Multiple superoxide dismutase 1/splicing factor serine alanine 15 variants are associated with the development and progression of diabetic nephropathy:the Diabetes Control and Complications Trial/Epidemiology of Diabetes Interventions and Complications Genetics study

Despite familial clustering of nephropathy and retinopathy severity in type 1 diabetes, few gene variants have been consistently associated with these outcomes.

Large-scale association analysis identifies 13 new susceptibility loci for coronary artery disease

We performed a meta-analysis of 14 genome-wide association studies of coronary artery disease (CAD) comprising 22,233 individuals with CAD (cases) and 64,762 controls of European descent followed by genotyping of top association signals in 56,682 additional individuals. This analysis identified 13 loci newly associated with CAD at P < 5 x 10(-8) and confirmed the association of 10 of 12 previously reported CAD loci. The 13 new loci showed risk allele frequencies ranging from 0.13 to 0.91 and were associated with a 6% to 17% increase in the risk of CAD per allele. Notably, only three of the new loci showed significant association with traditional CAD risk factors and the majority lie in gene regions not previously implicated in the pathogenesis of CAD. Finally, five of the new CAD risk loci appear to have pleiotropic effects, showing strong association with various other human diseases or traits.

Disorder-induced phase transition in a one-dimensional model of rice pile

We propose a one-dimensional rice-pile model which connects the 1D BTW sandpile model (Phys. Rev. A 38 (1988) 364) and the Oslo rice-pile model (Phys. Rev. Lett. 77 (1997) 107) in a continuous manner. We found that for a sufficiently large system, there is a sharp transition between the trivial critical behaviour of the 1D BTW model and the self-organized critical (SOC) behaviour. When there is SOC, the model belongs to a known universality class with the avalanche exponent tau = 1.53. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

On the universality of a one-dimensional model of a rice pile

A one-dimensional model of a rice pile is numerically studied for different driving mechanisms and different levels of medium disorder. The universality of the scaling exponents for the transit time distribution and avalanche size distribution is discussed. (C) 1997 Published by Elsevier Science B.V.

Applied aspects of Rhodococcus genetics

Eubacteria of the genus Rhodococcus are a diverse group of microorganisms commonly found in many environmental niches from soils to seawaters and as plant and animal pathogens. They exhibit a remarkable ability to degrade many organic compounds and their economic importance is becoming increasingly apparent. Although their genetic organisation is still far from understood, there have been many advances in recent years. Reviewed here is the current knowledge of rhodococci relating to gene transfer, recombination, plasmid replication and functions, cloning vectors and reporter genes, gene expression and its control, bacteriophages, insertion sequences and genomic rearrangements. Further fundamental studies of Rhodococcus genetics and the application of genetic techniques to the these bacteria will be needed for their continued biotechnological exploitation.