Arterial stiffness assessment in Tanzania by pulse wave velocity: a case-control study of HIV-infected cohort.

The expansion of HIV epidemic and scaling up of antiretroviral therapy in developing countries raise a concern for the development of cardiovascular disease in HIV-infected patients living in those areas. Aortic pulse wave velocity (PWV) is a non-invasive and objective measure of arterial wall elasticity. Arterial stiffness measures vascular damage secondary to ageing, hypertension and inflammation of the vascular wall. An elevated PWV has been established as an indicator of CVD

Exercise Causes Muscle GLUT4 Translocation in an Insulin-Independent Manner

Glucose uptake in skeletal muscle is dependent on the translocation of GLUT4 glucose transporters to the plasma membrane. The most important stimulators of glucose transport in skeletal muscle are insulin and exercise. Glucose uptake in skeletal muscle during exercise induces acceleration of many processes compared to the resting state. The scientific literature does not underline the role played by muscle contraction to increase glucose uptake with insulin-independent mechanisms. Search on Pub Med (May 05, 2015) using the key words "contraction and glucose uptake and muscle" gives 717 reports, while a search using the key words "insulin and glucose uptake and muscle" cites 5676 publications. The present paper describes the role of exercise in the muscle glucose uptake. Contraction of muscle induces GLUT4 translocation in the absence of insulin. There are different intracellular "pools" of GLUT4, one stimulated by insulin and another one stimulated by exercise. The roles exerted by AMPK, AICAR, calcium, NO, glycogen and hypoxia in the glucose uptake during exercise are emphasized. The effects of these phenomena on human wellness are reported

TOMM40, APOE, and APOC1 in Primary Progressive Aphasia and Frontotemporal Dementia

The aim of this study was to investigate the apolipoprotein E (APOE) chromosomal region in frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD), and in particular in primary progressive aphasia (PPA) and the behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD). To this aim, we selected three single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) rs2075650 and rs157590 (TOMM40), and rs1064725 (APOC1), representative of the linkage disequilibrium (LD) blocks at the 19q13-q13.2 chromosomal region. The SNPs rs429358 and rs7412 forming the APOE polymorphism were also included in the study. The analysis was made in 282 patients with a clinical diagnosis of sporadic FTLD, namely 207 bvFTD and 75 PPA, and 296 cognitively healthy control subjects. LD (r2 = 0.35) between TOMM40 (rs2075650) and APOC1 (rs1064725) was observed in PPA, but not in controls and in bvFTD. Inside this region of 26.9 kb, LD (r2 650.50) between TOMM40 (rs2075650) and APOE (rs429358) was observed in bvFTD and in controls, but not in PPA. Inside this region of 16.3 kb, LD (r2 = 0.14) between TOMM40 (rs157590) and APOE (rs429358)was observed in PPA, but not in bvFTD and in controls. Although the genetics of PPA and bvFTD needs further investigation, our results suggested the presence of a different genetic background underlying PPA and bvFTD at the 19q13-q13.2 chromosomal regio