FINDINGS: Here, we systematically enhanced the draft genome of S. haematobium using a single-molecule and long-range DNA-sequencing approach. We achieved a major improvement in the accuracy and contiguity of the genome assembly, making it superior or comparable to assemblies for other schistosome species. We transferred curated gene models to this assembly and, using enhanced gene annotation pipelines, inferred a gene set with as many or more complete gene models as those of other well-studied schistosomes. Using conserved, single-copy orthologs, we assessed the phylogenetic position of S. haematobium in relation to other parasitic flatworms for which draft genomes were available.
CONCLUSIONS: We report a substantially enhanced genomic resource that represents a solid foundation for molecular research on S. haematobium and is poised to better underpin population and functional genomic investigations and to accelerate the search for new disease interventions.
METHODS: The study employed a bidirectional MR analysis with two samples, utilizing a freely accessible genome-wide association study (GWAS). Furthermore, the primary analysis employed the inverse variance weighted (IVW) method. To determine whether the lipid profiles were associated with periodontitis, a variety of sensitivity analyses (including MR-Egger regression, MR-PRESSO, and weighted median), as well as multivariable MR, were employed.
RESULTS: MR analysis performed by IVW did not reveal any relationship between periodontitis and low-density lipoprotein (LDL), high-density lipoprotein (HDL), triglycerides (TG), or total cholesterol (TC). It was also found that LDL, HDL, TG, and TC were not associated to periodontitis. Furthermore, the MR estimations exhibited consistency with other MR sensitivity and multivariate MR (MVMR) analyses. These results show that the correlation between serum lipid levels and periodontitis could not be established.
CONCLUSION: The finding indicates a negligible link between periodontitis and serum lipid levels were identified, despite previous observational studies reporting a link between periodontitis and serum lipid levels.
METHODS: We obtained information on medication use and cancer diagnosis from National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey participants. After propensity score matching, we conducted survey-weighted multivariate logistic regression and restricted cubic spline analysis to assess the observed correlation between medication use and cancer while adjusting for multiple covariates. We also performed MR analysis to investigate causality based on summary data from genome-wide association studies on medication use and cancers. We performed sensitivity analyses, replication analysis, genetic correlation analysis, and reverse MR analysis to improve the reliability of MR findings.
RESULTS: We found that the use of agents acting on the renin-angiotensin system was associated with reduced risk of prostate cancer (odds ratio (OR) = 0.42; 95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.27-0.63, P