606 research outputs found
Gender differences in the association between adiposity and probable major depression: a cross-sectional study of 140,564 UK Biobank participants
<b>Background</b><p></p>
Previous studies on the association between adiposity and mood disorder have produced contradictory results, and few have used measurements other than body mass index (BMI). We examined the association between probable major depression and several measurements of adiposity: BMI, waist circumference (WC), waist-hip-ratio (WHR), and body fat percentage (BF%).<p></p>
<b>Methods</b><p></p>
We conducted a cross-sectional study using baseline data on the sub-group of UK Biobank participants who were assessed for mood disorder. Multivariate logistic regression models were used, adjusting for potential confounders including: demographic and life-style factors, comorbidity and psychotropic medication.<p></p>
<b>Results</b><p></p>
Of the 140,564 eligible participants, evidence of probable major depression was reported by 30,145 (21.5%). The fully adjusted odds ratios (OR) for obese participants were 1.16 (95% confidence interval (CI) 1.12, 1.20) using BMI, 1.15 (95% CI 1.11, 1.19) using WC, 1.09 (95% CI 1.05, 1.13) using WHR and 1.18 (95% CI 1.12, 1.25) using BF% (all p <0.001). There was a significant interaction between adiposity and gender (p = 0.001). Overweight women were at increased risk of depression with a dose response relationship across the overweight (25.0-29.9 kg/m2), obese I (30.0-34.9 kg/m2), II (35.0-39.9 kg/m2) and III (≥40.0 kg/m2) categories; fully adjusted ORs 1.14, 1.20, 1.29 and 1.48, respectively (all p < 0.001). In contrast, only obese III men had significantly increased risk of depression (OR 1.29, 95% CI 1.08, 1.54, p = 0.006).<p></p>
<b>Conclusion</b><p></p>
Adiposity was associated with probable major depression, irrespective of the measurement used. The association was stronger in women than men. Physicians managing overweight and obese women should be alert to this increased risk
Open Problems on Central Simple Algebras
We provide a survey of past research and a list of open problems regarding
central simple algebras and the Brauer group over a field, intended both for
experts and for beginners.Comment: v2 has some small revisions to the text. Some items are re-numbered,
compared to v
World Tuberculosis Day March 24th 2019 Theme: "It's TIME" - International Journal of Infectious Diseases Tuberculosis Theme Series.
Cultivation strategies for production of (R)-3-hydroxybutyric acid from simultaneous consumption of glucose, xylose and arabinose by Escherichia coli
Theory and Validation of Magnetic Resonance Fluid Motion Estimation Using Intensity Flow Data
15 p.Background Motion tracking based on spatial-temporal radio-frequency signals from the pixel representation of magnetic resonance (MR) imaging of a non-stationary fluid is able to provide two dimensional vector field maps. This supports the underlying fundamentals of magnetic resonance fluid motion estimation and generates a new methodology for flow measurement that is based on registration of nuclear signals from moving hydrogen nuclei in fluid. However, there is a need to validate the computational aspect of the approach by using velocity flow field data that we will assume as the true reference information or ground truth. Methodology/Principal Findings In this study, we create flow vectors based on an ideal analytical vortex, and generate artificial signal-motion image data to verify our computational approach. The analytical and computed flow fields are compared to provide an error estimate of our methodology. The comparison shows that the fluid motion estimation approach using simulated MR data is accurate and robust enough for flow field mapping. To verify our methodology, we have tested the computational configuration on magnetic resonance images of cardiac blood and proved that the theory of magnetic resonance fluid motion estimation can be applicable practically. Conclusions/Significance The results of this work will allow us to progress further in the investigation of fluid motion prediction based on imaging modalities that do not require velocity encoding. This article describes a novel theory of motion estimation based on magnetic resonating blood, which may be directly applied to cardiac flow imaging.Kelvin Kian Loong Wong, Richard Malcolm Kelso, Stephen Grant Worthley, Prashanthan Sanders, Jagannath Mazumdar, Derek Abbot
hElp3 Directly Modulates the Expression of HSP70 Gene in HeLa Cells via HAT Activity
Human Elongator complex, which plays a key role in transcript elongation in vitro assay, is incredibly similar in either components or function to its yeast counterpart. However, there are only a few studies focusing on its target gene characterization in vivo. We studied the effect of down-regulation of the human elongation protein 3 (hELP3) on the expression of HSP70 through antisense strategy. Transfecting antisense plasmid p1107 into HeLa cells highly suppressed hELP3 expression, and substantially reduced expression of HSP70 mRNA and protein. Furthermore, chromatin immunoprecipitation assay (ChIP Assay) revealed that hElp3 participates in the transcription elongation of HSPA1A in HeLa cells. Finally, complementation and ChIP Assay in yeast showed that hElp3 can not only complement the growth and slow activation of HSP70 (SSA3) gene transcription, but also directly regulates the transcription of SSA3. On the contrary, these functions are lost when the HAT domain is deleted from hElp3. These data suggest that hElp3 can regulate the transcription of HSP70 gene, and the HAT domain of hElp3 is essential for this function. These findings now provide novel insights and evidence of the functions of hELP3 in human cells
Distributed Stochastic Power Control in Ad-hoc Networks: A Nonconvex Case
Utility-based power allocation in wireless ad-hoc networks is inherently
nonconvex because of the global coupling induced by the co-channel
interference. To tackle this challenge, we first show that the globally optimal
point lies on the boundary of the feasible region, which is utilized as a basis
to transform the utility maximization problem into an equivalent max-min
problem with more structure. By using extended duality theory, penalty
multipliers are introduced for penalizing the constraint violations, and the
minimum weighted utility maximization problem is then decomposed into
subproblems for individual users to devise a distributed stochastic power
control algorithm, where each user stochastically adjusts its target utility to
improve the total utility by simulated annealing. The proposed distributed
power control algorithm can guarantee global optimality at the cost of slow
convergence due to simulated annealing involved in the global optimization. The
geometric cooling scheme and suitable penalty parameters are used to improve
the convergence rate. Next, by integrating the stochastic power control
approach with the back-pressure algorithm, we develop a joint scheduling and
power allocation policy to stabilize the queueing systems. Finally, we
generalize the above distributed power control algorithms to multicast
communications, and show their global optimality for multicast traffic.Comment: Contains 12 pages, 10 figures, and 2 tables; work submitted to IEEE
Transactions on Mobile Computin
Escherichia coli BdcA controls biofilm dispersal in Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Rhizobium meliloti
Suppression of charged particle production at large transverse momentum in central Pb-Pb collisions at TeV
Inclusive transverse momentum spectra of primary charged particles in Pb-Pb
collisions at = 2.76 TeV have been measured by the ALICE
Collaboration at the LHC. The data are presented for central and peripheral
collisions, corresponding to 0-5% and 70-80% of the hadronic Pb-Pb cross
section. The measured charged particle spectra in and GeV/ are compared to the expectation in pp collisions at the same
, scaled by the number of underlying nucleon-nucleon
collisions. The comparison is expressed in terms of the nuclear modification
factor . The result indicates only weak medium effects ( 0.7) in peripheral collisions. In central collisions,
reaches a minimum of about 0.14 at -7GeV/ and increases
significantly at larger . The measured suppression of high- particles is stronger than that observed at lower collision energies,
indicating that a very dense medium is formed in central Pb-Pb collisions at
the LHC.Comment: 15 pages, 5 captioned figures, 3 tables, authors from page 10,
published version, figures at http://aliceinfo.cern.ch/ArtSubmission/node/98
Two-pion Bose-Einstein correlations in central Pb-Pb collisions at = 2.76 TeV
The first measurement of two-pion Bose-Einstein correlations in central Pb-Pb
collisions at TeV at the Large Hadron Collider is
presented. We observe a growing trend with energy now not only for the
longitudinal and the outward but also for the sideward pion source radius. The
pion homogeneity volume and the decoupling time are significantly larger than
those measured at RHIC.Comment: 17 pages, 5 captioned figures, 1 table, authors from page 12,
published version, figures at
http://aliceinfo.cern.ch/ArtSubmission/node/388
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