Constructing an index of physical fitness age for Japanese elderly based on 7-year longitudinal data: sex differences in estimated physical fitness age

A standardized method for assessing the physical fitness of elderly adults has not yet been established. In this study, we developed an index of physical fitness age (fitness age score, FAS) for older Japanese adults and investigated sex differences based on the estimated FAS. Healthy elderly adults (52 men, 70 women) who underwent physical fitness tests once yearly for 7 years between 2002 and 2008 were included in this study. The age of the participants at the beginning of this study ranged from 60.0 to 83.0 years. The physical fitness tests consisted of 13 items to measure balance, agility, flexibility, muscle strength, and endurance. Three criteria were used to evaluate fitness markers of aging: (1) significant cross-sectional correlation with age; (2) significant longitudinal change with age consistent with the cross-sectional correlation; and (3) significant stability of individual differences. We developed an equation to assess individual FAS values using the first principal component derived from principal component analysis. Five candidate fitness markers of aging (10-m walking time, functional reach, one leg stand with eyes open, vertical jump and grip strength) were selected from the 13 physical fitness tests. Individual FAS was predicted from these five fitness markers using a principal component model. Individual FAS showed high longitudinal stability for age-related changes. This investigation of the longitudinal changes of individual FAS revealed that women had relatively lower physical fitness compared with men, but their rate of physical fitness aging was slower than that of men

Age and growth of the smooth hammerhead, Sphyrna zygaena, in the Atlantic Ocean: comparison with other hammerhead species

The smooth hammerhead Sphyrna zygaena (Sphyrnidae) is a pelagic shark occasionally caught as bycatch in pelagic longline fisheries, but is one of the least studied of all pelagic sharks. Age and growth of S. zygaena was studied along a wide Atlantic region covering both the northern and southern hemispheres. Data from 304 specimens, caught between October 2009 and September 2014, ranging in size from 126 to 253 cm fork length (FL), were analysed. Growth models were fitted using the three-parameter von Bertalanffy growth function (VBGF) re-parameterized to calculate L0 (size at birth). Growth models were fitted to the sample data and data from several back-calculation models. The model fit to the quadratic modified Dahl-Lea back-calculated data seems to be the most appropriate to describe growth in this species, with resulting growth parameters of Linf = 285 cm FL, k = 0.09 year−1 for males and Linf = 293 cm FL, k = 0.09 year−1 for females. Compared with other species of the same genus, estimated growth coefficients for S. zygaena seem to fall in the low to middle range. Although further work is still needed, this study adds to knowledge of the vital life-history parameters of smooth hammerheads in the Atlantic Ocean, which can be used in the management and conservation of this species.Programa Operacional Potencial Humano: IF/00253/2014info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The transcriptional response of Caenorhabditis elegans to ivermectin exposure identifies novel genes involved in the response to reduced food intake

We have examined the transcriptional response of Caenorhabditis elegans following exposure to the anthelmintic drug ivermectin (IVM) using whole genome microarrays and real-time QPCR. Our original aim was to identify candidate molecules involved in IVM metabolism and/or excretion. For this reason the IVM tolerant strain, DA1316, was used to minimise transcriptomic changes related to the phenotype of drug exposure. However, unlike equivalent work with benzimidazole drugs, very few of the induced genes were members of xenobiotic metabolising enzyme families. Instead, the transcriptional response was dominated by genes associated with fat mobilization and fatty acid metabolism including catalase, esterase, and fatty acid CoA synthetase genes. This is consistent with the reduction in pharyngeal pumping, and consequential reduction in food intake, upon exposure of DA1316 worms to IVM. Genes with the highest fold change in response to IVM exposure, cyp-37B1, mtl-1 and scl-2, were comparably up-regulated in response to short–term food withdrawal (4 hr) independent of IVM exposure, and GFP reporter constructs confirm their expression in tissues associated with fat storage (intestine and hypodermis). These experiments have serendipitously identified novel genes involved in an early response of C. elegans to reduced food intake and may provide insight into similar processes in higher organisms

Wet Granular Materials

Most studies on granular physics have focused on dry granular media, with no liquids between the grains. However, in geology and many real world applications (e.g., food processing, pharmaceuticals, ceramics, civil engineering, constructions, and many industrial applications), liquid is present between the grains. This produces inter-grain cohesion and drastically modifies the mechanical properties of the granular media (e.g., the surface angle can be larger than 90 degrees). Here we present a review of the mechanical properties of wet granular media, with particular emphasis on the effect of cohesion. We also list several open problems that might motivate future studies in this exciting but mostly unexplored field.Comment: review article, accepted for publication in Advances in Physics; tex-style change

Gene Expression in Chicken Reveals Correlation with Structural Genomic Features and Conserved Patterns of Transcription in the Terrestrial Vertebrates

Background - The chicken is an important agricultural and avian-model species. A survey of gene expression in a range of different tissues will provide a benchmark for understanding expression levels under normal physiological conditions in birds. With expression data for birds being very scant, this benchmark is of particular interest for comparative expression analysis among various terrestrial vertebrates. Methodology/Principal Findings - We carried out a gene expression survey in eight major chicken tissues using whole genome microarrays. A global picture of gene expression is presented for the eight tissues, and tissue specific as well as common gene expression were identified. A Gene Ontology (GO) term enrichment analysis showed that tissue-specific genes are enriched with GO terms reflecting the physiological functions of the specific tissue, and housekeeping genes are enriched with GO terms related to essential biological functions. Comparisons of structural genomic features between tissue-specific genes and housekeeping genes show that housekeeping genes are more compact. Specifically, coding sequence and particularly introns are shorter than genes that display more variation in expression between tissues, and in addition intergenic space was also shorter. Meanwhile, housekeeping genes are more likely to co-localize with other abundantly or highly expressed genes on the same chromosomal regions. Furthermore, comparisons of gene expression in a panel of five common tissues between birds, mammals and amphibians showed that the expression patterns across tissues are highly similar for orthologuous genes compared to random gene pairs within each pair-wise comparison, indicating a high degree of functional conservation in gene expression among terrestrial vertebrates. Conclusions - The housekeeping genes identified in this study have shorter gene length, shorter coding sequence length, shorter introns, and shorter intergenic regions, there seems to be selection pressure on economy in genes with a wide tissue distribution, i.e. these genes are more compact. A comparative analysis showed that the expression patterns of orthologous genes are conserved in the terrestrial vertebrates during evolutio

Avaliação da resistência ao cisalhamento da união entre duas ligas a base de CoCr e uma cerâmica

INTRODUCTION: Based on the importance of the integrity of the metal/ceramic interface, the purpose of this work was to evaluate the shear bond strength of the metal-ceramic union of two Co-Cr alloys (Wirobond C, Bego; Remanium 2000, Dentaurum) combined with Omega 900 ceramic (Vita Zahnfabrik). MATERIAL and METHOD: Eleven cylindrical matrixes were made for each alloy, and the metallic portion was obtained with the lost wax casting technique with standardized waxing of 4mm of height and of 4mm of diameter. The ceramic was applied according to the manufacturer’s recommendations with the aid of a teflon matrix that allowed its dimension to be standardized in the same size as the metallic portion. The specimens were submitted to the shear bond test in an universal testing machine (EMIC), with the aid of a device developed for such intention, and constant speed of 0.5mm/min. RESULTS and CONCLUSIONS: The mean resistance was 48.387MPa for Wirobond C alloy, with standard deviation of 17.718, and 55.956MPa for Remanium 2000, with standard deviation of 17.198. No statistically significant difference was observed between the shear strength of the two metal-ceramic alloys. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________ RESUMOINTRODUÇÃO: Baseados na importância da integridade da interface metal-cerâmica, este trabalho tem como objetivo avaliar a resistência ao cisalhamento da união metal-cerâmica de duas ligas de Co-Cr (Wirobond C, Bego; Remanium 2000, Dentaurum) combinadas com a cerâmica Omega 900 (Vita Zahnfabrik). MATERIAIS E MÉTODOS: Foram confeccionados 11 corpos-de-prova cilíndricos para cada liga utilizada, sendo que a porção metálica foi obtida por fundição pela técnica da cera perdida, através de enceramentos padronizados com 4mm de altura por 4mm de diâmetro. A aplicação da cerâmica foi realizada segundo recomendações do fabricante, com auxílio de uma matriz de teflon que permitia sua padronização com as mesmas dimensões da porção metálica. Os corpos-de-prova foram submetidos ao ensaio de resistência ao cisalhamento em máquina de ensaios universal (EMIC), com auxílio de dispositivo desenvolvido para tal propósito, sob velocidade constante de 0,5mm/ min. RESULTADOS E CONCLUSÕES: As médias de resistência obtidas foram 48,387 MPa para a liga Wirobond C, com desvio padrão de 17,718, e 55,956 MPa para a Remanium 2000, com desvio padrão de 17,198. Após análise de variância foi possível observar que não há diferença estatisticamente significante entre os valores de resistência ao cisalhamento das duas ligas metalocerâmicas

Age and growth of Cape stumpnose Rhabdosargus holubi (Pisces: Sparidae) in the Eastern Cape, South Africa

Rhabdosargus holubi (Steindachner, 1881) is a small (maximum size = 450 mm total length; Heemstra and Heemstra 2004) sparid that is distributed along the south-east coast of Africa from St Helena Bay, South Africa, to Maputo, Mozambique (Götz and Cowley 2013). Spawning occurs in the nearshore marine environment primarily during winter, specifically May–August in KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) (Wallace 1975) and July–February in the South-Eastern Cape (Whitfield 1998). Individuals reach 50% sexual maturity at approximately 150 mm standard length (SL) in the Eastern Cape (Whitfield 1998). The early life stages are transported by the south-westward-flowing Agulhas Current, and recruit as post-flexion larvae and early juveniles into estuaries during late winter and early summer (Blaber 1974). The warm temperatures and high nutrient levels in estuaries favour fast growth (Blaber 1973a), and fish spend their first year of life in these environments, migrating back out to sea after reaching approximately 120 mm SL. Some individuals remain trapped in closed estuaries, where they may reach sizes greater than 200 mm SL (James et al. 2007a). Rhabdosargus holubi is the dominant estuarine-dependent marine teleost species recorded in permanently open and temporarily open/closed estuaries in the warm-temperate region, which spans the south, south-east and east coast of South Africa (Harrison 2005). The species is also an important component of the linefishery in many SouthAfrican estuaries (10–15.6% by number) (Pradervand and Baird 2002), particularly in Eastern Cape estuaries (Cowley et al. 2003). These figures underestimate the presence of R. holubi, as most individuals making use of estuaries are young, feeding predominately on filamentous macroalgae and diatom flora, and are generally too small to be caught with hook and line (De Wet and Marais 1990). James et al. (2007b) showed that R. holubi made up 34–92% of the annual seine-net catch in the East Kleinemonde Estuary. Rhabdosargus holubi is also important in the KZN shorebased linefishery, representing 4.6% of the total landed catch (Dunlop and Mann 2012)

Purging Deleterious Mutations under Self Fertilization: Paradoxical Recovery in Fitness with Increasing Mutation Rate in Caenorhabditis elegans

Background: The accumulation of deleterious mutations can drastically reduce population mean fitness. Self-fertilization is thought to be an effective means of purging deleterious mutations. However, widespread linkage disequilibrium generated and maintained by self-fertilization is predicted to reduce the efficacy of purging when mutations are present at multiple loci. Methodology/Principal Findings: We tested the ability of self-fertilizing populations to purge deleterious mutations at multiple loci by exposing obligately self-fertilizing populations of Caenorhabditis elegans to a range of elevated mutation rates and found that mutations accumulated, as evidenced by a reduction in mean fitness, in each population. Therefore, purging in obligate selfing populations is overwhelmed by an increase in mutation rate. Surprisingly, we also found that obligate and predominantly self-fertilizing populations exposed to very high mutation rates exhibited consistently greater fitness than those subject to lesser increases in mutation rate, which contradicts the assumption that increases in mutation rate are negatively correlated with fitness. The high levels of genetic linkage inherent in self-fertilization could drive this fitness increase. Conclusions: Compensatory mutations can be more frequent under high mutation rates and may alleviate a portion of the fitness lost due to the accumulation of deleterious mutations through epistatic interactions with deleterious mutations. Th

Jet energy measurement with the ATLAS detector in proton-proton collisions at root s=7 TeV

The jet energy scale and its systematic uncertainty are determined for jets measured with the ATLAS detector at the LHC in proton-proton collision data at a centre-of-mass energy of √s = 7TeV corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 38 pb-1. Jets are reconstructed with the anti-kt algorithm with distance parameters R=0. 4 or R=0. 6. Jet energy and angle corrections are determined from Monte Carlo simulations to calibrate jets with transverse momenta pT≥20 GeV and pseudorapidities {pipe}η{pipe}<4. 5. The jet energy systematic uncertainty is estimated using the single isolated hadron response measured in situ and in test-beams, exploiting the transverse momentum balance between central and forward jets in events with dijet topologies and studying systematic variations in Monte Carlo simulations. The jet energy uncertainty is less than 2. 5 % in the central calorimeter region ({pipe}η{pipe}<0. 8) for jets with 60≤pT<800 GeV, and is maximally 14 % for pT<30 GeV in the most forward region 3. 2≤{pipe}η{pipe}<4. 5. The jet energy is validated for jet transverse momenta up to 1 TeV to the level of a few percent using several in situ techniques by comparing a well-known reference such as the recoiling photon pT, the sum of the transverse momenta of tracks associated to the jet, or a system of low-pT jets recoiling against a high-pT jet. More sophisticated jet calibration schemes are presented based on calorimeter cell energy density weighting or hadronic properties of jets, aiming for an improved jet energy resolution and a reduced flavour dependence of the jet response. The systematic uncertainty of the jet energy determined from a combination of in situ techniques is consistent with the one derived from single hadron response measurements over a wide kinematic range. The nominal corrections and uncertainties are derived for isolated jets in an inclusive sample of high-pT jets. Special cases such as event topologies with close-by jets, or selections of samples with an enhanced content of jets originating from light quarks, heavy quarks or gluons are also discussed and the corresponding uncertainties are determined. © 2013 CERN for the benefit of the ATLAS collaboration

Measurement of the inclusive and dijet cross-sections of b-jets in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

The inclusive and dijet production cross-sections have been measured for jets containing b-hadrons (b-jets) in proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of sqrt(s) = 7 TeV, using the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The measurements use data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 34 pb^-1. The b-jets are identified using either a lifetime-based method, where secondary decay vertices of b-hadrons in jets are reconstructed using information from the tracking detectors, or a muon-based method where the presence of a muon is used to identify semileptonic decays of b-hadrons inside jets. The inclusive b-jet cross-section is measured as a function of transverse momentum in the range 20 < pT < 400 GeV and rapidity in the range |y| < 2.1. The bbbar-dijet cross-section is measured as a function of the dijet invariant mass in the range 110 < m_jj < 760 GeV, the azimuthal angle difference between the two jets and the angular variable chi in two dijet mass regions. The results are compared with next-to-leading-order QCD predictions. Good agreement is observed between the measured cross-sections and the predictions obtained using POWHEG + Pythia. MC@NLO + Herwig shows good agreement with the measured bbbar-dijet cross-section. However, it does not reproduce the measured inclusive cross-section well, particularly for central b-jets with large transverse momenta.Comment: 10 pages plus author list (21 pages total), 8 figures, 1 table, final version published in European Physical Journal