BACKGROUND The prediction of clinical behavior, response to therapy, and outcome of infiltrative glioma is challenging. On the basis of previous studies of tumor biology, we defined five glioma molecular groups with the use of three alterations: mutations in the TERT promoter, mutations in IDH, and codeletion of chromosome arms 1p and 19q (1p/19q codeletion). We tested the hypothesis that within groups based on these features, tumors would have similar clinical variables, acquired somatic alterations, and germline variants. METHODS We scored tumors as negative or positive for each of these markers in 1087 gliomas and compared acquired alterations and patient characteristics among the five primary molecular groups. Using 11,590 controls, we assessed associations between these groups and known glioma germline variants. RESULTS Among 615 grade II or III gliomas, 29% had all three alterations (i.e., were triplepositive), 5% had TERT and IDH mutations, 45% had only IDH mutations, 7% were triple-negative, and 10% had only TERT mutations; 5% had other combinations. Among 472 grade IV gliomas, less than 1% were triple-positive, 2% had TERT and IDH mutations, 7% had only IDH mutations, 17% were triple-negative, and 74% had only TERT mutations. The mean age at diagnosis was lowest (37 years) among patients who had gliomas with only IDH mutations and was highest (59 years) among patients who had gliomas with only TERT mutations. The molecular groups were independently associated with overall survival among patients with grade II or III gliomas but not among patients with grade IV gliomas. The molecular groups were associated with specific germline variants. CONCLUSIONS Gliomas were classified into five principal groups on the basis of three tumor markers. The groups had different ages at onset, overall survival, and associations with germline variants, which implies that they are characterized by distinct mechanisms of pathogenesis.

Nanomaterials are at the leading edge of the rapidly developing field of nanotechnology. The development of reliable experimental protocols for the synthesis of nanomaterials over a range of chemical compositions, sizes, and high monodispersity is one of the challenging issues in current nanotechnology. In the context of the current drive to develop green technologies in material synthesis, this aspect of nanotechnology is of considerable importance. Biological systems, masters of ambient condition chemistry, synthesize inorganic materials that are hierarchically organized from the nano- to the macroscale. Recent studies on the use of microorganisms in the synthesis of nanoparticles are a relatively new and exciting area of research with considerable potential for development. This review describes a brief overview of the current research worldwide on the use of microorganisms in the biosynthesis of metal nanoparticles and their applications.

The “integrated diagnosis” for infiltrating gliomas in the 2016 revised World Health Organization (WHO) classification of tumors of the central nervous system requires assessment of the tumor for IDH mutations and 1p/19q codeletion. Since TERT promoter mutations and ATRX alterations have been shown to be associated with prognosis, we analyzed whether these tumor markers provide additional prognostic information within each of the five WHO 2016 categories. We used data for 1206 patients from the UCSF Adult Glioma Study, the Mayo Clinic and The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) with infiltrative glioma, grades II–IV for whom tumor status for IDH, 1p/19q codeletion, ATRX, and TERT had been determined. All cases were assigned to one of 5 groups following the WHO 2016 diagnostic criteria based on their morphologic features, and IDH and 1p/19q codeletion status. These groups are: 1-Oligodendroglioma, IDH-mutant and 1p/19q-codeleted; 2- Astrocytoma, IDH-mutant; 3- Glioblastoma, IDH-mutant; 4- Glioblastoma, IDH-wildtype; and 5-Astrocytoma, IDH-wildtype. Within each group, we used univariate and multivariate Cox proportional hazards models to assess associations of overall survival with patient age at diagnosis, grade, and ATRX alteration status and/or TERT promoter mutation status. Among Group 1 IDH-mutant 1p/19q-codeleted oligodendrogliomas, the TERT-WT group had significantly worse overall survival than the TERT-MUT group (HR: 2.72, 95%CI: 1.05–7.04, p=0.04). In both Group 2, IDH-mutant astrocytomas and Group 3, IDH-mutant glioblastomas, neither TERT mutations nor ATRX alterations were significantly associated with survival. Among Group 4, IDH-wildtype glioblastomas, ATRX alterations were associated with favorable outcomes (HR: 0.36, 95% CI: 0.17–0.81, p=0.01). Among Group 5, IDH-wildtype astrocytomas, the TERT-WT group had significantly better overall survival than the TERT-MUT group (HR: 0.48, 95% CI: 0.27–0.87), p=0.02). Thus, we present evidence that in certain WHO 2016 diagnostic groups, testing for TERT promoter mutations or ATRX alterations may provide additional useful prognostic information.

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The polymerase chain reaction (1) has become an indispenable tool of molecular biology. PCR of genomic segments from mammals typically generates acceptable specificity. However, specificity is much more difficult to achieve for segments of high GC content. In one instance for which the GC content was 74%, specificity was achieved with 7-deaza-2'-deoxyguanosine