Population structure, differential bias and genomic control in a large-scale, case-control association study

The main problems in drawing causal inferences from epidemiological case-control studies are confounding by unmeasured extraneous factors, selection bias and differential misclassification of exposure. In genetics the first of these, in the form of population structure, has dominated recent debate. Population structure explained part of the significant +11.2% inflation of test statistics we observed in an analysis of 6,322 nonsynonymous SNPs in 816 cases of type 1 diabetes and 877 population-based controls from Great Britain. The remainder of the inflation resulted from differential bias in genotype scoring between case and control DNA samples, which originated from two laboratories, causing false-positive associations. To avoid excluding SNPs and losing valuable information, we extended the genomic control method by applying a variable downweighting to each SNP.     

Cinephotographic superposition as a technique for the analysis of sub-cellular movement

Zusammenfassung Eine Methode zur einfachen Quantifizierung von gerichteten Bewegungen subzellularer Teile, zum Beispiel in Furchungszellen, wurde entwickelt.

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This work was financed by a grant from the Science Research Council.     

Presynaptic inhibition in crustacean muscle: Axo-axonal synapse

Zusammenfassung Es ist anzunehmen, dass die präsynaptische Hemmung der Crustaceen-Muskeln durch Reaktion eines hemmenden Überträgerstoffs mit Rezeptoren der Endigungen der motorischen Nervenfasern zustande kommt. Synaptische Kontakte des hemmenden Axons mit den Endigungen der motorischen Nervenfasern sind mit dem Elektronenmikroskop beobachtet worden. Wahrscheinlich vermitteln diese Strukturen den präsynaptischen Effekt.     

The landscape of cancer genes and mutational processes in breast cancer

All cancers carry somatic mutations in their genomes. A subset, known as driver mutations, confer clonal selective advantage on cancer cells and are causally implicated in oncogenesis, and the remainder are passenger mutations. The driver mutations and mutational processes operative in breast cancer have not yet been comprehensively explored. Here we examine the genomes of 100 tumours for somatic copy number changes and mutations in the coding exons of protein-coding genes. The number of somatic mutations varied markedly between individual tumours. We found strong correlations between mutation number, age at which cancer was diagnosed and cancer histological grade, and observed multiple mutational signatures, including one present in about ten per cent of tumours characterized by numerous mutations of cytosine at TpC dinucleotides. Driver mutations were identified in several new cancer genes including AKT2, ARID1B, CASP8, CDKN1B, MAP3K1, MAP3K13, NCOR1, SMARCD1 and TBX3. Among the 100 tumours, we found driver mutations in at least 40 cancer genes and 73 different combinations of mutated cancer genes. The results highlight the substantial genetic diversity underlying this common disease.