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| 2. |
- Murakami, Go, et al.
(author)
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Mio - First Comprehensive Exploration of Mercury's Space Environment : Mission Overview
- 2020
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In: Space Science Reviews. - : Springer Nature. - 0038-6308 .- 1572-9672. ; 216:7
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Research review (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Mercury has a unique and complex space environment with its weak global magnetic field, intense solar wind, tenuous exosphere, and magnetospheric plasma particles. This complex system makes Mercury an excellent science target to understand effects of the solar wind to planetary environments. In addition, investigating Mercury's dynamic magnetosphere also plays a key role to understand extreme exoplanetary environment and its habitability conditions against strong stellar winds. BepiColombo, a joint mission to Mercury by the European Space Agency and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, will address remaining open questions using two spacecraft, Mio and the Mercury Planetary Orbiter. Mio is a spin-stabilized spacecraft designed to investigate Mercury's space environment, with a powerful suite of plasma instruments, a spectral imager for the exosphere, and a dust monitor. Because of strong constraints on operations during its orbiting phase around Mercury, sophisticated observation and downlink plans are required in order to maximize science outputs. This paper gives an overview of the Mio spacecraft and its mission, operations plan, and data handling and archiving.
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| 3. |
- Namkoong, H, et al.
(author)
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DOCK2 is involved in the host genetics and biology of severe COVID-19
- 2022
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In: Nature. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1476-4687 .- 0028-0836. ; 609:7928, s. 754-
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Identifying the host genetic factors underlying severe COVID-19 is an emerging challenge1–5. Here we conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS) involving 2,393 cases of COVID-19 in a cohort of Japanese individuals collected during the initial waves of the pandemic, with 3,289 unaffected controls. We identified a variant on chromosome 5 at 5q35 (rs60200309-A), close to the dedicator of cytokinesis 2 gene (DOCK2), which was associated with severe COVID-19 in patients less than 65 years of age. This risk allele was prevalent in East Asian individuals but rare in Europeans, highlighting the value of genome-wide association studies in non-European populations. RNA-sequencing analysis of 473 bulk peripheral blood samples identified decreased expression of DOCK2 associated with the risk allele in these younger patients. DOCK2 expression was suppressed in patients with severe cases of COVID-19. Single-cell RNA-sequencing analysis (n = 61 individuals) identified cell-type-specific downregulation of DOCK2 and a COVID-19-specific decreasing effect of the risk allele on DOCK2 expression in non-classical monocytes. Immunohistochemistry of lung specimens from patients with severe COVID-19 pneumonia showed suppressed DOCK2 expression. Moreover, inhibition of DOCK2 function with CPYPP increased the severity of pneumonia in a Syrian hamster model of SARS-CoV-2 infection, characterized by weight loss, lung oedema, enhanced viral loads, impaired macrophage recruitment and dysregulated type I interferon responses. We conclude that DOCK2 has an important role in the host immune response to SARS-CoV-2 infection and the development of severe COVID-19, and could be further explored as a potential biomarker and/or therapeutic target.
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- Wang, QBS, et al.
(author)
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The whole blood transcriptional regulation landscape in 465 COVID-19 infected samples from Japan COVID-19 Task Force
- 2022
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In: Nature communications. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2041-1723. ; 13:1, s. 4830-
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a recently-emerged infectious disease that has caused millions of deaths, where comprehensive understanding of disease mechanisms is still unestablished. In particular, studies of gene expression dynamics and regulation landscape in COVID-19 infected individuals are limited. Here, we report on a thorough analysis of whole blood RNA-seq data from 465 genotyped samples from the Japan COVID-19 Task Force, including 359 severe and 106 non-severe COVID-19 cases. We discover 1169 putative causal expression quantitative trait loci (eQTLs) including 34 possible colocalizations with biobank fine-mapping results of hematopoietic traits in a Japanese population, 1549 putative causal splice QTLs (sQTLs; e.g. two independent sQTLs at TOR1AIP1), as well as biologically interpretable trans-eQTL examples (e.g., REST and STING1), all fine-mapped at single variant resolution. We perform differential gene expression analysis to elucidate 198 genes with increased expression in severe COVID-19 cases and enriched for innate immune-related functions. Finally, we evaluate the limited but non-zero effect of COVID-19 phenotype on eQTL discovery, and highlight the presence of COVID-19 severity-interaction eQTLs (ieQTLs; e.g., CLEC4C and MYBL2). Our study provides a comprehensive catalog of whole blood regulatory variants in Japanese, as well as a reference for transcriptional landscapes in response to COVID-19 infection.
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- Yabuta, Hikaru, et al.
(author)
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Macromolecular organic matter in samples of the asteroid (162173) Ryugu
- 2023
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In: Science. - : American Association for the Advancement of Science. - 0036-8075 .- 1095-9203. ; 379:6634
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Samples of the carbonaceous asteroid (162173) Ryugu were collected and brought to Earth by the Hayabusa2 spacecraft. We investigated the macromolecular organic matter in Ryugu samples and found that it contains aromatic and aliphatic carbon, ketone, and carboxyl functional groups. The spectroscopic features of the organic matter are consistent with those in chemically primitive carbonaceous chondrite meteorites that experienced parent-body aqueous alteration (reactions with liquid water). The morphology of the organic carbon includes nanoglobules and diffuse carbon associated with phyllosilicate and carbonate minerals. Deuterium and/or nitrogen-15 enrichments indicate that the organic matter formed in a cold molecular cloud or the presolar nebula. The diversity of the organic matter indicates variable levels of aqueous alteration on Ryugus parent body.
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