Faculty Bibliography

An increasing number of technologies combine spatial discrimination with molecule identification, as has been done for decades through immunohistochemistry and in situ hybridization. The difference is that now a sleuth of commercially available platforms promises to significantly increase the number of targets that can be identified on a single sample. They also provide higher throughput in terms of number of samples that can be interrogated, and some offer semiautomation with straightforward sample preparation. All these characteristics set up the new spatial profiling technologies as attractive candidates for biomedical research facilities. However, to be able to discriminate between them it is necessary to share real world experiences using them in our cores. This panel session brings together several researchers with hands on experience using two or more spatial profiling technologies. These will include antibody based (Opal/Vectra Polaris, Ultivue, MIBI, Hyperion) and nucleic acid (Visium, GeoMx) based platforms. Each panelist will give a quick overview of the technology, its biochemical principles, costs, advantages and disadvantages as they have identified them and compared them to each other or a gold standard, if available. At the end, we will have an open discussion where the audience is encouraged to ask questions and provide their experiences

We write to introduce our novel group formed to confront some of the issues raised by the COVID-19 pandemic. Information about the group, which we named "cure COVid for Ever and for All" (RxCOVEA), its dynamic membership (changing regularly), and some of its activities-described in more technical detail for expert perusal and commentary-are available upon request.

An estimated 92% of the world's population live in regions where people are regularly exposed to high levels of anthropogenic air pollution. Historically, research on the effects of air pollution have focused extensively on cardiovascular and pulmonary health. However, emerging evidence from animal and human studies has suggested that chronic exposures to air pollution detrimentally change the functioning of the central nervous system with the result being proteinopathy, neurocognitive impairment, and neurodegenerative disease. Case analyses of aging World Trade Center responders suggests that a single severe exposure may also induce a neuropathologic response. The goal of this report was to explore the neuroscientific support for the hypothesis that inhaled particulate matter might cause an Alzheimer's-like neurodegenerative disease, in order to consider proposed mechanisms and latency periods linking inhaled particulate matter and neurodegeneration, and to propose new directions in this line of research.

Mitochondria and their associated membranes actively participate in biosynthesis, trafficking, and degradation of cellular phospholipids. Two crucial lipid biosynthetic activities of mitochondria include (i) the decarboxylation of phosphatidylserine to phosphatidylethanolamine and (ii) the de novo synthesis of cardiolipin. Here we describe protocols to measure these two activities, applying isotope-labeled or exogenous substrates in combination with thin-layer chromatography or mass spectrometry.