Scientists with a long-running Framingham Heart Study looked at 1,932 people (examination of about 1.5 million markers of genetic variations), comparing unrelated friends to unrelated strangers. They found that friends shared about 1% of their genes — a percentage much higher than those shared with strangers.This new findings made it clear that people have more DNA in common with those who are selected as friends than with strangers in the same population. 

The genes that lined up the most were olfactory genes, which deal with smell. The ones that lined up the least were immune system genes. The researchers weren't sure why that happened :/. Olfactory genes might be a straightforward explanation: People who like the same smells tend to be drawn to similar environments, where they meet others with the same tendencies.

Reference:

http://www.pnas.org/content/111/Supplement_3/10796.full

Image : http://i.kinja-img.com

The ongoing 2014 West Africa Ebola outbreak is considered to be the largest and longest outbreak ever recorded of Ebola, killing at least 932 people and infecting more than 1,700 till date since March in Sierra Leone, Guinea, Nigeria and Liberia.

Hence, the World Health Organisation (WHO) on 8 August, 2014 declared the killer Ebola epidemic ravaging parts of West Africa an international health emergency.

Causes

EVD is caused by infection with a virus of the family Filoviridae, genus Ebolavirus. While there are five identified sub-species of Ebolavirus, four viruses cause disease in humans. They are Bundibugyo virus (BDBV), Ebola virus (EBOV), Sudan virus (SUDV), Taï Forest virus (TAFV).

The fifth virus, Reston virus (RESTV), is not considered to be disease-causing in humans.

According to WHO, EVD first appeared in 1976 in two simultaneous outbreaks, in Nzara, Sudan, and in Yambuku, Democratic Republic of Congo. The latter was in a village situated near the Ebola River from which the disease takes its name.

How does it spread?

It is still unclear how Ebola spreads. However, it is believed that the first pateint becomes infected through contact with an infected animal's body fluids.

Human-to-human transmission can occur through direct contact with blood, organs or other body fluids of infected people or exposure to objects such as needles and syringes that have been contaminated with infected secretions.

Ebola can also be transmitted from men who have recovered from the disease through semen as it is infectious for up to 7 weeks.

Infected dead bodies can spread Ebola as they are still infectious. So mourners who have direct contact with the body of deceased person can also get the disease.

Who is most at risk?

Health-care workers who do not wear appropriate protective clothing and family members who are in close contact with infected people or deceased patients.

Signs and symptoms:

Symptoms may occur between 2 and 21 days after contracting the infection. Common signs of Ebola include:

Fever

Headache

Muscle, abdominal and joint pain

Sore throat

Weakness

Diarrhea

Vomit or cough up blood

Chest pain

Difficulty in breathing and swallowing

Rash

Hiccups

Bleeding inside and outside the body

Prevention

Currently there is no vaccine available for humans. But the infection can be controlled through the use of recommended protective measures such as:

Avoid contacting infected blood or secretions, including from those who are dead .

Using standard precautions for all patients in the healthcare setting.

Sterilizing equipment, and wearing protective clothing including masks, gloves, gowns and goggles.

Washing your hands with soaps or detergents.

Disinfecting your surroundings.

Isolate people who have Ebola symptoms.

Culling of infected animals, with close supervision of burial or incineration of carcasses.

Yet, not travelling to the areas or countries where the virus is found is the best way to avoid Ebola.

Job Description: We are interested in finding an excellent postdoc with interests in protein functional annotation, machine learning and computer grids. The position is open for 3.5 years at the Université Pierre et Marie Curie, in the heart of paris.

Research topic: Protein function annotation, multiple probabilistic models, domain architecture, machine learning, combinatorial optimization, computer grid.

Title: A novel integrative platform for large scale protein annotation that exploits a multitude of diversified probabilistic models in several protein signature databases.

We propose a novel integrated approach for large scale protein annotation that will exploit an unprecedented amount of genomic data as well as sophisticated machine learning techniques and combinatorial optimization approaches taking advantages of High Performance Computing (HPC) environments. The idea is to uncover as much as possible the evolutionary processes of protein sequences that took place throughout the whole tree of life and that affected the evolution of a protein family. We have already demonstrated in a previous work that the problem of functional annotation is inherent to the ability of uncovering such paths. Now, we shall extend this approach to large scale genome annotation by considering 11 different protein databases, constituted by about 10^9 protein sequences, and by producing a large pool of diversified probabilistic models coding for about 10^7 evolutionary protein pathways. Such models will be used to search for specific domains in genomes to be annotated. Our previous methodology needs to be fundamentally improved to deal with this large amount of biological data. In this project, we shall work on the algorithms to reduce the space of models and the search complexity, and we shall implement some important algorithmic changes towards the realization of a powerful integrated annotation tool.

Where: This project is run on the Laboratoire de Biologie Computationnelle et Quantitative UMR7238 CNRS-UPMC – Analytical Genomics team, headed by A.Carbone. It is co-advised with Pierre-Henri Wuillemin, Laboratoire d’Informatique de Paris 6 – Equipe DECISION.

Start date: September 1st, 2014
Contact Person: Alessandra Carbone
Contact: alessandra.carbone@lip6.fr

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/research/coronavirus/

Address of the bookmark: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/research/coronavirus/

Address of the bookmark: https://peerj.com/preprints/453.pdf

• Using state of the art tools, easily extended for other viruses

• Tool and database updates for critical components via Conda

• Built using modern design patterns with Conda and Snakemake

• Extensible and easy to customize

• Submission Ready Genomes

• Customizable reporting with comprehensive visualization

https://ikim-essen.github.io/uncovar/

Github https://github.com/IKIM-Essen/uncovar

Address of the bookmark: https://ikim-essen.github.io/uncovar/

ROLLING ADVERTISEMENT NO. 01/2014(E-1)
ADVERTISEMENT FOR THE POSITIONS OF ASSISTANT PROFESSOR CANDIDATES CAN APPLY ANY TIME DURING THE YEAR.

IIT Delhi invites applications from qualified Indian Nationals, Persons of Indian Origin (PIOs) and Overseas Citizens of India (OCIs) for the following positions in the various Departments/Centres/Schools (in the fields
mentioned alongwith them):
Post Pay Band Assistant Professor and Assistant Professor (on Contract) Rs.15600-39100 (PB-3) (Minimum pay of Rs.30000/-)+ AGP Rs.8000/-

The following norms will be followed for fixing the basic pay + AGP for Assistant Professors appointed on
contract with Ph.D but experience of 3 years or less:-
Type Qualification & Experience on the date of joining
Assistant Professor (Contract) PB3 (Rs. 15,600-39,100).

MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS AND EXPERIENCE:
Ph.D. with First class at the preceding degree or equivalent in the appropriate branch with very good academic record throughout. A minimum of three years industrial/research/teaching experience, excluding however, the experience gained while Pursuing Ph. D. The candidates should preferably be below
35 years of age for male and 38 years for female ( to be relaxed by 5 years in case of persons with physical disability, SC/ST and 3 years in case of OBC-NCL).

Qualified persons include:
(a) Indian Nationals,
(b) Foreign Nationals who are “Persons of Indian Origin” (PIO) or Overseas
Citizens of India (OCI), in whose case, if selected, permission will be sought from Govt. of India
before he/she can join IIT Delhi, or
(c) Other Foreign Nationals, in whose case, if selected, appointment will be on a contract basis for up to 5 (five) years subject to permission from the Govt. of India before he/she can join IIT Delhi.
(d) Institute specifically encourages applicants from SC/ST/OBC category as well as persons
with disability to apply for these positions.

AMAR NATH & SHASHI KHOSLA SCHOOL OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY:
Computational Neuroscience, Medical Applications of Information Technologies, Computational & Systems Biology, Machine to Machine (M2M) Technologies, Embedded Systems & Sensors, Computer Security.
KUSUMA SCHOOL OF BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES:
In-silico Biology Applications, Systems Biology, Infection Biology, Neurodegeneration.

More at http://www.iitd.ac.in/sites/default/files/jobs/faculty/spl-areas-rolling-advt.pdf

http://www.iitd.ac.in/content/faculty-positions

Annotation

https://bigd.big.ac.cn/ncov/variation/annotation

Genome wharehouse 

https://bigd.big.ac.cn/gwh/browse/index

Released Genome

https://bigd.big.ac.cn/ncov/release_genome

Download data 

ftp://download.big.ac.cn/Genome/Viruses/Coronaviridae/

Raw data

https://bigd.big.ac.cn/gsa/browse/run/?tag=Coronaviridae

Address of the bookmark: https://bigd.big.ac.cn/ncov/about

Apply now Job no: 494553
Work type: Continuing full time
Vacancy type: External Vacancy, Internal Vacancy
Categories: Academic - Teaching and Research

The Faculty of Science is launching a new and innovative branch of biological science at Macquarie University – Synthetic Biology. Synthetic biology combines engineering principles with molecular biological approaches to design and construct biological devices and systems. Recent highlights in this field include the design and synthesis of a functional bacterial genome and a yeast chromosome, and generation of synthetic bacterial cells. The rational synthesis of "designer" organisms yield important insights into how organisms work and has the potential to revolutionise biotechnological applications in areas such as bioenergy and biomanufacturing.

Find more at http://jobs.mq.edu.au/cw/en/job/494553/lecturersenior-lecturer-level-bc-in-synthetic-biology-research-fellow-level-b-in-synthetic-biology-lecturersenior-lecturer-level-bc-in-bioinformatics