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In published online last week in Nature Genetics, a team led by Ó³»­´«Ã½ visiting scientist Paul de Bakker of University Medical Center Utrecht fine mapped the major histocompatibility complex (MHC) – a linked set of genetic loci known to influence the development of celiac disease. The team’s approach turned up five new associated genetic variants that together account for roughly 18% of the genetic risk for the disease. Combined with previously identified risk factors, these genetic loci can now explain up to 48% of celiac disease heritability.

What: A team of researchers from the Massachusetts General Hospital, Ó³»­´«Ã½ of MIT and Harvard, and the University of North Carolina has identified an inflammatory molecule that may play an essential role in the development of lupus—a chronic, painful autoimmune disease affecting more than 1.5 million Americans.

A  by Ó³»­´«Ã½ associate member Gökhan Hotamisligil, first author Takahisa Nakamura of Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, and colleagues identifies components of a pathway— including a complex between double-stranded RNA-dependent kinase (PKR) and TAR RNA-binding protein (TRBP)—that integrates metabolic cues, stress signals, translational regulation, and the metabolically driven inflammatory response in obesity-related pathogenesis. These findings uncover a potential link between RNA metabolism and endogenous dsRNA-mediated signaling in the initiation and maintenance of a metabolic inflammatory state and provide potential targets for the treatment of chronic stress-related diseases including obesity-induced metabolic diseases. Their paper can be found online in Cell Reports.

In , a team led by researchers from the Ó³»­´«Ã½, MIT, and Dana-Farber Cancer Center describes new statistical methods that account for artifacts introduced by whole-genome amplification of single-cell genomic DNA. Their approach establishes a system for characterizing amplification bias and provides a framework for quality assurance in single-cell DNA libraries. Ó³»­´«Ã½ associate member J. Christopher Love and institute member Matthew Meyerson were senior authors of the study; Ó³»­´«Ã½ researchers Cheng-Zhong Zhang and Viktor Adalsteinsson were first authors.