Prevalence and Determinants of Obesity among Primary School Children in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

Childhood obesity has increased dramatically and has become a public health concern worldwide. Childhood obesity is likely to persist through adulthood and may lead to early onset of NCDs. However, there is paucity of data on obesity among primary school children in Tanzania. This study assessed the prevalence and determinants of obesity among primary school children in Dar es Salaam. A cross sectional study was conducted among school age children in randomly selected schools in Dar es Salaam. Anthropometric and blood pressure measurements were taken using standard procedures. Body Mass Index (BMI) was calculated as weight in kilograms divided by the square of height in meters (kg/m2). Child obesity was defined as BMI at or above 95th percentile for age and sex. Socio-demographic characteristics of children were determined using a structured questionnaire. Logistic regression was used to determine association between independent variables with obesity among primary school children in Dar es Salaam. A total of 446 children were included in the analysis. The mean age of the participants was 11.1±2.0 years and 53.1% were girls. The mean BMI, SBP and DBP were 16.6±4.0 kg/m2, 103.9±10.3mmHg and 65.6±8.2mmHg respectively. The overall prevalence of child obesity was 5.2% and was higher among girls (6.3%) compared to boys (3.8%). Obese children had significantly higher mean values for age (p=0.042), systolic and diastolic blood pressures (all p<0.001). Most obese children were from households with fewer children (p=0.019) and residing in urban areas (p=0.002). Controlling for other variables, age above 10 years (AOR=3.3, 95% CI=1.5-7.2), female sex (AOR=2.6, 95% CI=1.4-4.9), urban residence (AOR=2.5, 95% CI=1.2-5.3) and having money to spend at school (AOR=2.6, 95% CI=1.4-4.8) were significantly associated with child obesity. The prevalence of childhood obesity in this population was found to be low. However, children from urban schools and girls were proportionately more obese compared to their counterparts. Primary preventive measures for childhood obesity should start early in childhood and address socioeconomic factors of parents contributing to childhood obesity

Quantifying Efficiency Loss of Perovskite Solar Cells by a Modified Detailed Balance Model

A modified detailed balance model is built to understand and quantify efficiency loss of perovskite solar cells. The modified model captures the light-absorption dependent short-circuit current, contact and transport-layer modified carrier transport, as well as recombination and photon-recycling influenced open-circuit voltage. Our theoretical and experimental results show that for experimentally optimized perovskite solar cells with the power conversion efficiency of 19%, optical loss of 25%, non-radiative recombination loss of 35%, and ohmic loss of 35% are the three dominant loss factors for approaching the 31% efficiency limit of perovskite solar cells. We also find that the optical loss will climb up to 40% for a thin-active-layer design. Moreover, a misconfigured transport layer will introduce above 15% of energy loss. Finally, the perovskite-interface induced surface recombination, ohmic loss, and current leakage should be further reduced to upgrade device efficiency and eliminate hysteresis effect. The work contributes to fundamental understanding of device physics of perovskite solar cells. The developed model offers a systematic design and analysis tool to photovoltaic science and technology.Comment: 21 pages, 9 figures, 3 table

Janus monolayers of transition metal dichalcogenides.

Structural symmetry-breaking plays a crucial role in determining the electronic band structures of two-dimensional materials. Tremendous efforts have been devoted to breaking the in-plane symmetry of graphene with electric fields on AB-stacked bilayers or stacked van der Waals heterostructures. In contrast, transition metal dichalcogenide monolayers are semiconductors with intrinsic in-plane asymmetry, leading to direct electronic bandgaps, distinctive optical properties and great potential in optoelectronics. Apart from their in-plane inversion asymmetry, an additional degree of freedom allowing spin manipulation can be induced by breaking the out-of-plane mirror symmetry with external electric fields or, as theoretically proposed, with an asymmetric out-of-plane structural configuration. Here, we report a synthetic strategy to grow Janus monolayers of transition metal dichalcogenides breaking the out-of-plane structural symmetry. In particular, based on a MoS2 monolayer, we fully replace the top-layer S with Se atoms. We confirm the Janus structure of MoSSe directly by means of scanning transmission electron microscopy and energy-dependent X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, and prove the existence of vertical dipoles by second harmonic generation and piezoresponse force microscopy measurements

Large-scale and rapid synthesis of disk-shaped and nano-sized graphene

We synthesized disk-shaped and nano-sized graphene (DSNG) though a novel ion-exchange methodology. This new methodology is achieved by constructing metal ion/ion-exchange resin framework. The morphology and size of the graphene can be modulated by changing the mass ratio of the carbon-containing resin to the cobalt-containing precursor. This is the first time to show that the DSNG formed on the granular transition metal substrate. The DSNG gives a high intensity of photoluminescence at near-UV wavelength of 311 nm which may provide a new type of fluorescence for applications in laser devices, ultraviolet detector UV-shielding agent and energy technology. The emission intensity of the DSNG is thirty times higher than that of the commercial large graphene. Our approach for graphene growth is conveniently controllable, easy to scale-up and the DSNG shows superior luminescent properties as compared to conventional large graphene

Sigma-1 Receptor Inhibition Reduces Neuropathic Pain Induced by Partial Sciatic Nerve Transection in Mice by Opioid-Dependent and -Independent Mechanisms

Sigma-1 (σ1) receptor antagonists are promising tools for neuropathic pain treatment, but it is unknown whether σ1 receptor inhibition ameliorates the neuropathic signs induced by nerve transection, in which the pathophysiological mechanisms and response to drug treatment differ from other neuropathic pain models. In addition, σ1 antagonism ameliorates inflammatory pain through modulation of the endogenous opioid system, but it is unknown whether this occurs during neuropathic pain. We investigated the effect of σ1 inhibition on the painful hypersensitivity associated with the spared nerve injury (SNI) model in mice. Wildtype (WT) mice developed prominent cold (acetone test), mechanical (von Frey test), and heat hypersensitivity (Hargreaves test) after SNI. σ1 receptor knockout (σ1-KO) mice did not develop cold allodynia and showed significantly less mechanical allodynia, although they developed heat hyperalgesia after SNI.IB-C was supported by an FPU grant from the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture, and Sports. This study was partially supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO, grant SAF2016-80540-R), the Junta de Andalucía (grant CTS 109), and funding from Esteve and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). This research was done in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the doctoral thesis of IB-C