👤 Maria Shadrina

Insomnia and depression are severe sequelae of COVID-19 and often occur simultaneously. Our study examined associations of insomnia and/or depression with cognitive impairments, white matter changes, and serum biomarkers. In total, 76 long COVID patients and 22 healthy controls were examined using neuropsychiatric (ISI, HADS, and HDRS) and cognitive (MoCA, Stroop, WMT, and TMT) tests, with their blood biomarkers (anti-SARS-CoV-2, BDNF, anti-S100, anti-MBP, and anti-PLP) investigated, and underwent MRI using macromolecular proton fraction (MPF) mapping to quantify myelination. The Insomnia (n = 14), Depression (n = 12), InsDep (comorbid insomnia-depression, n = 13), and PostCovid (long COVID without depression and insomnia, n = 32) groups were identified based on psychiatric/neurological diagnoses and neuropsychiatric assessment. Cognitive performance was most affected in the Insomnia group in the MoCA and CW Stroop tests. The Depression group underperformed in the TMT and W Stroop task; the InsDep group underperformed in the WMT. The Insomnia group showed the greatest demyelination, affecting commissural (CC and tapetum), projection (CR, IC, CST, cerebral peduncles, CP, and ML), and some association pathways (SLF, SFOF), as well as most juxtacortical regions, the thalamus, and the midbrain; these changes correlated with insomnia severity. The Depression and InsDep groups showed smaller but significant overall demyelination correlated with depression severity. The Depression group exhibited the highest MPF decrease in the globus pallidus, putamen, and external capsule, while the InsDep group demonstrated the highest demyelination of the association pathways IFOF, UF, and cingulum. The anti-PLP levels were the highest in the Insomnia group and correlated with both the persistence of insomnia/depression symptoms and demyelination. Demyelination in long COVID is associated with high levels of myelin-specific autoantibodies, but symptoms of insomnia and/or depression are associated with demyelination of a different set of brain structures. Show less

A variety of techniques for DNA sequencing, such as specific gene sequencing, whole genome sequencing, or exome sequencing, are currently used to detect single nucleotide variations (SNVs). Although RNA-seq can be used to identify SNVs, studies that employ this approach are uncommon, and those that do often rely on outdated mapping methods or methods that are more suitable for genomic and exomic alignment. In this work, our aim is to apply modern RNA-seq specific alignment method in order to identify SNV in a cohort of HCMP patients, and characterize those SNV to gain insight into possible mechanisms of HCMP pathogenesis. The algorithm of identification of SNV based on transcriptomic sequencing data has been developed and evaluated. The algorithm was evaluated and the optimal quality threshold was determined based on allelic discrimination for the rs397516037 mutation (MYBPC3 c.3697 C > T) among patients. A total of 42,809 SNVs with a quality of 75 or higher were identified in 48 transcriptomes of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCMP) myocardial tissue. Verification of missense and nonsense variants in key HCMP genes using Sanger sequencing confirmed the accuracy of the pipeline results. To identify variants potentially associated with HCMP pathogenesis, a filtration process was conducted based on minor allele frequency, substitution prediction score and ClinVar outcome. 214 missense mutations and 6 nonsense mutations were selected. Together with nonsense mutations, 19 mutations meeting the strictest SIFT and PolypPhen criteria were identified as potential factors influencing HCMP pathogenesis. We have developed and validated a method for identifying SNVs based on transcriptomic data, which can be used to identify putative pathogenic variants. We identified mutations in key HCMP genes MYBPC3 and MYH7 in a cohort of patients. We also found potentially pathologic mutations in genes ANXA6 and FEM1 A and obtained data supporting the role of NEBL in myocardial diseases. This method would be useful in analyzing transcriptomic data available in the Gene Expression Omnibus, but should be used with caution as we have tested it on a specific disease. Show less

Aim      To determine specific clinical characteristics caused by a combination of the rs397516037 pathogenic variant in the myosin-binding protein C (MTBPC3) and the rs749628307 polymorphic variant in the vinculin (VCL) gene in a Russian family of carriers and to evaluate the contribution of the rs749628307 polymorphic variant in the VCL gene to the development of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCMP).Material and methods  The family under study included one healthy person and 3 patients with HCMP. A targeted analysis of proband's exome was performed. A structural alignment for both forms of the VCL protein, the canonical form and the form with p.Arg230His substitution, was performed.Results The pathogenic rs397516037 variant and the potentially pathogenic rs749628307 variant were detected in the proband and several family members. A possibly damaging variant rs749628307 was detected in the proband and several family members evaluated in this study. The structural alignment confirmed that the rs749628307 variant did not alter the protein structure significantly and could not cause an impairment or loss of the protein function.Conclusion      This study demonstrated that apparently the rs749628307 variant in the VCL gene does not affect the protein structure in a pathogenetically significant way, neither does it affect the severity and form of the clinical manifestations of HCMP; therefore, it cannot be considered as pathogenic. Show less