical value for the diagnosis of acute lymphocytic leukemia, but without specificity for ALL subsets.