Immune responses to AAV in a phase I study for Canavan disease

BACKGROUND: Canavan disease is a rare leukodystrophy with no current treatment. rAAV-ASPA has been developed for gene delivery to the central nervous system (CNS) for Canavan disease. This study represents the first use of a viral vector in an attempt to ameliorate a neurodegenerative disorder. METHODS: Subjects received intracranial infusions via six cranial burr holes. Adeno-associated virus, serotype 2 (AAV2), mediated intraparenchymal delivery of the human aspartoacylase cDNA at a maximum dose of 1 x 10(12) vector genomes per subject. The immune response and safety profiles were monitored in the follow-up of ten subjects. RESULTS: Following rAAV2 administration, we found no evidence of AAV2 neutralizing antibody titers in serum for the majority of subjects tested (7/10). In a subset (3/10) of subjects, low to moderately high levels of AAV2 neutralizing antibody with respect to baseline were detected. In all subjects, there were minimal systemic signs of inflammation or immune stimulation. In subjects with catheter access to the brain lateral ventricle, cerebrospinal fluid was examined and there was a complete absence of neutralizing antibody titers with no overt signs of brain inflammation. CONCLUSIONS: rAAV2 vector administration to the human CNS appears well tolerated. The low levels of immune response to AAV2 detected in 3/10 subjects in this study suggest at this dose and with intraparenchymal administration this approach is relatively safe. Long-term monitoring of subjects and expansion to phase II/III will be necessary in order to make definitive statements on safety and efficacy.     

Gene therapy. An ethical profile of a new medical territory

From early on, the possibility of genetic intervention in humans has been the subject of philosophical and ethical reflection in the scientific community. It became the object of public debate and parliamentary decision‐making under the rule of law even before the first authorized trials on human subjects could start. This article explains why the debate on germ‐line intervention and genetic enhancement is still ongoing. The focus is on somatic gene therapy. There is a political and academic consensus that it represents an adequate tool for a high‐ranking end if some points are considered and taken into account. But where do we stand and what are the ethical conclusions we can draw from recent clinical experiences? Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Is it going to be SIN?

Insertional mutagenesis resulting in a leukaemia-like lymphoproliferative disease, as observed in the X-SCID (severe combined immunodeficiency) clinical trial using a gamma-retroviral vector that transferred a functional copy of the defective gene into hematopoietic precursor cells of affected children, sparked a debate about a ban on conventional gamma-retroviral vectors. This commentary summarizes the relevant data on this topic and concludes that there is no preclinical or clinical evidence as yet that SIN vectors, which self-inactivate the retroviral long terminal repeats (LTRs), will indeed show an improved safety profile. Conventional murine leukaemia virus (MLV) vectors can thus be used further in clinical gene therapy trials but require a thorough case-by-case risk-benefit analysis.     

Growth and phenology of mature temperate forest trees in elevated CO2

Are mature forest trees carbon limited at current CO₂ concentrations? Will ‘mid‐life’, 35 m tall deciduous trees grow faster in a CO₂‐enriched atmosphere? To answer these questions we exposed ca. 100‐year‐old temperate forest trees at the Swiss Canopy Crane site near Basel, Switzerland to a ca. 540 ppm CO₂ atmosphere using web‐FACE technology. Here, we report growth responses to elevated CO₂ for 11 tall trees (compared with 32 controls) of five species during the initial four treatment years. Tested across all trees, there was no CO₂ effect on stem basal area (BA) increment (neither when tested per year nor cumulatively for 4 years). In fact, the 4th year means were almost identical for the two groups. Stem growth data were standardized by pretreatment growth (5 years) in order to account for a priori individual differences in vigor. Although this experiment was not designed to test species specific effects, one species, the common European beech, Fagus sylvatica, showed a significant growth enhancement in the first year, which reoccurred during a centennial drought in the third year. None of the other dominant species (Quercus petraea, Carpinus betulus) showed a growth response to CO₂ in any of the 4 years or for all years together. The inclusion or exclusion of single individuals of Prunus avium and Tilia platyphyllos did not change the picture. In elevated CO₂, lateral branching in terminal shoots was higher in Fagus in 2002, when shoots developed from buds that were formed during the first season of CO₂ enrichment (2001), but there was no effect in later years and no change in lateral branching in any of the other species. In Quercus, there was a steady stimulation of leading shoot length in high‐CO₂ trees. Phenological variables (bud break, leaf fall, leaf duration) were highly species specific and were not affected by elevated CO₂ in any consistent way. Our 4‐year data set reflects a very dynamic and species‐specific response of tree growth to a step change in CO₂ supply. Stem growth after 4 years of exposure does not support the notion that mature forest trees will accrete wood biomass at faster rates in a future CO₂‐enriched atmosphere.     

Type II fish antifreeze protein accumulation in transgenic tobacco does not confer frost resistance

Type II fish antifreeze protein (AFP) is active in both freezing point depression and the inhibition of ice recrystallization. This extensively disulfidebonded 14 kDa protein was targeted for accumulation in its pro and mature forms in the cytosol and apoplast of transgenic tobacco plants. Type II AFP gene constructs under control of a duplicate cauliflower mosaic virus 35S promoter, both with and without a native plant transit peptide sequence, were introduced into tobacco by Agrobacterium tumefaciensmediated transformation. AFP did not accumulate in the cytosol of transgenic plants, but active AFP was present as 2% of the total protein present in the apoplast. Plantproduced AFP was the same size as mature Type II AFP isolated from fish, and was comparable to wildtype AFP in thermal hysteresis activity and its effect on ice crystal morphology. Field trials conducted in late summer on R1 generation transgenic plants showed similar AFP accumulation in plants under field conditions at levels suitable for largescale production: but no difference in frost resistance was observed between transgenic and wildtype plants during the onset of early fall frosts.     

Climate envelope, life history traits and the resilience of birds facing global change

Few studies have examined how life history traits and the climate envelope influence the ability of species to respond to climate change and habitat degradation. In this study, we test whether 18 species-specific variables, related to the climate envelope, ecological envelope and life history, could predict recent population trends (over 17 years) of 71 common breeding bird species in France. Habitat specialists were declining at a much higher rate than generalists, a sign that habitat quality is decreasing globally. The lower the thermal maximum (temperature at the hot edge of the climate envelope), the more negative are the population trends and the less tolerant these species are climate warming, regardless of the thermal range over which these species occur. The life history trait 'the number of broods per year' was positively related to recent trends, suggesting that single-brooded species might be more sensitive to advances in food peak due to climate change, as it increases the risk of mistiming their single-breeding event. Annual fecundity explained long-term declines, as it is a good proxy for most other demographic rates, with shorter-lived species being more sensitive to global change: individuals of species with higher fecundity might have too short a life to learn to adapt to directional changes in their environment. Finally, there was evidence that natal dispersal was a predictor of recent trends, with species with high natal dispersal experiencing smaller population declines than species with low natal dispersal. This is expected if the higher the natal dispersal, the larger the ability to shift spatially when facing changes in local habitat or climate, in order to track optimal conditions and adapt to global change. Identifying decline-promoting factors allow us to infer mechanisms responsible for observed declines in wild bird populations facing global change, and by doing so allow for a more pre-emptive approach to conservation planning.     

Size Dependent Sexual Selection in Drosophila ananassae

Mate choice based on body size is widespread and can have numerous consequences. We present data, which show the effect of male and female body size on sexual selection in Drosophila ananassae. The relationships between wing size, locomotor activity, mating latency, courtship pattern, fertility and mating success were studied. Mating latency was negatively correlated with wing length and with locomotor activity, while wing length and locomotor activity was positively correlated in males as well as in females. In female- and male-choice, we found that mate choice influenced size-assortative mating by: (1) large and small males preferring to mate with large females, (2) large males successfully competing for large females, leaving small males to mate with small females. Males increased their reproductive success by mating with large and more fecund females. In addition, in pairs of long/short winged flies, long winged flies courted and mated more successfully than short winged flies and they also have longer duration of copulation and more progeny than short winged flies. We found sterile mating in pairs of small winged males and females.     

Validation of surrogate markers in multiple randomized clinical trials with repeated measurements: canonical correlation approach

Part of the recent literature on the evaluation of biomarkers as surrogate endpoints starts from a multitrial context, which leads to a definition of validity in terms of the quality of both trial-level and individual-level association between the surrogate and true endpoints (Buyse et al., 2000, Biostatistics1, 49-67). These authors concentrated on cross-sectional continuous responses. However, in many randomized clinical studies, repeated measurements are encountered on either or both endpoints. A challenge in this setting is the formulation of a simple and meaningful concept of "surrogacy."Alonso et al. (2003, Biometrical Journal45, 931-945) proposed the variance reduction factor (VRF) to evaluate surrogacy at the individual level. They also showed how and when this concept should be extended to study surrogacy at the trial level. Here, we approach the problem from the natural canonical correlation perspective. We define a class of canonical correlation functions that can be used to study surrogacy at the trial and individual level. We show that the VRF and the R2 measure defined by Buyse et al. (2000) follow as special cases. Simulations are conducted to evaluate the performance of different members of this family. The methodology is illustrated on data from a meta-analysis of five clinical trials comparing antipsychotic agents for the treatment of chronic schizophrenia.     

Analysis of times to repeated events in two-arm randomized trials with noncompliance and dependent censoring

This article develops randomization-based methods for times to repeated events in two-arm randomized trials with noncompliance and dependent censoring. Structural accelerated failure time models are assumed to capture causal effects on repeated event times and dependent censoring time, but the dependence structure among repeated event times and dependent censoring time is unspecified. Artificial censoring techniques to accommodate nonrandom noncompliance and dependent censoring are proposed. Estimation of the acceleration parameters are based on rank-based estimating functions. A simulation study is conducted to evaluate the performance of the developed methods. An illustration of the methods using data from an acute myeloid leukemia trial is provided.