Addition of a dairy fraction rich in milk fat globule membrane to a high-saturated fat meal reduces the postprandial insulinaemic and inflammatory response in overweight and obese adults.

Meals high in SFA, particularly palmitate, are associated with postprandial inflammation and insulin resistance. Milk fat globule membrane (MFGM) has anti-inflammatory properties that may attenuate the negative effects of SFA-rich meals. Our objective was to examine the postprandial metabolic and inflammatory response to a high-fat meal composed of palm oil (PO) compared with PO with an added dairy fraction rich in MFGM (PO+MFGM) in overweight and obese men and women (n 36) in a randomised, double-blinded, cross-over trial. Participants consumed two isoenergetic high-fat meals composed of a smoothie enriched with PO with v. without a cream-derived complex milk lipid fraction ( dairy fraction rich in MFGM) separated by a washout of 1-2 weeks. Serum cytokines, adhesion molecules, cortisol and markers of inflammation were measured at fasting, and at 1, 3 and 6 h postprandially. Glucose, insulin and lipid profiles were analysed in plasma. Consumption of the PO + MFGM v. PO meal resulted in lower total cholesterol (P = 0·021), LDL-cholesterol (P = 0·046), soluble intracellular adhesion molecule (P = 0·005) and insulin (P = 0·005) incremental AUC, and increased IL-10 (P = 0·013). Individuals with high baseline C-reactive protein (CRP) concentrations (≥3 mg/l, n 17) had higher (P = 0·030) insulin at 1 h after the PO meal than individuals with CRP concentrations <3 mg/l (n 19). The addition of MFGM attenuated this difference between CRP groups. The addition of a dairy fraction rich in MFGM attenuated the negative effects of a high-SFA meal by reducing postprandial cholesterol, inflammatory markers and insulin response in overweight and obese individuals, particularly in those with elevated CRP

Consumption of a high-fat meal containing cheese compared with a vegan alternative lowers postprandial C-reactive protein in overweight and obese individuals with metabolic abnormalities: a randomised controlled cross-over study.

Dietary recommendations suggest decreased consumption of SFA to minimise CVD risk; however, not all foods rich in SFA are equivalent. To evaluate the effects of SFA in a dairy food matrix, as Cheddar cheese, v. SFA from a vegan-alternative test meal on postprandial inflammatory markers, a randomised controlled cross-over trial was conducted in twenty overweight or obese adults with metabolic abnormalities. Individuals consumed two isoenergetic high-fat mixed meals separated by a 1- to 2-week washout period. Serum was collected at baseline, and at 1, 3 and 6 h postprandially and analysed for inflammatory markers (IL-6, IL-8, IL-10, IL-17, IL-18, TNFα, monocyte chemotactic protein-1 (MCP-1)), acute-phase proteins C-reactive protein (CRP) and serum amyloid-A (SAA), cellular adhesion molecules and blood lipids, glucose and insulin. Following both high-fat test meals, postprandial TAG concentrations rose steadily (P < 0·05) without a decrease by 6 h. The incremental AUC (iAUC) for CRP was significantly lower (P < 0·05) in response to the cheese compared with the vegan-alternative test meal. A treatment effect was not observed for any other inflammatory markers; however, for both test meals, multiple markers significantly changed from baseline over the 6 h postprandial period (IL-6, IL-8, IL-18, TNFα, MCP-1, SAA). Saturated fat in the form of a cheese matrix reduced the iAUC for CRP compared with a vegan-alternative test meal during the postprandial 6 h period. The study is registered at clinicaltrials.gov under NCT01803633

Record disclosure in adoption.

Paper copy at Leddy Library: Theses & Major Papers - Basement, West Bldg. / Call Number: Thesis1977 .G478. Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 40-07, page: . Thesis (M.S.W.)--University of Windsor (Canada), 1977

Evaluating annotations of an Agilent expression chip suggests that many features cannot be interpreted

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>While attempting to reanalyze published data from Agilent 4 × 44 human expression chips, we found that some of the 60-mer olignucleotide features could not be interpreted as representing single human genes. For example, some of the oligonucleotides align with the transcripts of more than one gene. We decided to check the annotations for all autosomes and the X chromosome systematically using bioinformatics methods.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Out of 42683 reporters, we found that 25505 (60%) passed all our tests and are considered "fully valid". 9964 (23%) reporters did not have a meaningful identifier, mapped to the wrong chromosome, or did not pass basic alignment tests preventing us from correlating the expression values of these reporters with a unique annotated human gene. The remaining 7214 (17%) reporters could be associated with either a unique gene or a unique intergenic location, but could not be mapped to a transcript in RefSeq. The 7214 reporters are further partitioned into three different levels of validity.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Expression array studies should evaluate the annotations of reporters and remove those reporters that have suspect annotations. This evaluation can be done systematically and semi-automatically, but one must recognize that data sources are frequently updated leading to slightly changing validation results over time.</p

Why growth equals power - and why it shouldn't : constructing visions of China

When discussing the success of China's transition from socialism, there is a tendency to focus on growth figures as an indication of performance. Whilst these figures are indeed impressive, we should not confuse growth with development and assume that the former necessarily automatically generates the latter. Much has been done to reduce poverty in China, but the task is not as complete as some observers would suggest; particularly in terms of access to health, education and welfare, and also in dealing with relative (rather than absolute) depravation and poverty. Visions of China have been constructed that exaggerate Chinese development and power in the global system partly to serve political interests, but partly due to the failure to consider the relationship between growth and development, partly due to the failure to disaggregate who gets what in China, and partly due to the persistence of inter-national conceptions of globalised production, trade, and financial flows

HIPAD - A Hybrid Interior-Point Alternating Direction algorithm for knowledge-based SVM and feature selection

We consider classification tasks in the regime of scarce labeled training data in high dimensional feature space, where specific expert knowledge is also available. We propose a new hybrid optimization algorithm that solves the elastic-net support vector machine (SVM) through an alternating direction method of multipliers in the first phase, followed by an interior-point method for the classical SVM in the second phase. Both SVM formulations are adapted to knowledge incorporation. Our proposed algorithm addresses the challenges of automatic feature selection, high optimization accuracy, and algorithmic flexibility for taking advantage of prior knowledge. We demonstrate the effectiveness and efficiency of our algorithm and compare it with existing methods on a collection of synthetic and real-world data.Comment: Proceedings of 8th Learning and Intelligent OptimizatioN (LION8) Conference, 201

Immunocompromised Children with Severe Adenoviral Respiratory Infection

Purpose. To investigate the impact of severe respiratory adenoviral infection on morbidity and case fatality in immunocompromised children. Methods. Combined retrospective-prospective cohort study of patients admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) in four children’s hospitals with severe adenoviral respiratory infection and an immunocompromised state between August 2009 and October 2013. We performed a secondary case control analysis, matching our cohort 1 : 1 by age and severity of illness score with immunocompetent patients also with severe respiratory adenoviral infection. Results. Nineteen immunocompromised patients were included in our analysis. Eleven patients (58%) did not survive to hospital discharge. Case fatality was associated with cause of immunocompromised state (p=0.015), multiple organ dysfunction syndrome (p=0.001), requirement of renal replacement therapy (p=0.01), ICU admission severity of illness score (p=0.011), and treatment with cidofovir (p=0.005). Immunocompromised patients were more likely than matched controls to have multiple organ dysfunction syndrome (p=0.01), require renal replacement therapy (p=0.02), and not survive to hospital discharge (p=0.004). One year after infection, 43% of immunocompromised survivors required chronic mechanical ventilator support. Conclusions. There is substantial case fatality as well as short- and long-term morbidity associated with severe adenoviral respiratory infection in immunocompromised children

Create a translational medicine knowledge repository - Research downsizing, mergers and increased outsourcing have reduced the depth of in-house translational medicine expertise and institutional memory at many pharmaceutical and biotech companies: how will they avoid relearning old lessons?

Pharmaceutical industry consolidation and overall research downsizing threatens the ability of companies to benefit from their previous investments in translational research as key leaders with the most knowledge of the successful use of biomarkers and translational pharmacology models are laid off or accept their severance packages. Two recently published books may help to preserve this type of knowledge but much of this type of information is not in the public domain. Here we propose the creation of a translational medicine knowledge repository where companies can submit their translational research data and access similar data from other companies in a precompetitive environment. This searchable repository would become an invaluable resource for translational scientists and drug developers that could speed and reduce the cost of new drug development

Monoallelic deletion of the microRNA biogenesis gene Dgcr8 produces deficits in the development of excitatory synaptic transmission in the prefrontal cortex

Abstract Background Neuronal phenotypes associated with hemizygosity of individual genes within the 22q11.2 deletion syndrome locus hold potential towards understanding the pathogenesis of schizophrenia and autism. Included among these genes is Dgcr8, which encodes an RNA-binding protein required for microRNA biogenesis. Dgcr8 haploinsufficient mice (Dgcr8+/-) have reduced expression of microRNAs in brain and display cognitive deficits, but how microRNA deficiency affects the development and function of neurons in the cerebral cortex is not fully understood. Results In this study, we show that Dgcr8+/- mice display reduced expression of a subset of microRNAs in the prefrontal cortex, a deficit that emerges over postnatal development. Layer V pyramidal neurons in the medial prefrontal cortex of Dgcr8+/- mice have altered electrical properties, decreased complexity of basal dendrites, and reduced excitatory synaptic transmission. Conclusions These findings demonstrate that precise microRNA expression is critical for the postnatal development of prefrontal cortical circuitry. Similar defects in neuronal maturation resulting from microRNA deficiency could represent endophenotypes of certain neuropsychiatric diseases of developmental onset