Weight Patterns of Youth Entering an Urban Juvenile Justice Facility

Abstract Adolescents with a history of incarceration face a disproportionate number of health issues compared with their peers in virtually all areas, including perceived well-being; self-esteem; acute, chronic, and psychosocial disorders; and physical activity. Some studies have shown correlates of weight status and incarceration; however, the literature is conflicting. The current study sought to assess weight patterns of primarily minority urban youth (N ¼ 548) entering a juvenile justice facility as well as associations between medications and weight status. Results indicate incarcerated adolescents have higher rates of overweight and obesity (40%) in comparison with nonincarcerated adolescents in the state (20 to 30%) or surrounding community (30 to 34%). Of interest, incarcerated adolescents taking asthma medications have significantly higher rates of overweight and obesity when compared with those not taking asthma medications. The clinical implications of these findings are discussed and implications for future research explored

A randomized, open-label, cross-over pilot study investigating metabolic product kinetics of the palatable novel ketone ester, bis-octanoyl (R)-1,3-butanediol, and bis-hexanoyl (R)-1,3-butanediol ingestion in healthy adults

Introduction Bis-octanoyl (R)-1,3-butanediol (BO-BD) is a novel, palatable ketone ester that, when consumed, is hydrolyzed in the gastrointestinal tract into octanoic acid (OCT) and (R)-1,3-butanediol (BDO) which are subsequently metabolized into beta-hydroxybutyrate (BHB). Metabolism of BO-BD is hypothesized to be similar to bis-hexanoyl (R)-1,3-butanediol (BH-BD), apart from release of octanoic acid instead of hexanoic acid (HEX). Methods As part of the safety assessment for BO-BD a randomized, cross-over, open-label study in middle-aged, healthy adults ( n = 12) was undertaken to provide a qualitative comparison of plasma BHB, OCT, HEX and BDO concentrations for 8 h following consumption of 12.5 or 25  g of BO-BD and 12.5  g of BH-BD. Results All study products increased plasma BHB and BDO up to 4 h post-consumption. BH-BD increased HEX, whereas BO-BD increased OCT. All kinetic parameters for BHB and BDO were similar between 12.5  g servings of BH-BD and BO-BD while C max and AUC for OCT were higher following 12. 5  g servings of BO-BD as compared to HEX with 12.5  g of BH-BD. All metabolites returned to baseline by 8 h post-consumption. BHB, BDO and OCT C max and AUC were increased with serving size of BO-BD from 12.5 to 25  g . Sensory acceptability scores of BO-BD were significantly higher than for BH-BD. An in vitro hydrolysis experiment using human blood plasma further confirmed that plasma esterases possess the ability to break down the novel ketone esters into BDO, and OCT or HEX. Discussion The two novel ketone ester molecules exhibit similar metabolic breakdown to BHB and BDO and result in transiently higher concentrations of the plasma fatty acids, OCT and HEX, in vivo. Conclusions Given the similar ketone delivery with greater acceptability, BO-BD may offer a more broadly translatable tool to induce physiologic ketosis than BH-BD

Antibody responses to Zika virus proteins in pregnant and non-pregnant macaques.

The specificity of the antibody response against Zika virus (ZIKV) is not well-characterized. This is due, in part, to the antigenic similarity between ZIKV and closely related dengue virus (DENV) serotypes. Since these and other similar viruses co-circulate, are spread by the same mosquito species, and can cause similar acute clinical syndromes, it is difficult to disentangle ZIKV-specific antibody responses from responses to closely-related arboviruses in humans. Here we use high-density peptide microarrays to profile anti-ZIKV antibody reactivity in pregnant and non-pregnant macaque monkeys with known exposure histories and compare these results to reactivity following DENV infection. We also compare cross-reactive binding of ZIKV-immune sera to the full proteomes of 28 arboviruses. We independently confirm a purported ZIKV-specific IgG antibody response targeting ZIKV nonstructural protein 2B (NS2B) that was recently reported in ZIKV-infected people and we show that antibody reactivity in pregnant animals can be detected as late as 127 days post-infection (dpi). However, we also show that these responses wane over time, sometimes rapidly, and in one case the response was elicited following DENV infection in a previously ZIKV-exposed animal. These results suggest epidemiologic studies assessing seroprevalence of ZIKV immunity using linear epitope-based strategies will remain challenging to interpret due to susceptibility to false positive results. However, the method used here demonstrates the potential for rapid profiling of proteome-wide antibody responses to a myriad of neglected diseases simultaneously and may be especially useful for distinguishing antibody reactivity among closely related pathogens