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Bats harbor many types of coronaviruses and were probably the original source of the new coronavirus that appeared in the Middle East.

Bats harbor many types of coronaviruses and were probably the original source of the new coronavirus that appeared in the Middle East.

On the surface, the new coronavirus detected in the Middle East this month looks quite similar to SARS. It apparently causes severe respiratory problems, and can be lethal.

But with viruses, the devil is in their details the genetic details.

Dutch virologists have just published the whole genome of the new coronavirus all 30,118 letters of its code. And, the sequence reveals that the mystery virus is most closely related to coronaviruses that infect bats in Southeast Asia.

In fact, the pathogen is more similar to two bat viruses than it is to the human SARS virus that sent the world into a panic when it infected nearly 8,000 people in 2003.

Virologist Ron Fouchier, who has done controversial work on bird flu viruses, led the sequencing effort of the SARS-like virus. He tells Shots the results suggest that the new coronavirus virus came from bats. "Bats harbor many coronaviruses, so it's logical to assume that bats are the natural reservoir" of the new pathogen, he says.

"But this doesn't mean the Saudi man contracted the virus from bats," says Fouchier.

When viruses jump from animals to humans, there's usually a second animal that connects the natural carrier with humans. This species is called the amplifier because it increases the number of viral particles that can hop over into people.

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Holy Bat Virus! Genome Hints At Origin Of SARS-Like Virus

A Joint News Release from The Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia and BGI

Newswise September 27, 2012, Philadelphia and Shenzhen, China The Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and BGI announced today that the BGI@CHOP Joint Genome Center will begin to offer clinical next-generation sequencing (NGS) services at CHOP through the hospitals Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine in a CAP/CLIA-compliant environment.

The Clinical Laboratories Improvement Act of 1988 (CLIA) established quality standards for all laboratory testing to ensure the accuracy, reliability and timeliness of patient test results regardless of where the test was performed. The College of American Pathologists (CAP) Laboratory Accreditation Program is widely recognized as the gold standard, since it meets or exceeds CLIA requirements and serves as a model for various federal, state, and private laboratory accreditation programs throughout the world.

Supported by CHOPs and BGIs excellent infrastructure and extensive experiences in NGS services, the BGI@CHOP Joint Genome Center was established in Nov. 2011 under the partnership between CHOP and BGI to focus on discovery of genes underpinning rare and common pediatric diseases using next-generation sequencing.

Robert W. Doms, M.D., Ph.D., pathologist-in-chief and chair of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at CHOP, said, The BGI@CHOP Joint Genome Center, operating under the umbrella of the CAP-certified Molecular Genetics Lab at CHOP, plans to launch clinical exome sequencing in the near future.

Catherine Stolle, Ph.D., director of CHOPs Molecular Genetics Laboratory, added, This CAP- compliant NGS facility will enable us to rapidly expand into clinical NGS tests for diagnosis of specific diseases including heritable disorders and pediatric cancer. "BGI has been offering NGS and NGS data analysis services in a research setting since 2007," Dr. Jun Wang, Executive Director of BGI, said in a statement. "By working together with the CHOP Pathology Department, we will be able to leverage our NGS expertise to help clinicians better diagnose and treat their patients. BGI will also be able to extend our services to support new drug development and pharmaceutical clinical trial studies in compliance with CAP and CLIA standards.

At present, the Joint Genome Center is equipped with 5 high-throughput sequencers with the permanent space under renovation, and plans to scale up to 20 sequencers. The center has embarked on a number of projects with CHOP researchers, including an NIH-funded research grant to explore the use of NGS in a clinical diagnostic setting (co-led by Ian Krantz, M.D., and Nancy Spinner, Ph.D.). The Centers service portfolio includes human whole exome sequencing, targeted sequencing, whole genome re-sequencing, specialized applications such as ChIP-Seq and RNA-Seq, and NGS data analysis.

About The Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia The Childrens Hospital of Philadelphia was founded in 1855 as the first pediatric hospital in the United States. Through its long-standing commitment to providing exceptional patient care, training new generations of pediatric healthcare professionals and pioneering major research initiatives, Children's Hospital has fostered many discoveries that have benefited children worldwide and its pediatric research program is among the largest in the U.S. In addition, its unique family-centered care and public service programs have brought the 516-bed hospital recognition as a leading advocate for children and adolescents. For more information, visit http://www.chop.edu.

About BGI BGI was founded in Beijing, China, in 1999 with the mission to become a premier scientific partner for the global research community. The goal of BGI is to make leading-edge genomic science highly accessible, which it achieves through its investment in infrastructure, leveraging the best available technology, economies of scale, and expert bioinformatics resources. BGI, which includes both private non-profit genomic research institutes and sequencing application commercial units, and its affiliates, BGI Americas, headquartered in Cambridge, MA, and BGI Europe, headquartered in Copenhagen, Denmark, have established partnerships and collaborations with leading academic and government research institutions as well as global biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, supporting a variety of disease, agricultural, environmental, and related applications.

BGI has a proven track record of excellence, delivering results with high efficiency and accuracy for innovative, high-profile research: research that has generated over 200 publications in top-tier journals such as Nature and Science. BGIs many accomplishments include: sequencing one percent of the human genome for the International Human Genome Project, contributing 10 percent to the International Human HapMap Project, carrying out research to combat SARS and German deadly E. coli, playing a key role in the Sino-British Chicken Genome Project, and completing the sequence of the rice genome, the silkworm genome, the first Asian diploid genome, the potato genome, and, more recently, the human Gut Metagenome, as well as a significant proportion of the genomes for the1000 Genomes Project. For more information, please visit http://www.genomics.cn. or http://www.bgiamericas.com

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BGI@CHOP Joint Genome Center to Offer Clinical Next-Generation Sequencing Services

Starting today, researchers can now order a "plug-and-play" human genome interpretation system from Knome, the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based genome analysis company co-founded by Harvard Medical School's George Church. The nearly 600-lb box of computer hardware that is pre-loaded with genomic interpretation software sells for $125,000 and is designed to simplify the task of gleaning useful medical information from a patient's DNA.

The "lab in a box" model contrasts with a program underway at genomics giant Illumina, which plans to enable customers to upload their DNA sequences to a cloud-based data storage and analysis system for interpretation. And selling a product that integrates hardware and software together is a new move for Knome, which has previously provided genomeanalysisas a service to customers who send in their samples or raw DNA data. So why would Knome want to move into the hardware distribution business?

As reported by GenomeWeb Daily News, the idea for an integrated system grew from discussions the company had with early users of its KnomeClinic software,which is design to help health-care professionals interpret genomic data (see "Knome Software Makes Sense of the Genome"). The reasons seem to be two-fold: security concerns over the medical information and the lack of good IT support at some medical institutions.

Martin Tolar, Knome's CEO, said that these early-access users .... had a number of recommendations, but the primary one was that "they wanted a solution that was within the four walls of the institution for privacy and regulatory reasons."

Initially, he said, "we were considering having enterprise software that would be installed at each of the institutions, but it became very clear that not everybody had the hardware and the capabilities to run such a complicated system. And also, [we decided that] if we can optimize the hardware for the software that we've built, it's going to be much more effective and efficient. So that's why we decided to put it all in one box."

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Forget the Cloud—Knome Offers Genome Analysis in a Box

Software that enables collaboration between labs could make it easier for doctors to translate genome information.

DNA sequencing is increasingly being used in medicine, but doctors can have trouble making sense of the data. Now sequencing machine manufacturer Illumina has announced that it will integrate software into its desktop sequencing platform to assist physicians with that task. The most interesting aspect of the analysis tool may be its ability to share, which could be key to unlocking the real promise of genomics in medicine.

Every person's genome is full of variationsresearch estimates that the genomes of any two people differ at around three million positionsbut most of these differences, called variants, are harmless. But some variants cause disease, and others contribute to the likelihood of disease. When a variant is suspected to affect health, doctors can turn to the scientific literature for clues, but they may not find any useful information there, or they may find data on entire populations that may not apply to an individual patient.

"They want to be able to say, 'We found this variant in an important gene, it may be causing this effect, and we'd love to see if someone has seen this before,' " says Brad Ozenberger of the National Human Genome Research Initiative. But there's currently no centralized collection of medically relevant variants for doctors to use. Some National Institutes of Health-run databases include genetic variants linked to disease and drug response, but they are more suited for researchers than doctors. To address this issue, the National Human Genome Research Initiative announced this summer that it will fund such a centralized database.

"The grand vision is that whenever any patient gets their genome sequenced and analyzed, doctors will be able to tap those data," says Ozenberger.

The commercial answer to the question may come from Illumina's new collaboration with Partners HealthCare, a consortium of hospitals in the Boston area. Partners developed the interpretation software, and has already used it to support its own clinical interpretation of some 24,000 disease cases, says Heidi Rehm, who directs the hospitals' Laboratory for Molecular Medicine.

The software generates a report that might include information such as how a patient's variant will affect the behavior of the gene where it's located and whether one or two copies are needed to see an effect. If a lab has seen the variant before, the report may describe its impact on health. "This notion of a share and share alike network will be very powerful for interpretation of this data," says Rehm.

In the case of Illumina, some of that initial sharing may happen not with whole genome sequencing, but with disease-focused selective sequencing. Last week, the company began taking orders for its tests for autism, cancer, cardiomyopathy, and a broad range of inherited diseases. By sequencing only targeted genes, clinicians and researchers can increase the speed and reduce the cost of the analysis. Illumina's customers can use the Partners Healthcare software to generate reports from this data, and that could help strengthen the power of the technique.

"If I found a variant that's come through my lab that I've never seen, I can go out on my network and see if any other labs have seen it before and see the evidence they used to classify it," says Tim McDaniel, director of Scientific Research in Translational and Consumer Genomics at Illumina. "The dream here is that every lab would be on the network, so that it's not just, 'Has my lab seen it before?' but 'Has any lab seen it previously?' "

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By Simply Sharing, Doctors Could Unlock the Genome's Potential

Public release date: 24-Sep-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Jim Sliwa jsliwa@asmusa.org 202-942-9297 American Society for Microbiology

The American Society for Microbiology is launching a new online-only, open access journal, Genome Announcements, which will focus on reports of microbial genome sequences. Genome Announcements will begin publishing in January 2013.

"The revolution in high-speed, low-cost, and high-throughput parallel sequencing technology has changed the way we think about whole-genome sequencing and sequences. Identification of novel bacteria and viruses by sequencing entire genomes of isolates from normal and diseased tissue or the environment is now routine," says Tom Shenk of Princeton University, Chair of the ASM Publications Board.

Although sequence data typically are deposited in GenBank or other shared databases, the rationale for sequencing a particular organism and the detailed methodologies and protocols used often are not readily available.

Since 2007, the ASM's Journal of Bacteriology has published Genome Announcements, brief reports stating that the genome of a particular organism has been sequenced and deposited which provide a citable record of the corresponding GenBank submission. Two other ASM journals, the Journal of Virology and Eukaryotic Cell, joined the Journal of Bacteriology in accepting Genome Announcements in 2011 as a simple, rapid way for authors to inform their communities about completion of new sequencing projects.

"The exponential increase in submissions and the usage of Genome Announcements has confirmed the value and service they bring to the scientific community. As a result, ASM will now publish all Genome Announcements in a single, dedicated, online-only, open-access journal starting January 2013," says Phil Matsumura of the University of Illinois at Chicago, editor of the new journal.

Eukaryotic Cell, Journal of Bacteriology, and Journal of Virology will cease publishing Genome Announcements with the last issues of the 2012 volume year.

Any Genome Announcement manuscript accepted for publication in these three journals by 30 September 2012 will be published in 2012. Authors whose submissions are accepted on or after 1 October 2012 will have the option to transfer their submission to Genome Announcements.

Manuscripts submitted to Genome Announcements must include an abstract, an acknowledgments section indicating the source of support for the work, and a nucleotide sequence accession number. Manuscripts are limited to 500 words (exclusive of the abstract and acknowledgments), and no text headings should be used except for "References." Sequences must be made publicly available before a submission will be considered for publication, and the nucleotide sequence accession number(s) must be provided in a separate paragraph at the end of the text. Manuscripts may not include figures, tables, or supplemental material used to present data or analysis. However, multiple related sequences and their accompanying accession numbers and URL may be presented in tabular form. Publication of Sequence Read Archives (SRAs) is not permitted.

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New online, open access journal focuses on microbial genome announcements

Bangladeshi jute researchers are now upbeat at the prospect of commercial release of a new variety of jute -- Snow White Fibre -- following decoding of the genome of deadly fungus macrophomina phaseolina by a team of local scientists.

Globally famed geneticist Dr Maqsudul Alam led the team.

More than a decade ago, Bangladesh Jute Research Institute (BJRI) developed the jute variety with high commercial potentials but withheld its release to farmers considering its too much susceptibility to the deadly fungus -- macrophomina phaseolina.

BJRI breeders told The Daily Star that unlike other jute fibres, the fibres derived from Snow White variety do not require bleaching, and it has got all the potentials of being commercially used in threads, fabrics and garments.

"Its (Snow White) fibres could have been used alongside cotton at a 30-70 per cent ratio and it would have greatly reduced our import dependency for cotton. But after the invention of this special breeding line (Snow White), we found out that the variety is highly susceptive to macrophomina phaseolina," explained, biotechnologist Dr Shahidul Islam of BJRI.

Dr Islam, who was in the core team that Maqsudul Alam led in decoding the fungus genome, said despite all the potentials of the new jute variety, "We had to withhold its release to farmers because of fungi-susceptibility.

"Now that we traced out all the protein tools of macrophomina phaseolina and how it causes colossal damage to jute, in general, and this (Snow White) variety, in particular, we'll be able to engineer an immune system in the plant so that Snow White withstands the fungal damage."

Dr Islam went on, "We at BJRI even tried to develop a line (pre-variety stage) by cross-breeding Snow White with another line so that it no longer remains susceptive to macrophomina phaseolina. But that experiment in 2007 did not work as we ended up getting a line comparatively much less susceptive to the fungus but at the same time it lost many of the expected characteristics of Snow White line."

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina announced in parliament that Dr Alam and his team decoded the genome of the most deadly fungus that causes seedling blight, root rot and charcoal rot of more than 500 crop and non-crop species including jute and soybean.

The gene sequencing of macrophomina phaseolina would particularly help Bangladeshi scientists to develop jute varieties capable of fighting the fungus that causes an annual yield loss of around 40 billion taka (US$489.77 million) damaging 30 per cent of the country's precious natural fibre, experts said.

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Fungus genome map paves way for 'Snow White' jute variety

The public got its first look at extensive genome research from the UW when the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) released its findings to the public Sept. 5.

The UW has a rich history and promising future in genome studies. One of the five main data-generating centers for the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) was in the UWs Genome Studies Department in the William H. Foege Building. Its findings were published in 30 articles spread across three science journals: Nature, Genome Biology, and Genome Research.

Planning for ENCODE started in 2003, just after the human genome was sequenced, but the project truly took off in 2007. The majority of the findings recently published came from work done between 2007 and 2012.

Some of the research for ENCODE involved what turns different kinds of cells on and off. Early in the project, researchers realized that each switch is different for each type of cell for example, the instructional on-switches for blue eyes and breast cancer are not the same.

In order to conduct the research, John Stamatoyannopoulos, M.D., UW associate professor and ENCODE researcher since 2003, had to create new technology. Stamatoyannopoulos and his team at the StamLab in the Foege Building were able to successfully map which genomes within a group regulate other genomes.

After treating the genomes with a chemical called nuclease, they discovered that little DNA fragments are released from these switches. The DNA splits directly where the regulatory genomes are located. Scientists can then collect them and use massive parallel sequencing to sequence and map hundreds of millions of these DNA pieces.

Scientists can then reconstruct exactly where the regulatory proteins are sitting in the switches. The reconstruction is full of connections and secondary, or tertiary, connections that end up looking like a neural network map.

The way these switches work, just to conceptualize it, is basically a string of letters, and you can think of them like a sentence, Stamatoyannopoulos said. The sentence is made up of words. These regulatory proteins come in and make these letters into specific words. Once these proteins all dock at a specific site, the gene is turned on.

Across the hall from the Stamlab is the Akey Lab, where Joshua Akey, Ph.D. and associate professor of genome sciences, and graduate student Benjamin Vernot worked on the history of human genomes.

They superimposed the ENCODE data with 52 known genome sequences gathered from geographically diverse areas and asked themselves basic questions such as whether or not an average individual has more protein-coding variation or variation that influences gene expression levels in populations. Understanding how patterns and variation are spread out among individuals and populations, or even species, and finding the evolutionary forces that act upon the sequence variation is what a population geneticist like Akey does.

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Encoding the human genome

ScienceDaily (Sep. 23, 2012) A team of scientists with The Cancer Genome Atlas program reports their genetic characterization of 800 breast tumors, including finding some of the genetic causes of the most common forms of breast cancer, providing clues for new therapeutic targets, and identifying a molecular similarity between one sub-type of breast cancer and ovarian cancer.

Their findings, which offer a more comprehensive understanding of the mechanisms behind each sub-type of breast cancer, are reported in the Sept. 23, 2012 online edition of the journal Nature.

The researchers, including a large group from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, analyzed tumors using two basic approaches: first, using an unbiased and genome-wide approach, and second, within the context of four previously known molecular sub-types of breast cancer: HER2-enriched, Luminal A, Luminal B and Basal-like. Both approaches arrived at the same conclusions, which suggest that even when given the tremendous genetic diversity of breast cancers, four main subtypes were observed. This study is also the first to integrate information from six analytic technologies, thus providing new insights into these previously defined disease subtypes.

Charles Perou, PhD, corresponding author of the paper, says, "Through the use of multiple different technologies, we were able to collect the most complete picture of breast cancer diversity ever. These studies have important implications for all breast cancer patients and confirm a large number of our previous findings. In particular, we now have a much better picture of the genetic causes of the most common form of breast cancer, namely Estrogen-Receptor positive/Luminal A disease. We also found a stunning similarity between Basal-like breast cancers and ovarian cancers."

"This study has now provided a near complete framework for the genetic causes of breast cancer, which will significantly impact clinical medicine in the coming years as these genetic markers are evaluated as possible markers of therapeutic responsiveness."

Dr. Perou is the May Goldman Shaw Distinguished Professor of Molecular Oncology and a member of UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Among the many discoveries include findings of some of the likely genetic causes of the most common form of breast cancer, which is the Estrogen-Receptor positive Luminal A subtype. Luminal A tumors are the number one cause of breast cancer deaths in the USA accounting for approximately 40 percent, and thus, finding the genetic drivers of this subtype is of paramount importance. The TCGA team found that the mutation diversity within this group was the greatest, and that even specific types of mutations within individual genes, were associated with the Luminal A subtype. Some of these mutations may be directly targetable by a drug(s) that is in clinical development, thus possibly offering new options for many patients.

In addition, the team compared basal-like breast tumors (also known as triple-negative breast cancers) with high-grade serous ovarian tumors and found many similarities at the molecular level, suggesting a related origin and similar therapeutic opportunities. These data also suggest that basal-like breast cancer should be considered a different disease than ER-positive/Luminal breast cancer, and in fact, both basal-like breast cancer and ovarian cancer were more similar to each other than either was to ER-positive/Luminal breast cancer.

Dr. Perou adds, "Cancer is, of course, a complex disease that includes many types of alterations, and thus, no one technology can identify all of these alteration; however, by using such a diverse and powerful set of technologies in a coordinated fashion, we were able to identify the vast majority of these alterations."

Katherine Hoadley, PhD, study co-author, explains, "Our ability to compare and integrate data from RNA, microRNA, mutations, protein, DNA methylation, and DNA copy number gave us a multitude of insights about breast cancer. In particular, highlighting how distinct basal-like breast cancers are from all other breast cancers on all data types. These findings suggest that basal-like breast cancer, while arising in the same anatomical location, is potentially a completely different disease."

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Cancer genome analysis of breast cancer: Team identifies genetic causes and similarity to ovarian cancer

Public release date: 23-Sep-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]

Contact: Dianne G. Shaw dgs@med.unc.edu 919-966-7834 University of North Carolina Health Care

A team of scientists with The Cancer Genome Atlas program reports their genetic characterization of 800 breast tumors, including finding some of the genetic causes of the most common forms of breast cancer, providing clues for new therapeutic targets, and identifying a molecular similarity between one sub-type of breast cancer and ovarian cancer.

Their findings, which offer a more comprehensive understanding of the mechanisms behind each sub-type of breast cancer, are reported in the September 23, 2012 online edition of the journal Nature.

The researchers, including a large group from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, analyzed tumors using two basic approaches: first, using an unbiased and genome-wide approach, and second, within the context of four previously known molecular sub-types of breast cancer: HER2-enriched, Luminal A, Luminal B and Basal-like. Both approaches arrived at the same conclusions, which suggest that even when given the tremendous genetic diversity of breast cancers, four main subtypes were observed. This study is also the first to integrate information from six analytic technologies, thus providing new insights into these previously defined disease subtypes.

Charles Perou, PhD, corresponding author of the paper, says, "Through the use of multiple different technologies, we were able to collect the most complete picture of breast cancer diversity ever. These studies have important implications for all breast cancer patients and confirm a large number of our previous findings. In particular, we now have a much better picture of the genetic causes of the most common form of breast cancer, namely Estrogen-Receptor positive/Luminal A disease. We also found a stunning similarity between Basal-like breast cancers and ovarian cancers."

"This study has now provided a near complete framework for the genetic causes of breast cancer, which will significantly impact clinical medicine in the coming years as these genetic markers are evaluated as possible markers of therapeutic responsiveness."

Dr. Perou is the May Goldman Shaw Distinguished Professor of Molecular Oncology and a member of UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Among the many discoveries include findings of some of the likely genetic causes of the most common form of breast cancer, which is the Estrogen-Receptor positive Luminal A subtype. Luminal A tumors are the number one cause of breast cancer deaths in the USA accounting for approximately 40 percent, and thus, finding the genetic drivers of this subtype is of paramount importance. The TCGA team found that the mutation diversity within this group was the greatest, and that even specific types of mutations within individual genes, were associated with the Luminal A subtype. Some of these mutations may be directly targetable by a drug(s) that is in clinical development, thus possibly offering new options for many patients.

In addition, the team compared basal-like breast tumors (also known as triple-negative breast cancers) with high-grade serous ovarian tumors and found many similarities at the molecular level, suggesting a related origin and similar therapeutic opportunities. These data also suggest that basal-like breast cancer should be considered a different disease than ER-positive/Luminal breast cancer, and in fact, both basal-like breast cancer and ovarian cancer were more similar to each other than either was to ER-positive/Luminal breast cancer.

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UNC Lineberger scientists lead cancer genome analysis of breast cancer

September 20, 2012

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com Your Universe Online

An international teams sequencing of the Pacific oysters genome has produced pearls of wisdom regarding the structure and adaptability of the tasty mollusk.

The accomplishment is a major breakthrough in the international Conchological research, with great advancement in the fields of conchology and marine biology. said team member Fusui Zhang of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The study will provide valuable resources for studying the biology and genetic improvement of mollusks and other marine species.

According to their report in the journal Nature, the researchers analysis of the genetic code provided more details on how Pacific oysters build their shells and cope with a potentially hostile environment.

Previous theories on oyster shell construction were not heavy on details, but the new study identified 259 shell proteins and revealed the complexity of the formation process. Some proteins such as Laminin and different collagens were highly expressed in shells, suggesting some relation to animal connective tissues.

As oysters are not only soft-bodied, but also sedentary, a hard exterior would not be sufficient protection if the environment around it were to rapidly change. Extreme shifts in temperature, large amounts of toxic detritus, or prolonged exposure to open air are all potential threats to a mollusk that inhabits tidal zones.

To identify the genetic mechanism responsible for the oysters temperature durability, the researchers located 88 different genes that code for heat shock protein 70, which guards sensitive tissue against extreme temperatures. By comparison, humans 17 genes that are responsible for the production of this protein and sea urchins, the oysters tidal zones companions, have just 39. Scientists said this amount of genes might explain why sun-baked oysters can tolerate temperatures up to 120 degrees Fahrenheit.

Oysters toxic tolerance and filtration is so well-known, New York City officials have proposed putting them in waterways around Manhattan to filter undesirables out of the harbor. The genetics team found that the oysters cope with potential pathogens through the intensive immune system in their gut. According to the report, the amount and types of genes dedicated to protecting the oysters digestive gland indicate that the digestive system of this filter feeder is an important first-line defense organ against pathogens.

The research team was also looking into the sea creatures ability to survive in the open air during low tide and finding out why the oysters could survive prolonged exposure to air provided a window into just how adaptable these mollusks are. The researchers noted that over 4,400 different genes altered their expression when the animal was exposed to air. They also found a large number of duplicate genes, or paralogs, which suggested genetic repetition could be the key to the animals adaptability.

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Pacific Oyster Genome Shows Stress Adaptation And Complexity Of Shell Formation