ABSTRACT
The environmental conditions experienced by microbial communities are rarely fully simulated in the laboratory. Researchers use experimental containers ("bottles"), where natural samples can be manipulated and evaluated. However, container-based methods are subject to "bottle effects": changes that occur when enclosing the plankton community that are often times unexplained by standard measures like pigment and nutrient concentrations. We noted variability in a short-term, nutrient amendment experiment during a 2019 Lake Erie, Microcystis spp. bloom. We observed changes in heterotrophic bacteria activity (transcription) on a time-frame consistent with a response to experimental changes in nutrient availability, demonstrating how the often overlooked microbiome of cyanobacterial blooms can be altered. Samples processed at the time of collection (T0) contained abundant transcripts from Bacteroidetes, which reduced in abundance during incubation in all bottles, including controls. Significant biological variability in the expression of Microcystis-infecting phage was observed between replicates, with phosphate-amended treatments showing a 10-fold variation. The expression patterns of Microcystis-infecting phage were significantly correlated with â¼35% of Microcystis-specific functional genes and â¼45% of the cellular-metabolites measured across the entire microbial community, suggesting phage activity not only influenced Microcystis dynamics, but the biochemistry of the microbiome. Our observations demonstrate how natural heterogeneity among replicates can be harnessed to provide further insight on virus and host ecology.
ABSTRACT
Woody breast (WB) myopathy is significantly impacting modern broilers and is imposing a huge economic burden on the poultry industry worldwide. Yet, its etiology is not fully defined. In a previous study, we have shown that hypoxia and the activation of its upstream mediators (AKT/PI3K/mTOR) played a key role in WB myopathy, and supplementation of quantum blue (QB) can help to reduce WB severity via modulation of hypoxia-related pathways. To gain further insights, we undertook here a metabolomics approach to identify key metabolite signatures and outline their most enriched biological functions. Ultra performance liquid chromatography coupled with high resolution mass spectrometry (UPLC-HRMS) identified a total of 108 known metabolites. Of these, mean intensity differences at P < 0.05 were found in 60 metabolites with 42 higher and 18 lower in WB-affected compared to unaffected muscles. Multivariate analysis and Partial Least Squares Discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) scores plot displayed different clusters when comparing metabolites profile from affected and unaffected tissues and from moderate (MOD) and severe (SEV) WB muscles indicating that unique metabolite profiles are present for the WB-affected and unaffected muscles. To gain biologically related molecule networks, a stringent pathway analyses was conducted using IPA knowledge-base. The top 10 canonical pathways generated, using a fold-change -1.5 and 1.5 cutoff, with the 50 differentially abundant-metabolites were purine nucleotide degradation and de novo biosynthesis, sirtuin signaling pathway, citrulline-nitric oxide cycle, salvage pathways of pyrimidine DNA, IL-1 signaling, iNOS, Angiogenesis, PI3K/AKT signaling, and oxidative phosphorylation. The top altered bio-functions in term of molecular and cellular functions in WB-affected tissues included cellular development, cellular growth and proliferation, cellular death and survival, small molecular biochemistry, inflammatory response, free radical scavenging, cell signaling and cell-to-cell interaction, cell cycles, and lipid, carbohydrate, amino acid, and nucleic acid metabolisms. The top disorder functions identified were organismal injury and abnormalities, cancer, skeletal and muscular disorders, connective tissue disorders, and inflammatory diseases. Breast tissues from birds fed with high dose (2,000 FTU) of QB phytase exhibited 22 metabolites with significantly different levels compared to the control group with a clear cluster using PLS-DA analysis. Of these 22 metabolites, 9 were differentially abundant between WB-affected and unaffected muscles. Taken together, this study determined many metabolic signatures and disordered pathways, which could be regarded as new routes for discovering potential mechanisms of WB myopathy.
ABSTRACT
A talented artist developed a progressive aphasia syndrome associated with frontotemporal dementia (FTD). As her disease progressed, language and executive skills declined, but her paintings became freer and more original. She demonstrates that artistic development can occur in the setting of language-dominant types of FTD. The study of artistic development in the setting of FTD suggests that language is not required for, and may even inhibit, certain types of visual creativity.
