Management of Hypertension in the Obese Pregnant Patient.

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: To evaluate recent developments in the management of hypertension in obese pregnant women. RECENT FINDINGS: The mainstay of management targets prevention of hypertension with preconception counselling, entering pregnancy with a lower BMI, limiting weight gain, and taking low-dose aspirin to prevent pre-eclampsia from before 16 weeks' gestation. There are conflicting results regarding the use of metformin in reducing hypertensive disease, but there is a high probability that it has a role to play. Clinical trials are in progress examining the use of statins in preventing pre-eclampsia, with promising results from pre-clinical trials. Home blood pressure monitoring may be helpful in diagnosing and monitoring the control of hypertension. The most protective interventions against hypertensive disease in obese pregnant women are entering pregnancy at a lower BMI, avoiding inter-pregnancy weight gain, and taking low-dose aspirin during pregnancy. Further research is needed around the use of metformin, statins, and home blood pressure monitoring

Relic Neutralino Density in Scenarios with Intermediate Unification Scale

We analyse the relic neutralino density in supersymmetric models with an intermediate unification scale. In particular, we present concrete cosmological scenarios where the reheating temperature is as small as $\cal{O}$ $1 - 1000$ MeV). When this temperature is associated to the decay of moduli fields producing neutralinos, we show that the relic abundance increases considerably with respect to the standard thermal production. Thus the neutralino becomes a good dark matter candidate with 0.1\lsim \Omega h^2 \lsim 0.3, even for regions of the parameter space where large neutralino-nucleon cross sections, compatible with current dark matter experiments, are present. This is obtained for intermediate scales $M_I\sim 10^{11}-10^{14}$ GeV, and moduli masses $m_\phi\sim 100-1000$ GeV. On the other hand, when the above temperature is associated to the decay of an inflaton field, the relic abundance is too small.Comment: Latex, 11 pages, 2 figure

Polyunsaturated fatty acids influence offspring sex ratio in cows

Dietary polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) can influence fertility in farm animals. Some evidence in mice and sheep have suggested that PUFAs may influence offspring sex ratio, which may have significant value for cattle production. To test this hypothesis, three groups of Holstein cows were supplemented with either 0%, 3% or 5% protected fat (PF) in the form of calcium salt of fatty acids (rich in omega-6) from 14–21 days pre-partum until conception. Proven-fertile frozen semen from the same ejaculate was used for insemination. Calf sex recorded at birth was 8/19 (42.1%) male offspring in the control group, increasing to 14/20 (70%, P > 0.05) and 17/20 (85%, P < 0.05) in 3% and 5% PF, respectively. To test if this effect was caused by a direct influence on the oocyte, we supplemented bovine cumulus oocyte complexes during in vitro maturation with either omega-3 alpha-linolenic acid (ALA), omega-6 linoleic acid (LA) or trans-10, cis-12 conjugated linoleic acid (CLA). Sex ratio of the produced transferable embryos was determined using PCR of SRY gene. Similar to the in vivo results, sex ratio was skewed to the male side in the embryos derived from LA- and CLA-treated oocytes (79% and 71%) compared to control and ALA-treated oocytes (44% and 54%, respectively). These results indicate that both dietary and in vitro supplementation of omega-6 PUFAs can skew the sex ratio towards the male side in cattle. Further experiments are required to confirm this effect on a larger scale and to study the mechanisms of action that might be involved

Constraining supersymmetric models from B_d - B-bar_d mixing and the B_d --> J/psi K_S asymmetry

We analyze the chargino contributions to B_d - B-bar_d mixing and CP asymmetry of the B_d --> J/psi K_S decay, in the framework of the mass insertion approximation. We derive model independent bounds on the relevant mass insertions. Moreover, we study these contributions in supersymmetric models with minimal flavor violation, Hermitian flavor structure, and small CP violating phases and universal strength Yukawa couplings. We show that in supersymmetric models with large flavor mixing, the observed values of sin(2 beta) may be entirely due to the chargino-up-squark loops.Comment: 22 pages, 1 figure, minor corrections, version to appear in Phys. Rev.

Supersymmetric contributions to B -> D K and the determination of angle \gamma

We analyze supersymmetric contributions to B^- -> D^0 K^- and B^- ->\bar{D}^0 K^- processes. We investigate the possibility that supersymmetric CP violating phases can affect our determination for the angle \gamma in the unitary triangle of Cabibbo-Kobayashi-Maskaw mixing matrix. We calculate the gluino and chargino contributions to b--> u(\bar{c}s) and b-->c(\bar{u}s) transitions in a model independent way by using the mass insertion approximation method. We also revise the D^0 - \bar{D}^0 mixing constraints on the mass insertions between the first and second generations of the up sector. We emphasize that in case of negligible D^0 -\bar{D}^0 mixing, one should consider simultaneous contributions from more than one mass insertion in order to be able to obtain the CP asymmetries of these processes within their 1\sigma experimental range. However, with a large D^0-\bar{D}^0 mixing, one finds a significant deviation between the two asymmetries and it becomes natural to have them of order the central values of their experimental measurements.Comment: 20 page

Total perfusion-diffusion mismatch detected using resting-state functional MRI

Total perfusion- diffusion mismatch is a well- recognised phenomenon in patients with acute ischaemic stroke. We describe a case of total perfusion- diffusion mismatch detected using an emerging contrast- agent- free perfusion imaging technique in a young patient with acute cerebellar strok