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Koch FC, Olivier J, Brett J, Buckley NA, Gisev N, Pearson S, Daniels B. The impact of tightened prescribing restrictions for PBS-subsidised opioid medicines and the introduction of half-pack sizes, Australia, 2020-21: an interrupted time series analysis. Med J Aust 2024; 220:315-322. [PMID: 38522006 DOI: 10.5694/mja2.52257] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/05/2023] [Accepted: 09/12/2023] [Indexed: 03/25/2024]
Abstract
OBJECTIVES To evaluate the impact of the tightened Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) prescribing rules for immediate release (IR) and controlled release (CR) opioid medicines (1 June 2020), which also eliminated repeat dispensing without authorisation for codeine/paracetamol and tramadol IR and introduced half-pack size item codes for IR formulations. DESIGN, SETTING Population-based interrupted time series analysis of PBS dispensing data claims for a 10% sample of PBS-eligible residents and IQVIA national opioid medicine sales data (PBS-subsidised and private prescriptions), 28 May 2018 - 6 June 2021. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Mean amount of PBS-subsidised opioid medicines dispensed per day and mean overall amount sold per day - each expressed as oral morphine equivalent milligrams (OME) - overall, by formulation type (IR, CR), and by specific formulation. RESULTS During the twelve months following the PBS changes, daily PBS-subsidised opioid medicine dispensing was 81 565 OME lower (95% CI, -106 146 to -56 984 OME) than the mean daily level for 2018-20, a decline of 3.8% after adjusting for the pre-intervention trend; the relative reduction was greater for IR (8.4%) than CR formulations (2.6%). Total daily sales of all, IR formulation, and CR formulation opioid medicines did not change significantly after the PBS changes. Repeat dispensing of prescriptions comprised 7.4% of PBS-subsidised opioid dispensing before 1 June 2020, and 1.3% after the changes. Half-pack sizes comprised 8.4% of PBS-subsidised IR opioid medicine dispensing and 2.8% of all opioid medicines sold in the twelve months after the PBS changes. CONCLUSIONS The introduction of new PBS rules for subsidised opioid medicines was followed by a decline in PBS-subsidised dispensing. Some people may have bypassed the new restrictions by switching to private prescriptions, but our findings suggest that opioid medicine use in Australia declined as a result of the new restrictions.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Jake Olivier
- University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW
- Transport and Road Safety Research Centre, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW
| | | | | | - Natasa Gisev
- National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW
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2
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Koch FC, Tang M, Walpola R, Aslam M, Pearson SA, Daniels B. Changes in systemic cancer therapy in Australia during the Delta and Omicron waves of the COVID-19 pandemic (2021-2022): a controlled interrupted time series analysis. Public Health Res Pract 2024:34012402. [PMID: 38369711 DOI: 10.17061/phrp34012402] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/20/2024] Open
Abstract
OBJECTIVES Australian lockdowns in response to the initial coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak in 2020 were associated with small and transient changes in the use of systemic cancer therapy. We aimed to investigate the impacts of the longer and more restrictive lockdowns in the Australian states of New South Wales (NSW) and Victoria during both the Delta subvariant lockdowns in mid-2021 and the Omicron subvariant outbreak in late 2021/early 2022. STUDY TYPE Population-based, controlled interrupted time series analysis. METHODS We conducted a national observational study using de-identified records of government-subsidised cancer medicines dispensed to a random 10% sample of Australians between July 2018 and July 2022. We used controlled interrupted time series analysis to investigate changes in the dispensing, initiation and discontinuation of all cancer medicines dispensed to residents of NSW and Victoria, using the rest of Australia as a control series. We used quasi-Poisson regression to model weekly counts and estimate incidence rate ratios (IRRs) for the effect of (each) the Delta phase lockdown and the Omicron outbreak on our systemic cancer therapy outcomes. RESULTS Between July 2018 and July 2022, cancer medicines were dispensed 592 141 times to 33 198 people in NSW and Victoria. Overall, there were no changes to the rates of dispensing, initiation or discontinuation of antineoplastics during the Delta phase lockdowns. In both states during the Omicron outbreak, there were significant decreases in the dispensing of antineoplastics (NSW IRR 0.89; 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.84, 0.93. Victoria IRR 0.92; 95% CI 0.88, 0.96) and in the initiation of endocrine therapy (NSW IRR 0.85; 95% CI 0.74, 0.99. Victoria IRR 0.78; 95% CI 0.65, 0.94), and no changes in the discontinuation of any systemic cancer therapy. CONCLUSIONS The 2021 lockdowns and 2021/2022 Omicron outbreaks in NSW and Victoria had significant impacts on the dispensing, initiation and discontinuation of systemic cancer therapies, however, the overall effects were minimal. The impacts of lockdowns were less significant than the Omicron outbreaks, suggesting COVID-19 infection, health system capacity, and patient and community concerns were important factors for treatment changes.
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Affiliation(s)
- Forrest C Koch
- Medicines Intelligence Research Group, School of Population Health, UNSW Sydney, Australia
| | - Monica Tang
- Medicines Intelligence Research Group, School of Population Health, UNSW Sydney, Australia; Nelune Comprehensive Cancer Centre, Prince of Wales Hospital, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | | | - Maria Aslam
- Maitland Hospital, Metford, NSW, Australia; Hunter Medical Research Institute; University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia; School of Medicine and Public Health; College of Health, Medicine and Wellbeing; University of Newcastle; NSW, Australia
| | - Sallie-Anne Pearson
- University of New South Wales Medicines Intelligence Research Program, School of Population Health Sydney Australia
| | - Benjamin Daniels
- Medicines Intelligence Research Group, School of Population Health, UNSW Sydney, Australia;
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Subramanian S, Thoms JAI, Huang Y, Cornejo-Páramo P, Koch FC, Jacquelin S, Shen S, Song E, Joshi S, Brownlee C, Woll PS, Chacon-Fajardo D, Beck D, Curtis DJ, Yehson K, Antonenas V, O'Brien T, Trickett A, Powell JA, Lewis ID, Pitson SM, Gandhi MK, Lane SW, Vafaee F, Wong ES, Göttgens B, Alinejad-Rokny H, Wong JWH, Pimanda JE. Genome-wide transcription factor-binding maps reveal cell-specific changes in the regulatory architecture of human HSPCs. Blood 2023; 142:1448-1462. [PMID: 37595278 PMCID: PMC10651876 DOI: 10.1182/blood.2023021120] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/10/2023] [Revised: 07/06/2023] [Accepted: 07/25/2023] [Indexed: 08/20/2023] Open
Abstract
Hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPCs) rely on a complex interplay among transcription factors (TFs) to regulate differentiation into mature blood cells. A heptad of TFs (FLI1, ERG, GATA2, RUNX1, TAL1, LYL1, LMO2) bind regulatory elements in bulk CD34+ HSPCs. However, whether specific heptad-TF combinations have distinct roles in regulating hematopoietic differentiation remains unknown. We mapped genome-wide chromatin contacts (HiC, H3K27ac, HiChIP), chromatin modifications (H3K4me3, H3K27ac, H3K27me3) and 10 TF binding profiles (heptad, PU.1, CTCF, STAG2) in HSPC subsets (stem/multipotent progenitors plus common myeloid, granulocyte macrophage, and megakaryocyte erythrocyte progenitors) and found TF occupancy and enhancer-promoter interactions varied significantly across cell types and were associated with cell-type-specific gene expression. Distinct regulatory elements were enriched with specific heptad-TF combinations, including stem-cell-specific elements with ERG, and myeloid- and erythroid-specific elements with combinations of FLI1, RUNX1, GATA2, TAL1, LYL1, and LMO2. Furthermore, heptad-occupied regions in HSPCs were subsequently bound by lineage-defining TFs, including PU.1 and GATA1, suggesting that heptad factors may prime regulatory elements for use in mature cell types. We also found that enhancers with cell-type-specific heptad occupancy shared a common grammar with respect to TF binding motifs, suggesting that combinatorial binding of TF complexes was at least partially regulated by features encoded in DNA sequence motifs. Taken together, this study comprehensively characterizes the gene regulatory landscape in rare subpopulations of human HSPCs. The accompanying data sets should serve as a valuable resource for understanding adult hematopoiesis and a framework for analyzing aberrant regulatory networks in leukemic cells.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shruthi Subramanian
- School of Clinical Medicine, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
| | - Julie A. I. Thoms
- School of Biomedical Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
| | - Yizhou Huang
- Centre for Health Technologies and the School of Biomedical Engineering, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, Australia
| | | | - Forrest C. Koch
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, Faculty of Science, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
| | | | - Sylvie Shen
- Bone Marrow Transplant Laboratory, NSW Health Pathology, Prince of Wales Hospital, Randwick, NSW, Australia
| | - Emma Song
- Bone Marrow Transplant Laboratory, NSW Health Pathology, Prince of Wales Hospital, Randwick, NSW, Australia
| | - Swapna Joshi
- School of Clinical Medicine, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
| | - Chris Brownlee
- Mark Wainwright Analytical Centre, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
| | - Petter S. Woll
- Department of Medicine, Center for Hematology and Regenerative Medicine, Karolinska Institutet, Huddinge, Sweden
| | - Diego Chacon-Fajardo
- Centre for Health Technologies and the School of Biomedical Engineering, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, Australia
| | - Dominik Beck
- Centre for Health Technologies and the School of Biomedical Engineering, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, Australia
| | - David J. Curtis
- Australian Centre for Blood Diseases, Monash University, Melbourne, VIC, Australia
| | - Kenneth Yehson
- Blood Transplant and Cell Therapies Laboratory, NSW Health Pathology, Westmead, NSW, Australia
| | - Vicki Antonenas
- Blood Transplant and Cell Therapies Laboratory, NSW Health Pathology, Westmead, NSW, Australia
| | | | - Annette Trickett
- Bone Marrow Transplant Laboratory, NSW Health Pathology, Prince of Wales Hospital, Randwick, NSW, Australia
| | - Jason A. Powell
- Centre for Cancer Biology, SA Pathology, University of South Australia, Adelaide, Australia
- Adelaide Medical School, The University of Adelaide, Adelaide, Australia
| | - Ian D. Lewis
- Centre for Cancer Biology, SA Pathology, University of South Australia, Adelaide, Australia
| | - Stuart M. Pitson
- Centre for Cancer Biology, SA Pathology, University of South Australia, Adelaide, Australia
| | - Maher K. Gandhi
- Blood Cancer Research Group, Mater Research, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia
| | - Steven W. Lane
- Cancer Program, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research, Brisbane, Australia
| | - Fatemeh Vafaee
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, Faculty of Science, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
- UNSW Data Science Hub, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
| | - Emily S. Wong
- Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute, Sydney, Australia
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, Faculty of Science, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
| | - Berthold Göttgens
- Wellcome-MRC Cambridge Stem Cell Institute, Cambridge, United Kingdom
| | - Hamid Alinejad-Rokny
- BioMedical Machine Learning Lab, Graduate School of Biomedical Engineering, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
| | - Jason W. H. Wong
- School of Biomedical Sciences, Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China
| | - John E. Pimanda
- School of Clinical Medicine, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
- School of Biomedical Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia
- Haematology Department, Prince of Wales Hospital, Sydney, Australia
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Dinarvand M, Koch FC, Al Mouiee D, Vuong K, Vijayan A, Tanzim AF, Azad AKM, Penesyan A, Castaño-Rodríguez N, Vafaee F. dRNASb: a systems biology approach to decipher dynamics of host-pathogen interactions using temporal dual RNA-seq data. Microb Genom 2022; 8. [PMID: 36136078 DOI: 10.1099/mgen.0.000862] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
Infection triggers a dynamic cascade of reciprocal events between host and pathogen wherein the host activates complex mechanisms to recognise and kill pathogens while the pathogen often adjusts its virulence and fitness to avoid eradication by the host. The interaction between the pathogen and the host results in large-scale changes in gene expression in both organisms. Dual RNA-seq, the simultaneous detection of host and pathogen transcripts, has become a leading approach to unravelling complex molecular interactions between the host and the pathogen and is particularly informative for intracellular organisms. The amount of in vitro and in vivo dual RNA-seq data is rapidly growing, which demands computational pipelines to effectively analyse such data. In particular, holistic, systems-level, and temporal analyses of dual RNA-seq data are essential to enable further insights into the host-pathogen transcriptional dynamics and potential interactions. Here, we developed an integrative network-driven bioinformatics pipeline, dRNASb, a systems biology-based computational pipeline to analyse temporal transcriptional clusters, incorporate molecular interaction networks (e.g. protein-protein interactions), identify topologically and functionally key transcripts in host and pathogen, and associate host and pathogen temporal transcriptome to decipher potential between-species interactions. The pipeline is applicable to various dual RNA-seq data from different species and experimental conditions. As a case study, we applied dRNASb to analyse temporal dual RNA-seq data of Salmonella-infected human cells, which enabled us to uncover genes contributing to the infection process and their potential functions and to identify putative associations between host and pathogen genes during infection. Overall, dRNASb has the potential to identify key genes involved in bacterial growth or host defence mechanisms for future uses as therapeutic targets.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mojdeh Dinarvand
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Forrest C Koch
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Daniel Al Mouiee
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
- Ingham Institute for Applied Medical Research, Liverpool, NSW, Australia
- UNSW Data Science Hub, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Kaylee Vuong
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Abhishek Vijayan
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Afia Fariha Tanzim
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - A K M Azad
- ProCan®, Children's Medical Research Institute, Faculty of Medicine and Health, The University of Sydney, Westmead, NSW, Australia
| | - Anahit Penesyan
- School of Natural Sciences, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Natalia Castaño-Rodríguez
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Fatemeh Vafaee
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
- UNSW Data Science Hub, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
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5
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Mewton L, Lees B, Squeglia LM, Forbes MK, Sunderland M, Krueger R, Koch FC, Baillie A, Slade T, Hoy N, Teesson M. The relationship between brain structure and general psychopathology in preadolescents. J Child Psychol Psychiatry 2022; 63:734-744. [PMID: 34468031 PMCID: PMC8885925 DOI: 10.1111/jcpp.13513] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 07/23/2021] [Indexed: 12/17/2022]
Abstract
BACKGROUND An emerging body of literature has indicated that broad, transdiagnostic dimensions of psychopathology are associated with alterations in brain structure across the life span. The current study aimed to investigate the relationship between brain structure and broad dimensions of psychopathology in the critical preadolescent period when psychopathology is emerging. METHODS This study included baseline data from the Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study® (n = 11,875; age range = 9-10 years; male = 52.2%). General psychopathology, externalizing, internalizing, and thought disorder dimensions were based on a higher-order model of psychopathology and estimated using Bayesian plausible values. Outcome variables included global and regional cortical volume, thickness, and surface area. RESULTS Higher levels of psychopathology across all dimensions were associated with lower volume and surface area globally, as well as widespread and pervasive alterations across the majority of cortical and subcortical regions studied, after adjusting for sex, race/ethnicity, parental education, income, and maternal psychopathology. The relationships between general psychopathology and brain structure were attenuated when adjusting for cognitive functioning. There were no statistically significant relationships between psychopathology and cortical thickness in this sample of preadolescents. CONCLUSIONS The current study identified lower cortical volume and surface area as transdiagnostic biomarkers for general psychopathology in preadolescence. Future research may focus on whether the widespread and pervasive relationships between general psychopathology and brain structure reflect cognitive dysfunction that is a feature across a range of mental illnesses.
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Affiliation(s)
- Louise Mewton
- Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Briana Lees
- The Matilda Centre for Research in Mental Health and Substance Use, The University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Lindsay M Squeglia
- Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, SC, USA
| | - Miriam K Forbes
- Department of Psychology, Centre for Emotional Health, Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Matthew Sunderland
- The Matilda Centre for Research in Mental Health and Substance Use, The University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | | | - Forrest C Koch
- Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Andrew Baillie
- Sydney School of Health Sciences, The University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Tim Slade
- The Matilda Centre for Research in Mental Health and Substance Use, The University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Nicholas Hoy
- Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Maree Teesson
- The Matilda Centre for Research in Mental Health and Substance Use, The University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia
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6
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Zandavi SM, Koch FC, Vijayan A, Zanini F, Mora FV, Ortega DG, Vafaee F. Disentangling single-cell omics representation with a power spectral density-based feature extraction. Nucleic Acids Res 2022; 50:5482-5492. [PMID: 35639509 PMCID: PMC9178020 DOI: 10.1093/nar/gkac436] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/21/2021] [Revised: 04/26/2022] [Accepted: 05/10/2022] [Indexed: 12/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Emerging single-cell technologies provide high-resolution measurements of distinct cellular modalities opening new avenues for generating detailed cellular atlases of many and diverse tissues. The high dimensionality, sparsity, and inaccuracy of single cell sequencing measurements, however, can obscure discriminatory information, mask cellular subtype variations and complicate downstream analyses which can limit our understanding of cell function and tissue heterogeneity. Here, we present a novel pre-processing method (scPSD) inspired by power spectral density analysis that enhances the accuracy for cell subtype separation from large-scale single-cell omics data. We comprehensively benchmarked our method on a wide range of single-cell RNA-sequencing datasets and showed that scPSD pre-processing, while being fast and scalable, significantly reduces data complexity, enhances cell-type separation, and enables rare cell identification. Additionally, we applied scPSD to transcriptomics and chromatin accessibility cell atlases and demonstrated its capacity to discriminate over 100 cell types across the whole organism and across different modalities of single-cell omics data.
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Affiliation(s)
- Seid Miad Zandavi
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney), Australia.,Programs in Metabolism and Medical & Population Genetics, Broad Institute, Cambridge, MA, USA.,Division of Genetics and Genomics, Boston Children's Hospital, Boston, MA, USA.,Department of Pediatrics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA
| | - Forrest C Koch
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney), Australia
| | - Abhishek Vijayan
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney), Australia
| | - Fabio Zanini
- Prince of Wales Clinical School, UNSW Sydney, Australia.,Cellular Genomics Future Institute, UNSW Sydney, Australia
| | - Fatima Valdes Mora
- Children's Cancer Institute, Lowy Cancer Research Centre, UNSW Sydney, Australia.,School of Women's and Children's Health, Faculty of Medicine, UNSW, Sydney, Australia
| | - David Gallego Ortega
- School of Biomedical Engineering, University of Technology Sydney (UTS), Australia
| | - Fatemeh Vafaee
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney), Australia.,Cellular Genomics Future Institute, UNSW Sydney, Australia.,UNSW Data Science Hub (uDASH), UNSW Sydney, Australia
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Koch FC, Sutton GJ, Voineagu I, Vafaee F. Supervised application of internal validation measures to benchmark dimensionality reduction methods in scRNA-seq data. Brief Bioinform 2021; 22:6347204. [PMID: 34374742 DOI: 10.1093/bib/bbab304] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/31/2021] [Revised: 07/15/2021] [Accepted: 07/17/2021] [Indexed: 12/24/2022] Open
Abstract
A typical single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) experiment will measure on the order of 20 000 transcripts and thousands, if not millions, of cells. The high dimensionality of such data presents serious complications for traditional data analysis methods and, as such, methods to reduce dimensionality play an integral role in many analysis pipelines. However, few studies have benchmarked the performance of these methods on scRNA-seq data, with existing comparisons assessing performance via downstream analysis accuracy measures, which may confound the interpretation of their results. Here, we present the most comprehensive benchmark of dimensionality reduction methods in scRNA-seq data to date, utilizing over 300 000 compute hours to assess the performance of over 25 000 low-dimension embeddings across 33 dimensionality reduction methods and 55 scRNA-seq datasets. We employ a simple, yet novel, approach, which does not rely on the results of downstream analyses. Internal validation measures (IVMs), traditionally used as an unsupervised method to assess clustering performance, are repurposed to measure how well-formed biological clusters are after dimensionality reduction. Performance was further evaluated over nearly 200 000 000 iterations of DBSCAN, a density-based clustering algorithm, showing that hyperparameter optimization using IVMs as the objective function leads to near-optimal clustering. Methods were also assessed on the extent to which they preserve the global structure of the data, and on their computational memory and time requirements across a large range of sample sizes. Our comprehensive benchmarking analysis provides a valuable resource for researchers and aims to guide best practice for dimensionality reduction in scRNA-seq analyses, and we highlight Latent Dirichlet Allocation and Potential of Heat-diffusion for Affinity-based Transition Embedding as high-performing algorithms.
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Affiliation(s)
- Forrest C Koch
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney), Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Gavin J Sutton
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney), Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Irina Voineagu
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney), Sydney, NSW, Australia.,UNSW Data Science Hub, University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney), Sydney, NSW, Australia
| | - Fatemeh Vafaee
- School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney), Sydney, NSW, Australia.,UNSW Data Science Hub, University of New South Wales (UNSW Sydney), Sydney, NSW, Australia
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Du J, Koch FC, Xia A, Jiang J, Crawford JD, Lam BCP, Thalamuthu A, Lee T, Kochan N, Fawns-Ritchie C, Brodaty H, Xu Q, Sachdev PS, Wen W. Difference in distribution functions: A new diffusion weighted imaging metric for estimating white matter integrity. Neuroimage 2021; 240:118381. [PMID: 34252528 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2021.118381] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/19/2021] [Revised: 06/27/2021] [Accepted: 07/08/2021] [Indexed: 11/19/2022] Open
Abstract
Diffusion weighted imaging (DWI) is a widely recognized neuroimaging technique to evaluate the microstructure of brain white matter. The objective of this study is to establish an improved automated DWI marker for estimating white matter integrity and investigating ageing related cognitive decline. The concept of Wasserstein distance was introduced to help establish a new measure: difference in distribution functions (DDF), which captures the difference of reshaping one's mean diffusivity (MD) distribution to a reference MD distribution. This new DWI measure was developed using a population-based cohort (n=19,369) from the UK Biobank. Validation was conducted using the data drawn from two independent cohorts: the Sydney Memory and Ageing Study, a community-dwelling sample (n=402), and the Renji Cerebral Small Vessel Disease Cohort Study (RCCS), which consisted of cerebral small vessel disease (CSVD) patients (n=171) and cognitively normal controls (NC) (n=43). DDF was associated with age across all three samples and better explained the variance of changes than other established DWI measures, such as fractional anisotropy, mean diffusivity and peak width of skeletonized mean diffusivity (PSMD). Significant correlations between DDF and cognition were found in the UK Biobank cohort and the MAS cohort. Binary logistic analysis and receiver operator characteristic curve analysis of RCCS demonstrated that DDF had higher sensitivity in distinguishing CSVD patients from NC than the other DWI measures. To demonstrate the flexibility of DDF, we calculated regional DDF which also showed significant correlation with age and cognition. DDF can be used as a marker for monitoring the white matter microstructural changes and ageing related cognitive decline in the elderly.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jing Du
- Centre for Healthy Brain Aging (CHeBA), School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia.
| | - Forrest C Koch
- Centre for Healthy Brain Aging (CHeBA), School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia
| | - Aihua Xia
- School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia
| | - Jiyang Jiang
- Centre for Healthy Brain Aging (CHeBA), School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia
| | - John D Crawford
- Centre for Healthy Brain Aging (CHeBA), School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia
| | - Ben C P Lam
- Centre for Healthy Brain Aging (CHeBA), School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia
| | - Anbupalam Thalamuthu
- Centre for Healthy Brain Aging (CHeBA), School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia
| | - Teresa Lee
- Centre for Healthy Brain Aging (CHeBA), School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia; Neuropsychiatric Institute (NPI), Euroa Centre, Prince of Wales Hospital, Randwick, New South Wales 2031, Australia
| | - Nicole Kochan
- Centre for Healthy Brain Aging (CHeBA), School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia
| | - Chloe Fawns-Ritchie
- Centre for Cognitive Ageing and Cognitive Epidemiology (CCACE), Department of Psychology, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK
| | - Henry Brodaty
- Centre for Healthy Brain Aging (CHeBA), School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia; Dementia Centre for Research Collaboration, School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia
| | - Qun Xu
- Department of Health Manage Centre, RenJi Hospital, School of Medicine, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200127, China; Department of Neurology, RenJi Hospital, School of Medicine, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200127, China.
| | - Perminder S Sachdev
- Centre for Healthy Brain Aging (CHeBA), School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia; Neuropsychiatric Institute (NPI), Euroa Centre, Prince of Wales Hospital, Randwick, New South Wales 2031, Australia
| | - Wei Wen
- Centre for Healthy Brain Aging (CHeBA), School of Psychiatry, UNSW Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia; Neuropsychiatric Institute (NPI), Euroa Centre, Prince of Wales Hospital, Randwick, New South Wales 2031, Australia
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Jiang J, Thalamuthu A, Koch FC, Liu T, Xu Q, Trollor JN, Ames D, Wright MJ, Catts V, Sachdev PS, Wen W. Cerebral Blood Flow in Community-Based Older Twins Is Moderately Heritable: An Arterial Spin Labeling Perfusion Imaging Study. Front Aging Neurosci 2019; 11:169. [PMID: 31333444 PMCID: PMC6615405 DOI: 10.3389/fnagi.2019.00169] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/26/2019] [Accepted: 06/17/2019] [Indexed: 11/25/2022] Open
Abstract
Adequate cerebral blood flow (CBF) is necessary to maintain brain metabolism and function. Arterial spin labeling (ASL) is an emerging MRI technique offering a non-invasive and reliable quantification of CBF. The genetic basis of CBF has not been well documented, and one approach to investigate this is to examine its heritability. The current study aimed to examine the heritability of CBF using ASL data from a cohort of community-dwelling older twins (41 monozygotic (MZ) and 25 dizygotic (DZ) twin pairs; age range, 65–93 years; 56.4% female). The results showed that the cortex had higher CBF than subcortical gray matter (GM) regions, and CBF in the GM regions of the anterior cerebral artery (ACA) territory was lower than that of the middle (MCA) and posterior (PCA) cerebral arteries. After accounting for the effects of age, sex and scanner, moderate heritability was identified for global CBF (h2 = 0.611; 95% CI = 0.380–0.761), as well as for cortical and subcortical GM and the GM in the major arterial territories (h2 = 0.500–0.612). Strong genetic correlations (GCs) were found between CBF in subcortical and cortical GM regions, as well as among the three arterial territories (ACA, MCA, PCA), suggesting a largely convergent genetic control for the CBF in brain GM. The moderate heritability of CBF warrants future investigations to uncover the genetic variants and genes that regulate CBF.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jiyang Jiang
- Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, School of Psychiatry, University of New South Wales, Randwick, NSW, Australia
| | - Anbupalam Thalamuthu
- Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, School of Psychiatry, University of New South Wales, Randwick, NSW, Australia.,Neuroscience Research Australia, Randwick, NSW, Australia
| | - Forrest C Koch
- Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, School of Psychiatry, University of New South Wales, Randwick, NSW, Australia
| | - Tao Liu
- Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, School of Psychiatry, University of New South Wales, Randwick, NSW, Australia.,School of Biological Science and Medical Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing, China
| | - Qun Xu
- Department of Health Manage Centre, Renji Hospital, School of Medicine, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China.,Renji-UNSW CHeBA Neurocognitive Centre, Renji Hospital, School of Medicine, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China
| | - Julian N Trollor
- Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, School of Psychiatry, University of New South Wales, Randwick, NSW, Australia.,Neuropsychiatric Institute, Prince of Wales Hospital, Randwick, NSW, Australia.,Department of Developmental Disability Neuropsychiatry (3DN), University of New South Wales, Randwick, NSW, Australia
| | - David Ames
- National Ageing Research Institute, University of Melbourne, Parkville, VIC, Australia
| | - Margaret J Wright
- NeuroImaging Genetics Laboratory, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Herston, QLD, Australia.,Queensland Brain Institute, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia
| | - Vibeke Catts
- Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, School of Psychiatry, University of New South Wales, Randwick, NSW, Australia
| | - Perminder S Sachdev
- Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, School of Psychiatry, University of New South Wales, Randwick, NSW, Australia.,Neuropsychiatric Institute, Prince of Wales Hospital, Randwick, NSW, Australia
| | - Wei Wen
- Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing, School of Psychiatry, University of New South Wales, Randwick, NSW, Australia.,Neuropsychiatric Institute, Prince of Wales Hospital, Randwick, NSW, Australia
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Willier BH, Rawles ME, Koch FC. Biological Differences in the Action of Synthetic Male Hormones on the Differentiation of Sex in the Chick Embryo. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2006; 24:176-82. [PMID: 16588216 PMCID: PMC1077061 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.24.4.176] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Affiliation(s)
- B H Willier
- Department of Zoölogy, University of Rochester
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Willier BH, Gallagher TF, Koch FC. Sex-Modification in the Chick Embryo Resulting from Injections of Male and Female Hormones. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2006; 21:625-31. [PMID: 16588020 PMCID: PMC1076674 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.21.11.625] [Citation(s) in RCA: 45] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Affiliation(s)
- B H Willier
- Department of Zoölogy, University of Rochester
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Kenyon AT, Gallagher TF, Peterson DH, Dorfman RI, Koch FC. THE URINARY EXCRETION OF ANDROGENIC AND ESTROGENIC SUBSTANCES IN CERTAIN ENDOCRINE STATES. STUDIES IN HYPOGONADISM, GYNECOMASTIA AND VIRILISM. J Clin Invest 2006; 16:705-17. [PMID: 16694515 PMCID: PMC424908 DOI: 10.1172/jci100895] [Citation(s) in RCA: 30] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/17/2022] Open
Affiliation(s)
- A T Kenyon
- Department of Medicine of the University of Chicago, Chicago
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Gallagher TF, Peterson DH, Dorfman RI, Kenyon AT, Koch FC. THE DAILY URINARY EXCRETION OF ESTROGENIC AND ANDROGENIC SUBSTANCES BY NORMAL MEN AND WOMEN. J Clin Invest 2006; 16:695-703. [PMID: 16694514 PMCID: PMC424907 DOI: 10.1172/jci100894] [Citation(s) in RCA: 60] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/17/2022] Open
Affiliation(s)
- T F Gallagher
- Department of Biochemistry, The University of Chicago, Chicago
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Koch FC. The Chemistry and Biology of Male Sex Hormones. Bull N Y Acad Med 1938; 14:655-680. [PMID: 19312079 PMCID: PMC1911323] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Abstract] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 05/27/2023]
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Affiliation(s)
- H Sugata
- Hull Laboratories of Physiological Chemistry and Pharmacology, University of Chicago
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