Plasma cholesteryl ester fatty acids do not mediate the association of ethnicity with type 2 diabetes: results from the HELIUS study

Scope: Ethnic minority groups have a higher risk of type 2 diabetes (T2D) than the host population. Our aim was to identify whether plasma cholesteryl ester fatty acids (CEFA) mediate the ethnic differences in type 2 diabetes. Methods and results: We included 202 Dutch, 206 South-Asian Surinamese, 205 African Surinamese, 215 Turkish and 213 Moroccan origin participants of the HELIUS study (Amsterdam, the Netherlands). Logistic regression was used to determine the associations between plasma CEFA and T2D. Mediation analysis was used to identify whether CEFA contributed to the association between ethnicity and T2D. We adjusted for ethnicity, age, sex, smoking, physical activity and BMI. Associations between plasma CEFA and T2D were similar across all ethnic groups. Although differences in plasma CEFA across ethnic groups were observed, CEFA did not mediate the differences in T2D prevalence between ethnic groups. Conclusion: Although ethnic differences in plasma CEFA were found and CEFA were associated with T2D, CEFA did not contribute to the difference in T2D prevalence between ethnic groups. If confirmed, this implies that maintenance of the more beneficial CEFA profiles in the non-Dutch ethnic groups may be encouraged to prevent an even higher prevalence of T2D in these groups

Dynamic probabilistic linear discriminant analysis for video classification

Component Analysis (CA) comprises of statistical techniques that decompose signals into appropriate latent components, relevant to a task-at-hand (e.g., clustering, segmentation, classification). Recently, an explosion of research in CA has been witnessed, with several novel probabilistic models proposed (e.g., Probabilistic Principal CA, Probabilistic Linear Discriminant Analysis (PLDA), Probabilistic Canonical Correlation Analysis). PLDA is a popular generative probabilistic CA method, that incorporates knowledge regarding class-labels and furthermore introduces class-specific and sample-specific latent spaces. While PLDA has been shown to outperform several state-of-the-art methods, it is nevertheless a static model; any feature-level temporal dependencies that arise in the data are ignored. As has been repeatedly shown, appropriate modelling of temporal dynamics is crucial for the analysis of temporal data (e.g., videos). In this light, we propose the first, to the best of our knowledge, probabilistic LDA formulation that models dynamics, the so-called Dynamic-PLDA (DPLDA). DPLDA is a generative model suitable for video classification and is able to jointly model the label information (e.g., face identity, consistent over videos of the same subject), as well as dynamic variations of each individual video. Experiments on video classification tasks such as face and facial expression recognition show the efficacy of the proposed metho

Deep affect prediction in-the-wild: aff-wild database and challenge, deep architectures, and beyond

Automatic understanding of human affect using visual signals is of great importance in everyday human–machine interactions. Appraising human emotional states, behaviors and reactions displayed in real-world settings, can be accomplished using latent continuous dimensions (e.g., the circumplex model of affect). Valence (i.e., how positive or negative is an emotion) and arousal (i.e., power of the activation of the emotion) constitute popular and effective representations for affect. Nevertheless, the majority of collected datasets this far, although containing naturalistic emotional states, have been captured in highly controlled recording conditions. In this paper, we introduce the Aff-Wild benchmark for training and evaluating affect recognition algorithms. We also report on the results of the First Affect-in-the-wild Challenge (Aff-Wild Challenge) that was recently organized in conjunction with CVPR 2017 on the Aff-Wild database, and was the first ever challenge on the estimation of valence and arousal in-the-wild. Furthermore, we design and extensively train an end-to-end deep neural architecture which performs prediction of continuous emotion dimensions based on visual cues. The proposed deep learning architecture, AffWildNet, includes convolutional and recurrent neural network layers, exploiting the invariant properties of convolutional features, while also modeling temporal dynamics that arise in human behavior via the recurrent layers. The AffWildNet produced state-of-the-art results on the Aff-Wild Challenge. We then exploit the AffWild database for learning features, which can be used as priors for achieving best performances both for dimensional, as well as categorical emotion recognition, using the RECOLA, AFEW-VA and EmotiW 2017 datasets, compared to all other methods designed for the same goal. The database and emotion recognition models are available at http://ibug.doc.ic.ac.uk/resources/first-affect-wild-challenge

Social and cultural factors underlying generational differences in overweight: a cross-sectional study among ethnic minorities in the Netherlands

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The prevalence of overweight appears to vary in people of first and second generation ethnic minority groups. Insight into the factors that underlie these weight differences might help in understanding the health transition that is taking place across generations following migration. We studied the role of social and cultural factors associated with generational differences in overweight among young Turkish and Moroccan men and women in the Netherlands.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Cross-sectional data were derived from the LASER-study in which information on health-related behaviour and socio-demographic factors, level of education, occupational status, acculturation (cultural orientation and social contacts), religious and migration-related factors was gathered among Turkish and Moroccan men (n = 334) and women (n = 339) aged 15-30 years. Participants were interviewed during a home visit. Overweight was defined as a Body Mass Index ≥ 25 kg/m². Using logistic regression analyses, we tested whether the measured social and cultural factors could explain differences in overweight between first and second generation ethnic groups.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Second generation women were less often overweight than first generation women (21.8% and 45.0% respectively), but this association was no longer significant when adjusting for the socioeconomic position (i.e. higher level of education) of second generation women (Odds Ratio (OR) = 0.77, 95%, Confidence Interval (CI) 0.40-1.46). In men, we observed a reversed pattern: second generation men were more often overweight than first generation men (32.7% and 27.8%). This association (OR = 1.89, 95% CI 1.09-3.24) could not be explained by the social and cultural factors because none of these factors were associated with overweight among men.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The higher socio-economic position of second generation Turkish and Moroccan women may partly account for the lower prevalence of overweight in this group compared to first generation women. Further research is necessary to elucidate whether any postulated socio-biological or other processes are relevant to the opposite pattern of overweight among men.</p

Dietary and physical activity recommendations to prevent type 2 diabetes in South Asian adults:A systematic review

Intervention trials and guidelines for the prevention of type 2 diabetes (T2D) in populations of South Asian origin often include strategies to improve diet and physical activity that are based on those developed for other populations. These may be suboptimal for the South Asian target populations. We aimed to provide an overview of included recommended dietary and physical activity components, and to identify whether these were supported by evidence of their effectiveness. Databases were searched until September 2017 for intervention studies and guidelines with an adult South Asian population without T2D. The protocol was registered in PROSPERO, registration number: CRD42015207067. The quality of included studies and guidelines was assessed. Dietary and physical activity components, and effects on T2D incidence, glycemic status and adiposity measures, were summarized in tabular format and evaluated narratively. Eighteen intervention studies and four guidelines were identified. Dietary and physical activity components were similar to recommendations for the general population. Intervention studies and guidelines did not reference evidence to support the effectiveness of components included in the intervention for South Asian populations in particular. Moreover, we were unable to assess patterns of components to determine the effects of specific components. Evaluation of current and emerging components among South Asian populations and subgroups seems necessary to formulate more specific recommendations in future intervention studies and guidelines

Marine Toxins: Chemistry, Toxicity, Occurrence and Detection, with Special Reference to the Dutch Situation

Various species of algae can produce marine toxins under certain circumstances. These toxins can then accumulate in shellfish such as mussels, oysters and scallops. When these contaminated shellfish species are consumed severe intoxication can occur. The different types of syndromes that can occur after consumption of contaminated shellfish, the corresponding toxins and relevant legislation are discussed in this review. Amnesic Shellfish Poisoning (ASP), Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning (PSP), Diarrheic Shellfish Poisoning (DSP) and Azaspiracid Shellfish Poisoning (AZP) occur worldwide, Neurologic Shellfish Poisoning (NSP) is mainly limited to the USA and New Zealand while the toxins causing DSP and AZP occur most frequently in Europe. The latter two toxin groups are fat-soluble and can therefore also be classified as lipophilic marine toxins. A detailed overview of the official analytical methods used in the EU (mouse or rat bioassay) and the recently developed alternative methods for the lipophilic marine toxins is given. These alternative methods are based on functional assays, biochemical assays and chemical methods. From the literature it is clear that chemical methods offer the best potential to replace the animal tests that are still legislated worldwide. Finally, an overview is given of the situation of marine toxins in The Netherlands. The rat bioassay has been used for monitoring DSP and AZP toxins in The Netherlands since the 1970s. Nowadays, a combination of a chemical method and the rat bioassay is often used. In The Netherlands toxic events are mainly caused by DSP toxins, which have been found in Dutch shellfish for the first time in 1961, and have reoccurred at irregular intervals and in varying concentrations. From this review it is clear that considerable effort is being undertaken by various research groups to phase out the animal tests that are still used for the official routine monitoring programs

Measurement of the top quark forward-backward production asymmetry and the anomalous chromoelectric and chromomagnetic moments in pp collisions at √s = 13 TeV

Abstract The parton-level top quark (t) forward-backward asymmetry and the anomalous chromoelectric (d̂ t) and chromomagnetic (μ̂ t) moments have been measured using LHC pp collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, collected in the CMS detector in a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 35.9 fb−1. The linearized variable AFB(1) is used to approximate the asymmetry. Candidate t t ¯ events decaying to a muon or electron and jets in final states with low and high Lorentz boosts are selected and reconstructed using a fit of the kinematic distributions of the decay products to those expected for t t ¯ final states. The values found for the parameters are AFB(1)=0.048−0.087+0.095(stat)−0.029+0.020(syst),μ̂t=−0.024−0.009+0.013(stat)−0.011+0.016(syst), and a limit is placed on the magnitude of | d̂ t| &lt; 0.03 at 95% confidence level. [Figure not available: see fulltext.

MUSiC : a model-unspecific search for new physics in proton-proton collisions at root s=13TeV

Results of the Model Unspecific Search in CMS (MUSiC), using proton-proton collision data recorded at the LHC at a centre-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 35.9 fb(-1), are presented. The MUSiC analysis searches for anomalies that could be signatures of physics beyond the standard model. The analysis is based on the comparison of observed data with the standard model prediction, as determined from simulation, in several hundred final states and multiple kinematic distributions. Events containing at least one electron or muon are classified based on their final state topology, and an automated search algorithm surveys the observed data for deviations from the prediction. The sensitivity of the search is validated using multiple methods. No significant deviations from the predictions have been observed. For a wide range of final state topologies, agreement is found between the data and the standard model simulation. This analysis complements dedicated search analyses by significantly expanding the range of final states covered using a model independent approach with the largest data set to date to probe phase space regions beyond the reach of previous general searches.Peer reviewe

Search for new particles in events with energetic jets and large missing transverse momentum in proton-proton collisions at root s=13 TeV

A search is presented for new particles produced at the LHC in proton-proton collisions at root s = 13 TeV, using events with energetic jets and large missing transverse momentum. The analysis is based on a data sample corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 101 fb(-1), collected in 2017-2018 with the CMS detector. Machine learning techniques are used to define separate categories for events with narrow jets from initial-state radiation and events with large-radius jets consistent with a hadronic decay of a W or Z boson. A statistical combination is made with an earlier search based on a data sample of 36 fb(-1), collected in 2016. No significant excess of events is observed with respect to the standard model background expectation determined from control samples in data. The results are interpreted in terms of limits on the branching fraction of an invisible decay of the Higgs boson, as well as constraints on simplified models of dark matter, on first-generation scalar leptoquarks decaying to quarks and neutrinos, and on models with large extra dimensions. Several of the new limits, specifically for spin-1 dark matter mediators, pseudoscalar mediators, colored mediators, and leptoquarks, are the most restrictive to date.Peer reviewe

Measurement of prompt open-charm production cross sections in proton-proton collisions at root s=13 TeV

The production cross sections for prompt open-charm mesons in proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13TeV are reported. The measurement is performed using a data sample collected by the CMS experiment corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 29 nb(-1). The differential production cross sections of the D*(+/-), D-+/-, and D-0 ((D) over bar (0)) mesons are presented in ranges of transverse momentum and pseudorapidity 4 < p(T) < 100 GeV and vertical bar eta vertical bar < 2.1, respectively. The results are compared to several theoretical calculations and to previous measurements.Peer reviewe