Exploring Australian night shift workers’ food experiences within and outside of the workplace: A qualitative photovoice study

Abstract Objective: Night shift workers are at a 20 to 40% increased risk of metabolic diseases, which may be associated with their disrupted eating patterns. This qualitative study explores factors that influence night shift workers’ eating habits, within and outside of the workplace, to identify target areas for health promotion strategies. Participants & Setting: Eligible participants resided in Australia, working at least 3 overnight shifts per month. Design: The photovoice method was used, whereby participants were asked to take photos that represent their typical eating habits. These photos were incorporated as prompts in a semi-structured interview, which explored factors influencing eating habits on night shifts and days-off and perceptions and enablers to healthy eating. Results: Ten participants completed the study. Thematic analysis generated four main themes, which were mapped onto the Social Ecological Model (SEM). Aligned with the SEM, our results show night shift workers’ eating habits are influenced by intrapersonal, interpersonal and (work) organisational levels. Participants reported that at work, appropriate food preparation facilities are required to enable healthy food choices. Poor shift work rostering leads to prolonged fatigue on days-off, limiting their ability and motivation to engage in healthy eating. Consequently, night shift workers seem to require additional supports from their social networks and enhanced food literacy skills, in order to adopt/ maintain healthy eating behaviours. Conclusions: Night shift work creates individual and environmental barriers to healthy eating, which are present during and outside of work. Health promotion strategies for this population should include multiple approaches, targeting these barriers

Protein Design Using Continuous Rotamers

Optimizing amino acid conformation and identity is a central problem in computational protein design. Protein design algorithms must allow realistic protein flexibility to occur during this optimization, or they may fail to find the best sequence with the lowest energy. Most design algorithms implement side-chain flexibility by allowing the side chains to move between a small set of discrete, low-energy states, which we call rigid rotamers. In this work we show that allowing continuous side-chain flexibility (which we call continuous rotamers) greatly improves protein flexibility modeling. We present a large-scale study that compares the sequences and best energy conformations in 69 protein-core redesigns using a rigid-rotamer model versus a continuous-rotamer model. We show that in nearly all of our redesigns the sequence found by the continuous-rotamer model is different and has a lower energy than the one found by the rigid-rotamer model. Moreover, the sequences found by the continuous-rotamer model are more similar to the native sequences. We then show that the seemingly easy solution of sampling more rigid rotamers within the continuous region is not a practical alternative to a continuous-rotamer model: at computationally feasible resolutions, using more rigid rotamers was never better than a continuous-rotamer model and almost always resulted in higher energies. Finally, we present a new protein design algorithm based on the dead-end elimination (DEE) algorithm, which we call iMinDEE, that makes the use of continuous rotamers feasible in larger systems. iMinDEE guarantees finding the optimal answer while pruning the search space with close to the same efficiency of DEE. Availability: Software is available under the Lesser GNU Public License v3. Contact the authors for source code

A Genome-Wide Homozygosity Association Study Identifies Runs of Homozygosity Associated with Rheumatoid Arthritis in the Human Major Histocompatibility Complex

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic inflammatory disorder with a polygenic mode of inheritance. This study examined the hypothesis that runs of homozygosity (ROHs) play a recessive-acting role in the underlying RA genetic mechanism and identified RA-associated ROHs. Ours is the first genome-wide homozygosity association study for RA and characterized the ROH patterns associated with RA in the genomes of 2,000 RA patients and 3,000 normal controls of the Wellcome Trust Case Control Consortium. Genome scans consistently pinpointed two regions within the human major histocompatibility complex region containing RA-associated ROHs. The first region is from 32,451,664 bp to 32,846,093 bp (−log10(p)>22.6591). RA-susceptibility genes, such as HLA-DRB1, are contained in this region. The second region ranges from 32,933,485 bp to 33,585,118 bp (−log10(p)>8.3644) and contains other HLA-DPA1 and HLA-DPB1 genes. These two regions are physically close but are located in different blocks of linkage disequilibrium, and ∼40% of the RA patients' genomes carry these ROHs in the two regions. By analyzing homozygote intensities, an ROH that is anchored by the single nucleotide polymorphism rs2027852 and flanked by HLA-DRB6 and HLA-DRB1 was found associated with increased risk for RA. The presence of this risky ROH provides a 62% accuracy to predict RA disease status. An independent genomic dataset from 868 RA patients and 1,194 control subjects of the North American Rheumatoid Arthritis Consortium successfully validated the results obtained using the Wellcome Trust Case Control Consortium data. In conclusion, this genome-wide homozygosity association study provides an alternative to allelic association mapping for the identification of recessive variants responsible for RA. The identified RA-associated ROHs uncover recessive components and missing heritability associated with RA and other autoimmune diseases

Potential role of coenzyme Q10 in health and disease conditions

Taylor C Rodick,1 Donna R Seibels,2 Jeganathan Ramesh Babu,1 Kevin W Huggins,1 Guang Ren,3 Suresh T Mathews2 1Department of Nutrition, Dietetics, & Hospitality Management, Auburn University, Auburn, 2Department of Nutrition and Dietetics, Samford University, 3Medicine-Endocrinology, Diabetes & Metabolism, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA Abstract: Coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10), an endogenously produced compound, is found in all human cells. Within the mitochondria, it plays a substantial role in energy production by acting as a mobile electron carrier in the electron transport chain. Outside the mitochondria, it acts as an excellent antioxidant by sequestering free radicals and working synergistically with other antioxidants, including vitamin E. Dietary contribution is limited, making endogenous production the primary source for optimal function. Now widely available as an over-the-counter supplement, CoQ10 has gained attention for its possible therapeutic use in minimizing the outcomes of certain metabolic diseases, notably cardiovascular disease, diabetes, neurodegenerative disease, and cancer. Research has shown positive results in subjects supplemented with CoQ10, especially in relation to upregulating antioxidant capability. Emerging research suggests beneficial effects of CoQ10 supplementation in individuals on statin medications. CoQ10 supplementation in individuals participating in strenuous exercise seems to exert some beneficial effects, although the data are conflicting with other types of physical activity. This broad review of current CoQ10 literature, while outlining its physiological/functional significance in health and disease conditions, also offers a dietitian’s perspective on its potential use as a supplement in the promotion of health and management of disease conditions. Keywords: coenzyme Q, antioxidant, oxidative stress, dietary supplement, stati