This list will be updated with all of our new commentaries including Comments, Editorials, Meeting reports, Opinions and Q&As. Commentaries in Genome Medicine are open access and therefore free to read and share.
Recent work has reported that the activation of the p53 pathway in primary cells hampers the efficiency of genome editing by CRISPR/Cas9 via induction of apoptosis or cell cycle arrest. These findings highligh...
We provide a conceptual framework to establish a causal link between diet, gut microbiota, and health. Identifying the key strains that mediate microbe–host interactions and understanding the mechanisms involv...
Authors: Yan Y. Lam, Chenhong Zhang and Liping Zhao
Avian influenza A viruses (AIVs) pose a threat to global health because of their sporadic zoonotic transmission and potential to cause pandemics. Genomic surveillance of AIVs has become a powerful, cost-effect...
There is an urgent need to develop vaccines against emerging diseases, including those caused by pathogens that are currently unknown to cause human disease, termed ‘disease X’. Here, Zika virus infection is c...
Understanding the complex and highly dynamic interactions between fungi and host cells in a tissue-specific manner is crucial to facilitate the development of new therapeutic approaches to infections. Here, we...
Authors: Vinod Kumar, Frank L. van de Veerdonk and Mihai G. Netea
The heart is one of the least regenerative organs in the human body; adult cardiac myocytes divide at extremely low frequency. Therefore, meaningful induction of cardiac regeneration requires in-depth understa...
Authors: Rajan Jain, Andrey Poleshko and Jonathan A. Epstein
CRISPR–Cas systems have provided revolutionary tools for genome editing. The discovery of Cas proteins with alternative activities has now enabled sensitive and robust tools for detecting nucleic acids. Recent...
New computational and database-driven tools are emerging to aid in the interpretation of cancer genomic data as its use becomes more common in clinical evidence-based cancer medicine. Two such open source tool...
Exosomes are promising tools for improving cancer care, but conversely may also contribute to tumor progression. Here, we highlight recently discovered roles of exosomes in modulating immune responses in cance...
Authors: Paul Kurywchak, Jena Tavormina and Raghu Kalluri
Evidence has recently been reported of prion seeding activity in skin tissue from patients with sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (sCJD). This is relevant information for infection control measures during sur...
Progress in sensitive analytical approaches has opened new avenues for the detection of cells or products such as circulating cell-free DNA released by tumors. These ‘liquid biopsies’ are being explored in cli...
Endophenotypes, quantitative neurobehavioral traits that index genetic susceptibility for a psychiatric disorder, have been examined in thousands of studies. Nevertheless, they have underexploited potential to...
Novel associations between the human microbiome and health and disease are routinely emerging, and important host–microbiome interactions are targets for new diagnostics and therapeutics. Understanding how bro...
Specific prophylactic migraine treatments are urgently needed because of the unmet needs of many migraine patients. Antibodies targeting calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP) or its receptor have recently sho...
Authors: Antoinette MaassenVanDenBrink, Gisela M. Terwindt and Arn M. J. M. van den Maagdenberg
Breakthroughs on many fronts have provided strong evidence to support synaptic dysfunction as a causal factor for neuropsychiatric diseases. Genetic studies have identified variants implicated in novel biologi...
Authors: Xinyuan Wang, Kimberly M. Christian, Hongjun Song and Guo-li Ming
Our understanding of the neurobiology of psychiatric disorders remains limited, and biomarker-based clinical management is yet to be developed. Induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) technology has revolutionize...
Authors: Krishna C. Vadodaria, Debha N. Amatya, Maria C. Marchetto and Fred H. Gage
The translation of personal genomics to precision medicine depends on the accurate interpretation of the multitude of genetic variants observed for each individual. However, even when genetic variants are pred...
Authors: Gustavo Glusman, Peter W. Rose, Andreas Prlić, Jennifer Dougherty, José M. Duarte, Andrew S. Hoffman, Geoffrey J. Barton, Emøke Bendixen, Timothy Bergquist, Christian Bock, Elizabeth Brunk, Marija Buljan, Stephen K. Burley, Binghuang Cai, Hannah Carter, JianJiong Gao…
Antibiotics have become the standard of care for bacterial infections. However, rising rates of antibiotic-resistant infections are outpacing the development of new antimicrobials. Broad-spectrum antibiotics a...
Authors: Alexandra E. Paharik, Henry L. Schreiber IV, Caitlin N. Spaulding, Karen W. Dodson and Scott J. Hultgren
Airway inflammation is key to the severity and persistence of asthma. Recent studies have revealed novel immune mechanisms that target dendritic cells, T helper 2 cytokines, regulatory T cells, and type 2 inna...
Genome-wide association studies have made strides in identifying common variation associated with disease. The modest effect sizes preclude risk prediction based on single genetic variants, but polygenic risk ...
Genome editing using clustered regularly interspersed short palindromic repeats (CRISPR) and CRISPR-associated proteins offers the potential to facilitate safe and effective treatment of genetic diseases refra...
Authors: Dianne Nicol, Lisa Eckstein, Michael Morrison, Jacob S. Sherkow, Margaret Otlowski, Tess Whitton, Tania Bubela, Kathryn P. Burdon, Don Chalmers, Sarah Chan, Jac Charlesworth, Christine Critchley, Merlin Crossley, Sheryl de Lacey, Joanne L. Dickinson, Alex W. Hewitt…
Over 300 million adults are obese, but little is known about the impact of obesity on cardiovascular health. We discuss recent genetic and epigenetic studies of adiposity that indicate a causal role for genera...
Authors: Michael V. Holmes, Sara L. Pulit and Cecilia M. Lindgren
Advances in molecular tools to characterize the microbiome have led to the discovery of unique roles for microbes in human disease. Findings that the female genital microbiome can influence HIV acquisition and...
Authors: Lenine J. P. Liebenberg, Derseree Archary, Aida Sivro and Douglas S. Kwon
Recent studies have identified links between host genetic variants and microbial recognition of the microbiome. Defects in host–microbiome interactions in individuals harboring inflammatory bowel disease risk ...
Intestinal epithelium is structured by two distinct components: the villi and the crypts. The crypts harbor stem cells expressing Lgr5 and thus have been a representative model to study tissue stem cell functi...
Biomedical research is becoming increasingly large-scale and international. Cloud computing enables the comprehensive integration of genomic and clinical data, and the global sharing and collaborative processi...
Authors: Fruzsina Molnár-Gábor, Rupert Lueck, Sergei Yakneen and Jan O. Korbel
Recent advances in genome sequencing of single microbial cells enable the assignment of functional roles to members of the human microbiome that cannot currently be cultured. This approach can reveal the genom...
Advances in mass spectrometry have allowed the high-throughput quantitative identification of human leukocyte antigen (HLA) class I ligands, and recent studies have reported on the breadth and diversity of the...
Recent advances in β-cell regeneration in vivo are providing insights into the mechanisms involved in the conversion of distinct pancreatic cell lineages into β cells. These mechanisms mostly involve reactivat...
Dual diagnosis with substance use disorders (SUDs) consistently contributes to the premature mortality and increased disability observed in schizophrenia. Large genome-wide association studies are providing th...
Authors: Renato Polimanti, Arpana Agrawal and Joel Gelernter
Rett syndrome is a profound neurological disorder caused by mutations in the MECP2 gene, but preclinical research has indicated that it is potentially treatable. Progress towards this goal depends on the developm...
N6-methyladenosine (m6A) in mRNA has emerged as a crucial epitranscriptomic modification that controls cellular differentiation and pluripotency. Recent studies a...
This era of groundbreaking scientific developments in high-resolution, high-throughput technologies is allowing the cost-effective collection and analysis of huge, disparate datasets on individual health. Prop...
Combinations of therapies are being actively pursued to expand therapeutic options and deal with cancer’s pervasive resistance to treatment. Research efforts to discover effective combination treatments have f...
Authors: Jonathan R. Dry, Mi Yang and Julio Saez-Rodriguez
The advent of mitochondrial replacement techniques poses many scientific, regulatory, and ethical questions. Previous studies suggest good safety and efficacy profiles of these techniques, but challenges remai...
Authors: Thomas Klopstock, Barbara Klopstock and Holger Prokisch
The development of the CRISPR-Cas platform for genome editing has greatly simplified the process of making targeted genetic modifications. Applications of genome editing are expected to have a substantial impa...
Anti-programmed cell death 1 (PD1) immunotherapies are among the most effective anti-cancer immunotherapies available; however, a large number of patients present with or develop resistance to them. Unfortunat...
Authors: Jake S. O’Donnell, Mark J. Smyth and Michele W. L. Teng
Precision medicine (PM) can be defined as a predictive, preventive, personalized, and participatory healthcare service delivery model. Recent developments in molecular biology and information technology make P...
Authors: Gabrielle Bertier, Jian Carrot-Zhang, Vassilis Ragoussis and Yann Joly
Advances in genetic analysis have revealed new complexities in the interpretation of genetic variants. Correct assessment of a genetic variant relies on the clinical context and knowledge of the underlying bio...
The World Health Organization has declared Zika virus an international public health emergency. Knowledge of Zika virus genomic epidemiology is currently limited due to challenges in obtaining and processing s...
Authors: Nuno Rodrigues Faria, Ester C. Sabino, Marcio R. T. Nunes, Luiz Carlos Junior Alcantara, Nicholas J. Loman and Oliver G. Pybus
Several recent studies have investigated either genetic or epigenetic variation in schizophrenia. A recent study presents comprehensive analyses of blood samples to better characterize the combined role of gen...
For genomic medicine research to be fully translated into clinical care, it is critical for researchers to engage stakeholders who ultimately regulate the use of genomic technologies and therapeutics within he...
Authors: Julianne M. O’Daniel and Jonathan S. Berg
Medicine and healthcare are undergoing profound changes. Whole-genome sequencing and high-resolution imaging technologies are key drivers of this rapid and crucial transformation. Technological innovation comb...
Authors: Charles Auffray, Rudi Balling, Inês Barroso, László Bencze, Mikael Benson, Jay Bergeron, Enrique Bernal-Delgado, Niklas Blomberg, Christoph Bock, Ana Conesa, Susanna Del Signore, Christophe Delogne, Peter Devilee, Alberto Di Meglio, Marinus Eijkemans, Paul Flicek…
Advances in sequencing technology have taught us much about the human genome, including how difficult it is to interpret rare variation. Improvements in genetic test interpretation are likely to come through d...
The identification of somatic mosaicism in the brain lends a new perspective to our understanding of the role of gene and environment interactions in psychiatric disease risk. Somatic mutations, such as retrot...
Authors: Tracy A. Bedrosian, Sara Linker and Fred H. Gage
The gut microbiota has been linked with metabolic diseases in humans, but demonstration of causality remains a challenge. The gut microbiota, as a complex microbial ecosystem, consists of hundreds of individua...
There is a growing realization that the gut–brain axis plays a key role in maintaining brain health and the stress response. Recently, the gut microbiota has emerged as a master regulator of this axis. Thus, o...
