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What are seminal studies in ME research?

JaimeS

Senior Member
Messages
3,408
Location
Silicon Valley, CA
Hello, all! I am curating a small collection of the best / most interesting ME/CFS studies to make an informative packet regarding what we know about ME/CFS. Each will have a small commentary, so consider poorly-performed studies that have had an impact on the ME/CFS landscape, such as PACE.

From the quick article / intro to ME/CFS I wrote as a blog post awhile back:

FLUGE AND MELLA 2016; ARMSTRONG ET AL, 2016; ARMSTRONG ET Al, 2015

Recent research from Fluge and Mella in Norway, and Christopher Armstrong of Australia have identified errors in cellular energy metabolism in ME patients that differs from sedentary controls. Reduced glyolysis, accompanying high blood glucose, and metabolites that demonstrate a marked uptick in mitochondrial activity in response have been documented. Other energy-producing reactions’ metabolites were elevated, which may indicate compensatory energy metabolic mechanisms in people with ME. Women’s amino acid stores in particular are being utilized in place of glucose, and are decreased in comparison to that of healthy controls. Women’s diet showed no difference in protein intake than in controls.

Further analysis by Fluge and Mella impicated PDH inhibitors as a mechanism for decreased glycolysis.

Finally, bathing culture-grown cells in ME patients’ serum caused them to exhibit the same metabolic abormalities as patients’ cells.

HANSEN ET AL., 2016

Hansen of Cornell as well as researchers from the University of Melbourne have confirmed an older study’s results showing that ME patients have gut bacteria that is not just different from controls, but different in a predictable manner, with Firmicutes and Bacterioides off. Using a machine-learning approach, the Melbourne team was able to identify the right patient utilizing a sample of their gut bacteria over 80% of the time.

HORNIG ET AL, 2015:

Mady Hornig and her team at Columbia University discovered a pattern of upregulated inflammatory and anti-inflammatory markers in early ME (first three years after onset) all of which were inverted in late ME (over three years after onset). Long-term patients’ immune markers were lower even than those of controls.

Dysregulated immune markers included IL-12p40, IL-12p70, IFN-gamma, TNF-alpha, and GM-CSF (CSF2). The marked involvement of interferon-gamma points to an initial infective trigger, as it is the product of activated T-cells, natural killer cells, and macrophages.

Hornig’s study, besides pointing to a future blood test for ME, is the first to identify a two-stage illness, with an acute phase and a chronic phase.

NEWTON ET AL, 2015:

Julie Newton and her team discovered that muscle cells of patients with ME had increased myogenin expression but decreased IL-6 secretion in comparison to controls and, when an electrical pulse was sent through the tissue to simulate exercise, muscle cells of ME patients demonstrated impaired AMPK activation and impaired uptake of glucose. Cells responded normally to insulin.

FLUGE AND MELLA:

Fluge and Mella found that the anti-cancer drug Rituximab caused complete remission in a significant percentage of ME patients.

Other suggestions?

[Edit: changed first Fluge and Mella citation to 2016 -- it came out in December of 2016. I had it as a 2017 article.]
 
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A.B.

Senior Member
Messages
3,780
Can patients with chronic fatigue syndrome really recover after graded exercise or cognitive behavioural therapy? A critical commentary and preliminary re-analysis of the PACE trial
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/21641846.2017.1259724?journalCode=rftg20

Beyond Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: Redefining an Illness
http://iom.nationalacademies.org/Reports/2015/ME-CFS.aspx

A community-based study of chronic fatigue syndrome.
I believe this was the first large random sample population study which showed that many patients were undiagnosed, it wasn't a white middle class woman's illness, and that about 0.4% of the population had it.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10527290
 

Jenny TipsforME

Senior Member
Messages
1,184
Location
Bristol
Bookmarked this thread :) too tired right to think of additions

Although what about

1: Light AR, White AT, Hughen RW, Light KC. Moderate exercise increases
expression for sensory, adrenergic, and immune genes in chronic fatigue syndrome
patients but not in normal subjects. J Pain. 2009 Oct;10(10):1099-112. doi:
10.1016/j.jpain.2009.06.003. Epub 2009 Jul 31. PubMed PMID: 19647494; PubMed
Central PMCID: PMC2757484.

I think the 2009 one is what I'm thinking of
 
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Wonkmonk

Senior Member
Messages
1,006
Location
Germany
Hi @JaimeS

Not sure if this is seminal but I thought I'd suggest it. According to Mark this paper was presented at the 2015 IiME conference:

http://www2.le.ac.uk/offices/press/...diagnose-people-with-chronic-fatigue-syndrome

I think that maybe giving this more exposure could be warranted.

This is very interesting. I have dry and red eyes for several years now and it only occurred recently to me that it might be part of CFS. It always got worse with Vitamin D and/or calcium supplements over several weeks, so I suspect there might be connection as well.
 

JaimeS

Senior Member
Messages
3,408
Location
Silicon Valley, CA
Light AR, White AT, Hughen RW, Light KC. Moderate exercise increases
expression for sensory, adrenergic, and immune genes in chronic fatigue syndrome
patients but not in normal subjects. J Pain. 2009 Oct;10(10):1099-112. doi:
10.1016/j.jpain.2009.06.003. Epub 2009 Jul 31. PubMed PMID: 19647494; PubMed
Central PMCID: PMC2757484.

Yes, absolutely!
 
Messages
51
Location
Maryland, USA
So many from Leonard Jason. Too many to pick from, but here's three that stand out to me.

A Prospective Study of Infectious Mononucleosis in College Students
https://www.researchgate.net/public..._Infectious_Mononucleosis_in_college_students

Estimating the disease burden of ME/CFS in the United States and its relation to research funding https://oatext.com/Estimating-the-d...ates-and-its-relation-to-research-funding.php

Mortality in patients with myalgic encephalomyelitis and chronic fatigue syndrome
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/21641846.2016.1236588?journalCode=rftg20

Good luck with your project!