Phytoestrogens

Collectively, plants contain several different families of natural products among which are compounds with weak estrogenic or antiestrogenic activity toward mammals. These compounds, termed phytoestrogens, include certain isoflavonoids, flavonoids, stilbenes, and lignans. The best-studied dietary phytoestrogens are the soy isoflavones and the flaxseed lignans. Their perceived health beneficial properties extend beyond hormone-dependent breast and prostate cancers and osteoporosis to include cognitive function, cardiovascular disease, immunity and inflammation, and reproduction and fertility. In the future, metabolic engineering of plants could generate novel and exquisitely controlled dietary sources with which to better assess the potential health beneficial effects of phytoestrogens

Tic disorders and the premonitory urge

The aims of this study were to examine a non-English (Hebrew) version of a scale that measures the premonitory urge in children suffering from tic disorder, as well as examine the correlations of the urge with demographic and clinical aspects of Tourette Syndrome. Forty children and adolescents, suffering from tics participated in this study. They were assessed with the Premonitory Urge for Tics Scale (PUTS); the Yale Global Tic Severity Scale (YGTSS); the Childhood Version of the Yale Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale (CYBOCS); the ADHD Rating Scale IV (Conners) Scale; the Screen for Child Anxiety Related Emotional Disorders (SCARED); and the Child Depression Inventory (CDI). The mean PUTS score was 20.15 (SD = 5.89). For the entire sample the PUTS was found to be internally consistent at a = 0.79. Youths older than 10 years had higher consistency (a = 0.83) than youths younger than 10 (a = 0.69). Premonitory urge was not correlated with tic severity in the entire sample. In youths older than 10, as opposed to youths younger than 10, premonitory urge did correlate with obsessions, compulsions and depression, but not with anxiety or with ADHD. The premonitory urge can be measured reliably and the PUTS is a useful instrument for measuring this important phenomena. Premonitory urges seems to be related to obsessions, compulsions, and depression in older children and this may have implications for the developmental psychopatholgy of these symptoms

Tales of Emergence - Synthetic Biology as a Scientific Community in the Making

International audienceThis article locates the beginnings of a synthetic biology network and thereby probes the formation of a potential disciplinary community. We consider the ways that ideas of community are mobilized, both by scientists and policy-makers in building an agenda for new forms of knowledge work, and by social scientists as an analytical device to understand new formations for knowledge production. As participants in, and analysts of, a network in synthetic biology, we describe our current understanding of synthetic biology by telling four tales of community making. The first tale tells of the mobilization of synthetic biology within a European context. The second tale describes the approach to synthetic biology community formation in the UK. The third narrates the creation of an institutionally based, funded 'network in synthetic biology'. The final tale de-localizes community-making efforts by focussing on 'devices' that make communities. In tying together these tales, our analysis suggests that the potential community can be understood in terms of 'movements'--the (re)orientation and enrolment of people, stories, disciplines and policies; and of 'stickiness'--the objects and glues that begin to bind together the various constitutive elements of community

The fitness of African malaria vectors in the presence and limitation of host behaviour

<p>Background Host responses are important sources of selection upon the host species range of ectoparasites and phytophagous insects. However little is known about the role of host responses in defining the host species range of malaria vectors. This study aimed to estimate the relative importance of host behaviour to the feeding success and fitness of African malaria vectors, and assess its ability to predict their known host species preferences in nature.</p> <p>Methods Paired evaluations of the feeding success and fitness of African vectors Anopheles arabiensis and Anopheles gambiae s.s in the presence and limitation of host behaviour were conducted in a semi-field system (SFS) at Ifakara Health Institute, Tanzania. In one set of trials, mosquitoes were released within the SFS and allowed to forage overnight on a host that was free to exhibit natural behaviour in response to insect biting. In the other, mosquitoes were allowed to feed directly on from the skin surface of immobile hosts. The feeding success and subsequent fitness of vectors under these conditions were investigated on 6 host types (humans, calves, chickens, cows, dogs and goats) to assess whether physical movements of preferred host species (cattle for An. arabiensis, humans for An. gambiae s.s.) were less effective at preventing mosquito bites than those of common alternatives.</p> <p>Results Anopheles arabiensis generally had greater feeding success when applied directly to host skin than when foraging on unrestricted hosts (in five of six host species). However, An. gambiae s.s obtained blood meals from free and restrained hosts with similar success from most host types (four out of six). Overall, the blood meal size, oviposition rate, fecundity and post-feeding survival of mosquito vectors were significantly higher after feeding on hosts free to exhibit behaviour, than those who were immobilized during feeding trials.</p> <p>Conclusions Allowing hosts to move freely during exposure to mosquitoes was associated with moderate reductions in mosquito feeding success, but no detrimental impact to the subsequent fitness of mosquitoes that were able to feed upon them. This suggests that physical defensive behaviours exhibited by common host species including humans do not impose substantial fitness costs on African malaria vectors.</p&gt

An Inhibitory Sex Pheromone Tastes Bitter for Drosophila Males

Sexual behavior requires animals to distinguish between the sexes and to respond appropriately to each of them. In Drosophila melanogaster, as in many insects, cuticular hydrocarbons are thought to be involved in sex recognition and in mating behavior, but there is no direct neuronal evidence of their pheromonal effect. Using behavioral and electrophysiological measures of responses to natural and synthetic compounds, we show that Z-7-tricosene, a Drosophila male cuticular hydrocarbon, acts as a sex pheromone and inhibits male-male courtship. These data provide the first direct demonstration that an insect cuticular hydrocarbon is detected as a sex pheromone. Intriguingly, we show that a particular type of gustatory neurons of the labial palps respond both to Z-7-tricosene and to bitter stimuli. Cross-adaptation between Z-7-tricosene and bitter stimuli further indicates that these two very different substances are processed by the same neural pathways. Furthermore, the two substances induced similar behavioral responses both in courtship and feeding tests. We conclude that the inhibitory pheromone tastes bitter to the fly

Entrepreneurial sons, patriarchy and the Colonels' experiment in Thessaly, rural Greece

Existing studies within the field of institutional entrepreneurship explore how entrepreneurs influence change in economic institutions. This paper turns the attention of scholarly inquiry on the antecedents of deinstitutionalization and more specifically, the influence of entrepreneurship in shaping social institutions such as patriarchy. The paper draws from the findings of ethnographic work in two Greek lowland village communities during the military Dictatorship (1967–1974). Paradoxically this era associated with the spread of mechanization, cheap credit, revaluation of labour and clear means-ends relations, signalled entrepreneurial sons’ individuated dissent and activism who were now able to question the Patriarch’s authority, recognize opportunities and act as unintentional agents of deinstitutionalization. A ‘different’ model of institutional change is presented here, where politics intersects with entrepreneurs, in changing social institutions. This model discusses the external drivers of institutional atrophy and how handling dissensus (and its varieties over historical time) is instrumental in enabling institutional entrepreneurship

Mortality and morbidity among people living close to incinerators: a cohort study based on dispersion modeling for exposure assessment

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Several studies have been conducted on the possible health effects for people living close to incinerators and well-conducted reviews are available. Nevertheless, several uncertainties limit the overall interpretation of the findings. We evaluated the health effects of emissions from two incinerators in a pilot cohort study.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The study area was defined as the 3.5 km radius around two incinerators located near Forlì (Italy). People who were residents in 1/1/1990, or subsequently became residents up to 31/12/2003, were enrolled in a longitudinal study (31,347 individuals). All the addresses were geocoded. Follow-up continued until 31/12/2003 by linking the mortality register, cancer registry and hospital admissions databases. Atmospheric Dispersion Model System (ADMS) software was used for exposure assessment; modelled concentration maps of heavy metals (annual average) were considered the indicators of exposure to atmospheric pollution from the incinerators, while concentration maps of nitrogen dioxide (NO₂) were considered for exposure to other pollution sources. Age and area-based socioeconomic status adjusted rate ratios and 95% Confidence Intervals were estimated with Poisson regression, using the lowest exposure category to heavy metals as reference.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The mortality and morbidity experience of the whole cohort did not differ from the regional population. In the internal analysis, no association between pollution exposure from the incinerators and all-cause and cause-specific mortality outcomes was observed in men, with the exception of colon cancer. Exposure to the incinerators was associated with cancer mortality among women, in particular for all cancer sites (RR for the highest exposure level = 1.47, 95% CI: 1.09, 1.99), stomach, colon, liver and breast cancer. No clear trend was detected for cancer incidence. No association was found for hospitalizations related to major diseases. NO₂levels, as a proxy from other pollution sources (traffic in particular), did not exert an important confounding role.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>No increased risk of mortality and morbidity was found in the entire area. The internal analysis of the cohort based on dispersion modeling found excesses of mortality for some cancer types in the highest exposure categories, especially in women. The interpretation of the findings is limited given the pilot nature of the study.</p

Seabird species vary in behavioural response to drone census

This is the final version of the article. Available from the publisher via the DOI in this record.Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) provide an opportunity to rapidly census wildlife in remote areas while removing some of the hazards. However, wildlife may respond negatively to the UAVs, thereby skewing counts. We surveyed four species of Arctic cliff-nesting seabirds (glaucous gull Larus hyperboreus, Iceland gull Larus glaucoides, common murre Uria aalge and thick-billed murre Uria lomvia) using a UAV and compared censusing techniques to ground photography. An average of 8.5% of murres flew off in response to the UAV, but >99% of those birds were non-breeders. We were unable to detect any impact of the UAV on breeding success of murres, except at a site where aerial predators were abundant and several birds lost their eggs to predators following UAV flights. Furthermore, we found little evidence for habituation by murres to the UAV. Most gulls flew off in response to the UAV, but returned to the nest within five minutes. Counts of gull nests and adults were similar between UAV and ground photography, however the UAV detected up to 52.4% more chicks because chicks were camouflaged and invisible to ground observers. UAVs provide a less hazardous and potentially more accurate method for surveying wildlife. We provide some simple recommendations for their use.We thank T. Leonard and the Seabird Ecological Reserves Advisory Committee for permission to work at Witless Bay, the Canadian Wildlife Service for permits to work at Newfoundland and Nunavut and the Government of Nunavut for permits to work in Nunavut. Newfoundland and Labrador Murre Fund, Bird Studies Canada and the Molson Foundation directly funded the work. An NSERC Discovery Grant, the Canada Research Chair in Arctic Ecology and Polar Continental Shelf Project also helped fund the project. We thank T. Burke, G. Sorenson, T. Lazarus and M. Guigueno for their help and J. Nakoolak for keeping us safe from bear

The Past and Future of Evolutionary Economics : Some Reflections Based on New Bibliometric Evidence

This document is the Accepted Manuscript version of the following article: Geoffrey M. Hodgson, and Juha-Antti Lamberg, ‘The past and future of evolutionary economics: some reflections based on new bibliometric evidence’, Evolutionary and Institutional Economics Review, first online 20 June 2016. The final publication is available at Springer via doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s40844-016-0044-3 © Japan Association for Evolutionary Economics 2016The modern wave of ‘evolutionary economics’ was launched with the classic study by Richard Nelson and Sidney Winter (1982). This paper reports a broad bibliometric analysis of ‘evolutionary’ research in the disciplines of management, business, economics, and sociology over 25 years from 1986 to 2010. It confirms that Nelson and Winter (1982) is an enduring nodal reference point for this broad field. The bibliometric evidence suggests that ‘evolutionary economics’ has benefitted from the rise of business schools and other interdisciplinary institutions, which have provided a home for evolutionary terminology, but it has failed to nurture a strong unifying core narrative or theory, which in turn could provide superior answers to important questions. This bibliometric evidence also shows that no strong cluster of general theoretical research immediately around Nelson and Winter (1982) has subsequently emerged. It identifies developmental problems in a partly successful but fragmented field. Future research in ‘evolutionary economics’ needs a more integrated research community with shared conceptual narratives and common research questions, to promote conversation and synergy between diverse clusters of research.Peer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio