Rapid identification of common medicinal snakes and their adulterants using the Bar-HRM analysis method

Effective identification methods for snake species are lacking, exacerbating the extermination of medicinal and commercially valuable snake species. Hence, it is imperative to find fast and reliable methods to distinguish snake samples available on the market. Seventy-three samples from four families belonging to 13 genera were collected in China and found to contain common medicinal snakes and their adulterants. Cytochrome oxidase I (COI) was utilized as a DNA barcode to analyse these common snakes, and a DNA mini-barcode was employed for fast detection. Then, the DNA mini-barcode assays were coupled with a high-resolution melting (HRM) analysis (Bar-HRM) to realize the rapid discrimination of these snake species. The results showed the power of DNA barcoding with COI, which was capable of distinguishing all collected snake samples, and the combined Bar-HRM method can successfully identify the adulterants and different snake species. In particular, Bar-HRM revealed Bungarus fasciatus adulterants in B. multicinctus at concentrations as low as 1.6%. Moreover, the results of the study confirmed the effectiveness of the technique in terms of the rapid identification of snakes, which has great potential for ensuring the safety of commercially valuable snake species.

Association of AdipoQ single-nucleotide polymorphisms and smoking interaction with the risk of coronary heart disease in Chinese Han population

AIMS

To investigate the impact of AdipoQ polymorphisms, and their additional interactions with smoking and drinking on coronary heart disease (CHD) risk based on Chinese population.

METHODS

Hardy‒Weinberg equilibrium (HWE) was performed using SNPStats (available online at http://bioinfo.iconcologia.net/SNPstats ). Generalized multifactor dimensionality reduction (GMDR) model was used to screen the best gene‒gene and gene‒environment interaction combinations. Logistic regression was performed to investigate association between four single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and CHD and the interaction effect between rs1501299 and smoking.

RESULTS

Logistic analysis showed that CHD risks were higher in carriers with homozygous mutant of rs1501299 and rs2241766 than those with wild-type homozygotes, odds ratio (ORs) (95%CI) were 1.49 (1.19-1.95) and 1.71 (1.33-2.24), respectively, but CHD risks were lower in carriers with homozygous mutant of rs7649121 than those with wild-type homozygotes, OR (95%CI) was 0.72 (0.51-0.96). GMDR model indicated that there was a significant two-locus model (p = 0.0107) involving rs1501299 and current smoking, indicating a potential gene-environment interaction between rs1501299 and current smoking. Overall, the cross-validation consistency of this model was 9/10, and the testing accuracy was 60.11% (p = 0.0010). T-allele carriage had 42% prevalence, and one-quarter of them were current smokers. Smokers with rs1501299-GT or TT genotype have the highest CHD risk, compared to never-smokers with rs1501299-GG genotype, OR (95%CI) was 3.56 (1.91-5.42), after adjustment for gender, age, alcohol status, and body mass index. But we did not find any significant gene-gene and gene-drinking interaction combinations in GMDR models.

CONCLUSIONS

Polymorphisms in rs1501299 and rs2241766, and their additional interactions between rs1501299 and smoking were associated with increased CHD risks: polymorphism in rs7649121 was associated with decreased CHD risks.