Effect of short-term consumption bitter apricot seeds on the body composition in healthy population

The distribution of fat in different areas of the body is important since accumulation of fat within the abdominal cavity represents a much more severe cardiovascular risk than accumulation in subcutaneous adipose tissues. Apricot seeds contain a wide variety of bioactive compounds and that consumption can decrease blood pressure and total blood cholesterol levels, fight oxidative stress and maintain body weight. The aim of the study was to analyse body composition: body fat mass (BFM), fat free mass (FFM), skeletal muscle mass (SMM), body fat percentage (%BFM), visceral fat area (VFA), total body water (TBW) - intracellular water (ICW) and extracellular water (ECW) and to evaluate the changes that occur after 6-weeks consumption of bitter apricot seeds. The study group finally consisted of 34 healthy adults volunteers (21 females and 13 males). Volunteers were recruited from the general population of Slovakia. Respondents were 23 - 65 years old, where the average age of women was 40.65 ±11.31 years and the average age of men was 36.91 ±9.98 years. All participants were asked to consume 60 mg.kg-1 of body weight of bitter apricot seeds daily during 6 weeks. Body composition was diagnosed by multi-frequency bioelectrical impedance analysis (MFBIA) by InBody 720 (Biospace Co., Korea), which measures the total impedance at frequencies of 1, 5, 50, 100, 500, 1000 kHz. At baseline mean body weight was 85.78 ±14.66 and 62.84 ±12.19 kg in the male and female participants, respectively. After 6 weeks of consumation we observed non-significant decreasing of mean body weight. The mean BFM was 19.25 ±8.81 kg in the male group and 19.47 ±7.21 kg in the female group. After six weeks, BFM decreased non-significantly (on average 0.5 kg) in both groups. The mean FFM at baseline was 43.37 ±5.98 and 66.54 ±7.98 kg in the female and male participants, respectively. The statistical analysis confirmed that the increase of FFM (43.37 ±5.98 kg to 43.56 ±5.80 kg) in the female were statistically significant (p <0.05). VFA was greater in the men (82.04 ±39.82 cm2 at baseline and 78.65 ±39.79 cm2 after 6 weeks) comparison to women (79.82 ±29.03 cm2 at baseline and 78.29 ±29.90 cm2 after 6 weeks). The mean of TBW in males before the start of study was 48.78 ±5.77 kg and 47.88 ±5.57 kg after 6 weeks of consumption. The results of study show the small weight loss in the both group. Therefore, the results from this study indicate that daily consumption of bitter apricot seeds produce measurable health benefits, but further studies are also required

Copulas with given values on a horizontal and a vertical section

summary:In this paper we study the set of copulas for which both a horizontal section and a vertical section have been given. We give a general construction for copulas of this type and we provide the lower and upper copulas with these sections. Symmetric copulas with given horizontal section are also discussed, as well as copulas defined on a grid of the unit square. Several examples are presented

Does apricot seeds consumption cause changes in human urine?

Natural substances, such as amygdalin, used in alternative medicine gained high popularity. Common people as well as patients with different diseases have almost unlimited access to various natural supplements. To protect human health, it is very important to study effect of these substances. Amygdalin is a cyanogenic glucoside derived from seeds of rosaceous plants, for example seeds of bitter almonds (Prunus dulcis), or apricot, cherry, apple, peach, plum, etc. It is a natural product that owns antitumor activity, it has also been used for the treatment of asthma, bronchitis, emphysema, leprosy and diabetes and produces a kind of antitussive and antiasthmatic effects. The present in vivo study was designed to reveal whether amygdalin in apricot seeds has got an effect on human urine composition, pH value and urine associated health status after six weeks of oral administration. The study group finally consisted of 34 healthy adult volunteers (21 females and 13 males). All participants were asked to consume 60 mg.kg-1 body weight of bitter apricot seeds daily (approximately 3.0 mg.kg-1 of amygdalin) during 6 weeks. During the experiment, three urine collections were carried out (first collection - at the beginning of the experiment; second collection - after 21 days; third collection - after 42 days). Quantification of urine calcium (Ca), magnesium (Mg), phosphorus (P), sodium (Na), potassium (K), chlorides (Cl-), urea and pH value after apricot seeds supplementation was performed. Statistical analysis of variance showed, that consumption of bitter apricot seeds during 42 days had a significant (p <0.01) effect on amount of calcium excreted in urine, though this decrease shifted its level from elevated mean value in control collection into normal physiological range. Significant changes were observed in urea (p <0.05) and phosphorus (p <0.01) levels in urine after apricot seed ingestion, but gender was also considered to be a source of their variation

Effect of apricot seeds on renal structure of rabbits

Amygdalin is the major cyanogenic glycoside present in apricot seeds and is degraded to cyanide by chewing or grinding. The animal data available did not provide a suitable basis for acute human health hazard. The apricot seeds are potentially useful in human nutrition and for treatment of several diseases especially cancer. The present study demonstrates the potential effect of short-term oral application of apricot seeds on renal structure of rabbit as a biological model. Meat line P91 Californian rabbits from the experimental farm of the Animal Production Research Centre Nitra (Slovak Republic) were used in the experiments. The animals were randomly divided into the three groups (C-control, P1, P2 - experimental groups) leading to 8 rabbits in each group. The control group received no apricot seeds while the experimental groups P1 and P2 received a daily dose 60 and 300 mg.kg-1 b.w. of crushed apricot seeds mixed with feed during 28 days, respectively. After 28 days all animals were slaughtered and kidney tissue was processed by standard histopathological techniques. Tissue sections were observed under an optical microscope with camera Olympus CX41 (Olympus, Japan) at a magnification of 10 x 0.40. The basic morphometric criteria of the preparations were quantified using image program MeasurIT (Olympus, Japan). From each sample (n = 24) three histological sections with five different fields of view in each section were analysed and followed parameters were analysed: diameter of renal corpuscles (RC), diameter of glomeruli (G), diameter of tubules (T) and the height of epithelial tubules (E). In our study, we observed a slight increase in the most frequent occurrence parenchyma dystrophy experimental animals. These changes were more pronounced in the experimental group (P2) rabbits received a daily dose of 300 mg.kg-1 of body weight of apricot seeds. Most often, we have found enlarged glomeruli filling the entire space of the capsule, and also glomerular basement membrane thickening. The most frequent alterations of tubular organs manifested by thickening and dilatation of proximal tubules and in the lumen of the occurrence fuchsinophilic mass, grains and hyaline cylinders. The occurrence of the vacuole and parenchymal atrophy was mostly balanced groups. Changes in P2 group are also reflected in morphometric evaluation structures. We have found significant decrease (p <0.001) in the average of all renal structures (diameter of renal corpuscles, diameter of glomeruli, diameter of tubules, and the height of epithelial tubules). Inversely, oral administration a daily dose of 60 mg.kg-1 of body weight of apricot seeds had no significant impact on these parameters. The change displays only the increase of renal tubule diameter. Our data may provide more specific evidence of oral application of apricot seeds on renal structure but further detailed studies are also required

Pre-aggregation functions: construction and an application

In this work we introduce the notion of preaggregation function. Such a function satisfies the same boundary conditions as an aggregation function, but, instead of requiring monotonicity, only monotonicity along some fixed direction (directional monotonicity) is required. We present some examples of such functions. We propose three different methods to build pre-aggregation functions. We experimentally show that in fuzzy rule-based classification systems, when we use one of these methods, namely, the one based on the use of the Choquet integral replacing the product by other aggregation functions, if we consider the minimum or the Hamacher product t-norms for such construction, we improve the results obtained when applying the fuzzy reasoning methods obtained using two classical averaging operators like the maximum and the Choquet integral.This work was supported in part by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology under projects TIN2008-06681-C06-01, TIN2010- 15055, TIN2013-40765-P, TIN2011-29520

Construction of admissible linear orders for interval-valued Atanassov intuitionistic fuzzy sets with an application to decision making

In this work we introduce a method for constructing linear orders between pairs of intervals by using aggregation functions. We adapt this method to the case of interval-valued Atanassov intuitionistic fuzzy sets and we apply these sets and the considered orders to a decision making problem.The work has been supported by projects TIN2013-40765-P and MTM2012-37894-C02-02 of the Spanish Ministry of Science and the Research Services of the Universidad Publica de Navarra

The effect of the regular consumption of lard from fats of crossbreed Mangalitsa and breed of meat type pig on the lipid profile of consumers

The aim of this study was to evaluate the influence of consumption of lard processed from crossbreed of the original mangalitsa genotype and the breed of meat type pigs on selected biochemical parameters: total cholesterol (T-C), LDL cholesterol, HDL cholesterol and triacylglycerols (TAG). Twenty-nine probands participated in the study, of which 14 women and 15 men (aged 21 - 59) who consumed regularly lard four times a week during 5 weeks. By evaluating the lipid profile of probands, we observed elevated hypercholesterolemia at the beginning of the study in 43% women and 27% men. Statistically significant differences were recorded in this group of probands, where we recorded a decrease in TC of 0.55 mmol.L-1 in the whole sample of probands with p &lt;0.05 probability in the 2nd sample of study after 5 weeks of consumption of lard. Borderline high (up to 3.35 mmol.L-1) was found in 21% of women and 33% of men, and above LDL cholesterol was found in 79% of women and 60% of men. This high level of LDL cholesterol is considered a risk factor for the development of atherosclerosis. We can conclude from the results that regular consumption of lard has significantly reduced the total cholesterol levels, especially in women, this effect has been associated with lowering LDL cholesterol (p &lt;0.01) and lowering HDL cholesterol.&nbsp; Normal 0 21 false false false SK X-NONE X-NONE <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid Accent

A generalization of a copula-based construction of fuzzy implications

In this paper we complement and generalize some constructions of fuzzy implications based on two arbitrary copulas, obtaining new fuzzy implications. By means of (restricted) aggregation functions acting on [0, 1]S, where Sis a fixed finite or infinite set, and related S-systems of fuzzy implications and transforming functions, we introduce and discuss a rather general method for constructing fuzzy implications. Several examples illustrating our results are also included