Florida State University

About: Florida State University is a education organization based out in Tallahassee, Florida, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Poison control. The organization has 25117 authors who have published 65361 publications receiving 2527087 citations. The organization is also known as: FSU & Florida State.

GWAS of 126,559 Individuals Identifies Genetic Variants Associated with Educational Attainment

Abstract: A genome-wide association study of educational attainment was conducted in a discovery sample of 101,069 individuals and a replication sample of 25,490. Three independent SNPs are genome-wide significant (rs9320913, rs11584700, rs4851266), and all three replicate. Estimated effects sizes are small (R2 ≈ 0.02%), approximately 1 month of schooling per allele. A linear polygenic score from all measured SNPs accounts for ≈ 2% of the variance in both educational attainment and cognitive function. Genes in the region of the loci have previously been associated with health, cognitive, and central nervous system phenotypes, and bioinformatics analyses suggest the involvement of the anterior caudate nucleus. These findings provide promising candidate SNPs for follow-up work, and our effect size estimates can anchor power analyses in social-science genetics.

Fertility and women's employment in industrialized nations

Abstract: The association between fertility and womens labor force activity reflects the incompatibility between caring for the children and participating in economically productive work that typifies industrialized societies. Women who wish to participate in the labor force must either limit their fertility or make alternative arrangements for the care of their children. As a result fertility rates in most countries are below the level needed for population replacement and rising proportion of children are in non-maternal care while their mothers work. In the assumption that women either limit their fertility to accommodate their force activity or they adjust their labor force behavior to their fertility evidence suggests that women do both. A substantial body of individual-level research describes the various strategies by which women in industrialized settings accommodate their employment patterns to their fertility and their fertility to their labor force participation. The evidence also suggests that strategies vary across national settings and that the ability to combine labor force participation and motherhood varies across countries.

Combined results of searches for the standard model Higgs boson in pp collisions at √s = 7 TeV

Abstract: Combined results are reported from searches for the standard model Higgs boson in proton-proton collisions at sqrt(s)=7 TeV in five Higgs boson decay modes: gamma pair, b-quark pair, tau lepton pair, W pair, and Z pair. The explored Higgs boson mass range is 110-600 GeV. The analysed data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 4.6-4.8 inverse femtobarns. The expected excluded mass range in the absence of the standard model Higgs boson is 118-543 GeV at 95% CL. The observed results exclude the standard model Higgs boson in the mass range 127-600 GeV at 95% CL, and in the mass range 129-525 GeV at 99% CL. An excess of events above the expected standard model background is observed at the low end of the explored mass range making the observed limits weaker than expected in the absence of a signal. The largest excess, with a local significance of 3.1 sigma, is observed for a Higgs boson mass hypothesis of 124 GeV. The global significance of observing an excess with a local significance greater than 3.1 sigma anywhere in the search range 110-600 (110-145) GeV is estimated to be 1.5 sigma (2.1 sigma). More data are required to ascertain the origin of this excess.

Advances in fluorescent protein technology

Abstract: Current fluorescent protein (FP) development strategies are focused on fine-tuning the photophysical properties of blue to yellow variants derived from the Aequorea victoria jellyfish green fluorescent protein (GFP) and on the development of monomeric FPs from other organisms that emit in the yellow-orange to far-red regions of the visible light spectrum. Progress toward these goals has been substantial, and near-infrared emitting FPs may loom over the horizon. The latest efforts in jellyfish variants have resulted in new and improved monomeric BFP, CFP, GFP and YFP variants, and the relentless search for a bright, monomeric and fast-maturing red FP has yielded a host of excellent candidates, although none is yet optimal for all applications. Meanwhile, photoactivatable FPs are emerging as a powerful class of probes for intracellular dynamics and, unexpectedly, as useful tools for the development of superresolution microscopy applications.

Topologically associating domains are stable units of replication-timing regulation

Abstract: Eukaryotic chromosomes replicate in a temporal order known as the replication-timing program. In mammals, replication timing is cell-type-specific with at least half the genome switching replication timing during development, primarily in units of 400-800 kilobases ('replication domains'), whose positions are preserved in different cell types, conserved between species, and appear to confine long-range effects of chromosome rearrangements. Early and late replication correlate, respectively, with open and closed three-dimensional chromatin compartments identified by high-resolution chromosome conformation capture (Hi-C), and, to a lesser extent, late replication correlates with lamina-associated domains (LADs). Recent Hi-C mapping has unveiled substructure within chromatin compartments called topologically associating domains (TADs) that are largely conserved in their positions between cell types and are similar in size to replication domains. However, TADs can be further sub-stratified into smaller domains, challenging the significance of structures at any particular scale. Moreover, attempts to reconcile TADs and LADs to replication-timing data have not revealed a common, underlying domain structure. Here we localize boundaries of replication domains to the early-replicating border of replication-timing transitions and map their positions in 18 human and 13 mouse cell types. We demonstrate that, collectively, replication domain boundaries share a near one-to-one correlation with TAD boundaries, whereas within a cell type, adjacent TADs that replicate at similar times obscure replication domain boundaries, largely accounting for the previously reported lack of alignment. Moreover, cell-type-specific replication timing of TADs partitions the genome into two large-scale sub-nuclear compartments revealing that replication-timing transitions are indistinguishable from late-replicating regions in chromatin composition and lamina association and accounting for the reduced correlation of replication timing to LADs and heterochromatin. Our results reconcile cell-type-specific sub-nuclear compartmentalization and replication timing with developmentally stable structural domains and offer a unified model for large-scale chromosome structure and function.