The environmental change manifested in terms of drought and desertification in the Lake Chad basin area is characterised by the drastically reduction in the volume of the water in the basin, with serious consequences both at the local and global environment. This therefore demands an immediate attention as such change can no longer sustain the livelihood of the people of the area. A questionnaire was administered to collect primary data on the socio-economic activities and drought coping strategies of the people living in the locations of the Lake Chad basin (the Baga in the north of the basin and Southern Chad project around Marte in the south of the basin). Five communities were randomly selected from the 21 in Baga and another 5 from the 24 in Marte. The populations of these communities were between 2000 and 2500. Thus a sample size of about 2.5 %, (that is 500 people) was taken. The strategies with which local communities are responding to the increasingly unfavourable environment of the basin were evaluated. These were done with a view to providing an understanding of the dynamics of land and water uses in the area.

AMPA receptors (AMPARs) are tetrameric ligand-gated channels made up of combinations of GluA1-4 subunits encoded by GRIA1-4 genes. GluA2 has an especially important role because, following post-transcriptional editing at the Q607 site, it renders heteromultimeric AMPARs Ca2+-impermeable, with a linear relationship between current and trans-membrane voltage. Here, we report heterozygous de novo GRIA2 mutations in 28 unrelated patients with intellectual disability (ID) and neurodevelopmental abnormalities including autism spectrum disorder (ASD), Rett syndrome-like features, and seizures or developmental epileptic encephalopathy (DEE). In functional expression studies, mutations lead to a decrease in agonist-evoked current mediated by mutant subunits compared to wild-type channels. When GluA2 subunits are co-expressed with GluA1, most GRIA2 mutations cause a decreased current amplitude and some also affect voltage rectification. Our results show that de-novo variants in GRIA2 can cause neurodevelopmental disorders, complementing evidence that other genetic causes of ID, ASD and DEE also disrupt glutamatergic synaptic transmission.

Objective: Worldwide, the highest frequencies of APOL1-associated kidney variants are found in indigenous West Africans among whom small vessel disease (SVD) ischemic stroke is the most common stroke phenotype. The objective of this study was to investigate the association and effect sizes of 23 selected SNPs in 14 genes of relevance, including the APOL1 G1 variants, with the occurrence of SVD ischemic stroke among indigenous West African participants in the Stroke Investigative Research and Education Network (SIREN) Study. Materials and Methods: Cases were consecutively recruited consenting adults (aged 18 years or older) with neuroimaging—confirmed first clinical stroke. Stroke-free controls were ascertained using a locally validated version of the Questionnaire for Verifying Stroke-Free Status (QVSFS). Logistic regression models adjusting for known vascular risk factors were fitted to assess the associations of the 23 SNPs in rigorously phenotyped cases (N = 154) of SVD ischemic stroke and stroke-free (N = 483) controls. Results: Apolipoprotein L1 (APOL1) rs73885319 (OR = 1.52; CI: 1.09-2.13, P-value =.013), rs2383207 in CDKN2A/CDKN2B (OR = 3.08; CI: 1.15-8.26, P –value =.026) and rs2107595 (OR = 1.70; CI: 1.12-2.60, P-value =.014) and rs28688791 (OR = 1.52; CI: 1.03-2.26, P-value =.036) in HDAC9 gene were associated with SVD stroke at 0.05 significance level. Polymorphisms in other genes did not show significant associations. Conclusion: This is the first report of a specific association of APOL1 with a stroke subtype. Further research is needed to confirm these initial findings and deepen understanding of the genetics of stroke in people of African ancestry with possible implications for other ancestries as all humans originated from Africa.

Despite the growing demand of tourism in Malaysia, there are no resolute efforts to develop beaches as tourist destinations. With no incentives to monitor public beaches or to use them in a sustainable manner, they might eventually degenerate in quality as a result of influx of pollutants. This calls for concerted action plans with a view to promoting their sustainable use. The success of such plans is inevitably anchored on the availability of robust quality monitoring schemes. Although significant efforts have been channelled to collation and public disclosure of bacteriological quality data of rivers, beach water monitoring appears left out. This partly explains the dearth of published information related to beach water quality data. As part of an on-going nation-wide surveillance study on the bacteriological quality of recreational beaches, this paper draws on a situation analysis with a view to proffering recommendations that could be adapted for ensuring better beach water quality in Malaysia.