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Plateauing IVF Pregnancy Rates in Europe a Stark Contrast to the US Rates, Says a Fertility Expert

The 1KITE (1K Insect Transcriptome Evolution) project involves more than 50 scientists from all over the world. It will unravel the secrets of the evolutionary history of insects using a molecular data set of unparalleled dimensions and quality. Started in September 2011, the transcriptomes of 1,000 insect species will be investigated. Within the next two years, BGI, China the worlds largest genomic sequencing center has invested initiating funds to enable this international project that requires roughly 6 Million dollars and has made its extensive sequencing infrastructure available to achieve this goal. The realization of this ambitious program requires synergistic collaboration among experts from a wide range of research fields. The 1KITE has brought together around 50 internationally renowned experts in molecular biology, morphology, palaeontology, embryology, bioinformatics, and scientific computing in an unprecedented way. Overall, scientists from seven nations (Australia, Austria, China, Germany, Japan, Mexico, and the US) are tightly collaborating in the 1KITE project.

A “transcriptome” includes the sequences of all the sets of genes that are being translated into proteins in a particular organism at the time it was collected. It represents a major and important part of the complete genome, since these mRNAs are involved in the life processes of the organism and how it interacts with it's ecosystem. Analyses of the transcriptome data will allow the reconstruction of a robust phylogenetic tree of insects, which will greatly contribute to the understanding of the reasons for their astonishing success. Furthermore, the project includes the development of new and advanced approaches analyzing enormous (phylogenomic) data sets, which are generated by new laboratory techniques at an ever-increasing rate. These data will produce the best resolved tree of insects, setting the stage for comparative analyses of genome evolution says Prof. Bernhard Misof, Head of the Department of Molecular Biodiversity Research at the ZFMK, Bonn, Germany. Professor Misof is one of the initiators of this research program, along with Karl Kjer from Rutgers University, and Xin Zhou from BGI.

Insects are the most species-rich group of animals. They play a pivotal role in most non-marine ecosystems and many insect species are of enormous economic and medical importance as pests, pollinators, disease vectors, and keystone species. It will be essential to resolve the relationships within insects in order to understand how such an immense diversity of insects could have evolved. Since insects are such an fundamental component of biodiversity we hope to answer why ecosystems shaped and adjusted in the way they are says Dr. Xin Zhou, Head of the National Bio-resource Bank at BGI and co-founder of the 1KITE project.

Part of the project is devoted to the development of new bioinformatics methods. The production of new data has gained such an enormous speed recently, that the analysis and storage of the data will become the real challenge in the near future! says Dr. Alexandros Stamatakis, Head of the High Performance Computing Department at HITS, Heidelberg.

Involved are:

From Japan: the Sugadaira Mountain Research Center; Department of Arthropod Comparative Embryology, University of Tsukuba; and the Department of Systematic Entomology, Hokkaido University.
From Austria: the Department of Evolutionary Biology and the Department of Animal Biodiversity, University Vienna and the Natural History Museum, Vienna.
From the US: the Department of Ecology, Evolution and Natural Resources and the Department of Biological Sciences, Rutgers University; the Department of Entomology, North Carolina State University; and Department of Entomology, University of Minnesota.
From Australia: the CSIRO Ecosystem Sciences, Australian National Insect Collection, Canberra.
From Mexico: the Centro de Estudios en Zoolog?, Universidad de Guadalajara, Zapopan, Jalisco.
From China: BGI and China Agricultural University, China Agricultural University, Department of Entomology, Laboratory of Systematic & Evolutionary Entomology, Bejing, China
From Germany: Zoological Research Museum Koenig, the Institute of Systematic Zoology and Evolutionary Biology with Phyletic Museum Jena, the Department of Scientific Computing at the Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies, the Zoological Institute and the Zoological Museum, University of Hamburg, the Department of Paleontology, Steinmann Institute, University of Bonn, and the Stuttgart State Museum of Natural History.
From New Zealand: the Department of Biosystematics, Landcare Research, Auckland.

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The Zoological Research Museum Alexander Koenig (ZFMK) and Leibniz Institute for Animal Biodiversity is one of the largest natural-history-research museums in Germany. The museum has earned its reputation as a leader in the documentation, research, and interpretation of biodiversity.

The Leibniz Association is a network of 87 scientifically, legally and economically independent research institutes and scientific service facilities. Leibniz Institutes perform strategic- and thematically-oriented research and offer scientific service of national significance while striving to find scientific solutions for major social challenges. jQuery(document).ready(function($) { $(“fb_share”).attr(“share_url”) = encodeURIComponent(window.location); });
Weitere Informationen: http://www.1kite.org – further information

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New International Research Initiative on the Evolution of Insects officially started

Novel observations can sometimes be correct for unexpected reasons.

By H. Steven Wiley | February 1, 2012

Over the last year, I have been fascinated by the brouhaha surrounding the Science article about a bacterium that was reported to incorporate arsenic in its DNA backbone rather than phosphorus. Part of my attraction to the story is the novelty of the observations, but I have also been interested by the response of the research community. Scientists are, rightly, a skeptical lot, but when unexpected results are reported, it seems that choruses of “nonsense” (or other, more unsavory terms) always arise. What is unfortunate is that disagreements over data interpretation sometimes degenerate into personal assaults on scientific competence.

I learned from personal experience that sometimes the most seemingly wrong data actually turn out to be correct. In my case, the controversy was over the discovery of DNA in amphibian yolk platelets, which are membrane-bound crystalline inclusions in eggs, which contain storage proteins that are degraded during embryogenesis. In the early days of embryology, amphibian eggs were a favorite model system, and it was observed that the spatial pattern of development seemed organized around the pattern of yolk distribution. So a central question was whether yolk platelets directly influenced embryonic patterning.

Cytochemical studies in the 1930s by the famous Belgian biochemist Jean Brachet showed that DNA was mostly localized in the chromosomes of cells. His later studies indicated that DNA could also be found in yolk platelets, suggesting that it might play a potential role in development. However, in the 1960s, another group of scientists claimed that all DNA in the egg cytoplasm was in the mitochondria, not in yolk platelets. Thus, yolk could not contribute any genetic information during development.

For more than a decade, each group claimed that the DNA detection and platelet isolation methodology of the other was flawed. The controversy escalated to the point where the leader of the anti–yolk DNA group proclaimed publicly at a national meeting, “There is not, there has never been, and there will never be DNA in yolk!”

At this time, I was a graduate student of Robin Wallace’s at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Robin had shown some years earlier that amphibian yolk was not synthesized by the oocyte, but instead from proteins made in the maternal liver, endocytosed by oocytes, and proteolytically cleaved to form platelets. Because of the endocytic process that gave rise to yolk platelets, a small amount of serum proteins was always nonspecifically included.

Robin had an inspired idea: unlike the red blood cells of mammals, those of amphibians had nuclei. Perhaps DNA released during blood cell turnover could be nonspecifically incorporated into the yolk during endocytosis. Our tests showed that amphibian blood did indeed contain tiny amounts of DNA. Significantly, we found that the amount of DNA taken up by nonspecific endocytosis during the long period of oogenesis was sufficient to explain the amount measured by the pro–yolk DNA group. It seems that the observations that there was DNA in yolk were correct, but it likely had no biological significance. Following the publication of our study, the yolk DNA controversy effectively ceased.

Publishing the study proved difficult because many of the anti-yolk DNAers were not willing to admit they were wrong.  However, a couple of months after our study appeared, we received a nice handwritten note from Jean Brachet, thanking us for putting the issue to rest. He said that he was always willing to admit that his hypothesis regarding the significance of yolk DNA might be wrong, but found it far more difficult to accept questions regarding his experimental skills.

Questioning the technical competence of other scientists is unlikely to resolve any controversy. Unless the yea- and naysayers are willing to work together, technical approaches and experimental systems will always differ and the data will never be equivalent. It is much more productive to test the hypotheses that are suggested by the data and see if they go anywhere. If observations do not lead to new, fruitful areas of investigation, then they are of little scientific utility, regardless of how intriguing they might seem.

H. Steven Wiley is lead biologist for the Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.

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Never Say Never

Anyone who has had a miscarriage — or even worse a several pregnancy losses — can't help but ask herself, “what is wrong with me? Why can't my body hold onto a baby?”

Oddly enough, scientists are asking just the opposite. They are wondering why pregnancies stick at all. I mean, if you think about it, your body should react to a fetus precisely the same way it reacts to a germ or even a tumor. It should rev up its immune system and start attacking.

The way the immune system works is that we are able to distinguish ourselves (our internal organs) from strangers (bacteria and viruses). A fetus is half ourselves and half someone else. The huge question is why we have allowed these half-foreigners to survive at all?

Recently, an eclectic group of scientists — including those who study embryology, the placenta, genetics as well as the immune system — are joining forces to figure out what humans have been doing ever since Eve: getting and staying pregnant. The answers will not only shed a glimmer of light on the fundamentals of gestation but should offer clues to help women who suffer from miscarriages and other women who suffer from pre-eclampsia, dangerously high blood pressure.

“This is a battle, an absolute battle. It's a war zone,” said Yale University's Harvey Kliman, MD, PhD, who investigates the placenta. That's the way he talks about the pregnant body and the precarious relationship between mother and fetus. His recent study, published in the Journal of Reproductive Sciences this fall, suggests that a specific protein in pregnant women acts as a decoy of sorts to trick the mom's immune system to stay away from the baby.

Kliman claims a protein, called PP13 — short for placenta protein 13 — sends the mother's destructive immune cells far away from the growing fetus. In essence, as he puts it, it's like robbers who wreak havoc in the neighboring grocery store so they can steal the loot from the bank. It's a cute metaphor, but may not convince experts that the placenta proteins truly work this way.

Yet, Kliman points to areas of dead tissue that he spotted in the placenta of women who had abortions. He found it utterly “mindblowing” because typically you do not find huge areas of dead tissue in healthy organs. He then discovered PP13, the placenta protein, flooding the dead tissue. He suspects a connection. He suspects the PP13 drives immune cells to one area of the placenta — away from the growing fetus — so the fetus can continue to grow.

The PP13 theory is one of many circulating among experts.

Dr. Koji Yoshinaga, the program director of the reproductive sciences branch of the of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, said there are huge gaps in our knowledge about what really happens to during pregnancy to allow babies — these foreigners — to survive within us. We know that hormones of pregnancy change our immune cells. Perhaps the surge of progesterone or prolactin — two hormones that increase during pregnancy — calm immune responses near the fetus.

It's a huge balancing act, said Yoshinaga, between the mother's body revving up certain systems to nourish baby and staunching other systems that could hurt the baby. Among other things, his team is focusing on so-called BIEFs, or blastocyst implantation essential factors. He believes these factors signal to the mother that her body must provide nutrients without attacking. The earliest days of pregnancy — when the first cells of the embryo are snuggling into the placenta — are the most important to begin this tricky balancing act.

And while no one yet has the solution, the good news is that for the first time, experts in seemingly diverse fields (immunology and endocrinology) are spearheading joint projects to solve this age-old mystery.

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Randi Hutter Epstein: Pregnant Mysteries

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The Tioga County 4-H will be offering a four session Incubation and Embryology program to Youth ages five to 19 and their families. The program will consist of four instructional classes to be held on April 10, April 17, May 8 and May 22 at the Tioga County Office Building.

As part of the program youth will have the opportunity to learn about poultry reproduction, hatch eggs and learn how they develop. For more information or to sign up for the program, contact Cornell Cooperative Extension Tioga County at (607) 687-4020. Space is limited to six families.

4-H is a unique, informal educational program that supplements training received in home, school, church and other youth-serving agencies. Open to all youth five to 19 years of age, 4-H utilizes a real-life work experience where the individual sets his/her own goals for achievement.

To learn more about 4-H in Tioga County, call Cornell Cooperative Extension, Tioga County at (607) 687-4020.

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Incubation and Embryology to be offered through Tioga County 4-H

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BRIEFLY: Jan. 27

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Couples with fertility problems given help

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Children's Upper and Lower Limb Orthopaedic Disorders [Book and Media Reviews]

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UK sets sights on gene therapy in eggs

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New Insights Into Carpal Tunnel Symptoms, Wolf Spider and Zoologie Published

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The case for egg-sharing

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Labour ‘dogma’ criticised as IVF clinic costs NHS £1.5m

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Catholic Respect Life Office holding teen bootcamp on abortion issues in Denver Saturday

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Newcastle University experts get £5.8m funding boost for pioneering DNA work

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Children with genes from three parents to be born within two years thanks to new IVF technique

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Team to set up £5.8m centre for gene studies

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INVO Bioscience Announces Approval of INVOcell by Brazil's ANVISA

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Babies with 3 parents could be born soon, scientists say