Fetal origins of adult disease: epidemiology and mechanisms

The past 10 years have provided unequivocal evidence that there are associations between birth size measures and future development of adult diseases, such as type 2 diabetes and coronary artery disease. Despite initial concern that bias or residual confounding in the analyses had produced these rather bizarre associations, the findings have now been reproduced in different cohorts by independent investigators from many parts of the world. The challenge for the next decade must be to discover the cellular and molecular mechanisms giving rise to these associations. If this aim is accomplished, it might be possible to devise strategies to reduce the impact of these disabling, chronic, and expensive diseases. The purpose of this review is to describe some of the relevant, important, and more recent epidemiological studies, and also to discuss potential mechanisms underpinning the associations.J Clin Pathol(J Clin Pathol 2000;53:822–828) Key Words: atherosclerotic vascular disease • type 2 diabetes • birth weigh

Impact of Surface Active Compounds on Iron Catalyzed Oxidation of Methyl Linolenate in AOT-Water-Hexadecane Systems

Edible oils contain minor surface active components that form micro-heterogeneous environments, such as reverse micelles, which can alter the rate and direction of chemical reactions. However, little is known about the role of these micro-heterogeneous environments on lipid oxidation of bulk oil. Our objective was to evaluate the ability of water, cumene hydroperoxide, oleic acid, and phosphatidylcholine to influence the structure of reverse micelles in a model oil system: sodium bis(2-ethylhexyl) sulfosuccinate (aerosol-OT; AOT) in n-hexadecane. The influence of reverse micelle structure on iron catalyzed lipid oxidation was determined using methyl linolenate as an oxidizable substrate. The size and shape of the reverse micelle were investigated by small-angle x-ray scattering, and water contents was determined by Karl Fischer titrations. Lipid hydroperoxides and thiobarbituric acid reactive substances were used to follow lipid oxidation. Our results showed that AOT formed spherical reverse micelles in hexadecane. The size of the reverse micelles increased with increased water or phosphatidylcholine concentration, but decreased upon addition of cumene hydroperoxide or oleic acid. Iron catalyzed oxidation of methyl linolenate in the reverse micelle system decreased with increasing water concentration. Addition of phosphatidylcholine into the reverse micelle systems decreased methyl linolenate oxidation compared to control and reverse micelles with added oleic acid. These results indicate that water, cumene hydroperoxide, oleic acid, and phosphatidylcholine can alter reverse micelle size and lipid oxidation rates. Understanding how these compounds influence reverse micelle structure and lipid oxidation rates could provide information on how to modify bulk oil systems to increase oxidative stability

Factors of Employees’ Effective Voice in Corporate Goverance*

Traditionally, corporate governance has focused on the problem of crafting mechanisms to align the interests of owners and managers. The key characteristic has been to minimize the potential for managers to act in their own self-interest at the expense of shareholders. The purpose of this paper is to focus on employees as stakeholders in the governance process. We argue that creating an environment where employees have help in behaving ethically, in the course of their work, is the first step in encouraging them to voice observations of wrongdoing. Seven groups of professionals in the accounting and insurance fields were surveyed during a 10-year period and asked to indicate the extent to which 14 items were helpful in dealing with ethical challenges. Over 2700 responses were analyzed. The findings indicate that professionals think that their organizational culture and policy for voice was more helpful in dealing with ethical dilemmas than was their professional association. Copyright Springer 2005boards of directors, corporate governance, ethics, employee voice, stakeholders,