Development and validation of a questionnaire to assess adherence to the healthy food pyramid in Spanish adults

We aimed to design and validate a new questionnaire of adherence to healthy food pyramid (HFP) (AP-Q), to improve previous instruments. The questionnaire was self-administered and included 28 questions from 10 categories (physical activity, health habits, hydration, grains, fruits, vegetables, oil type, dairy products, animal proteins, and snacks). A population of 130 Spanish adults answered it, obtaining scores from each category and a global score of HFP adherence (AP-Q score). Validation was performed through principal components analysis (PCA) and internal consistency by Cronbach’s alpha. AP-Q was also externally validated with Kidmed-test, answered by 45 individuals from the cohort. The global AP-Q score was 5.1 1.3, with an internal consistency of 64%. The PCA analysis extracted seven principal components, which explained 68.5% of the variance. The global AP-Q score was positively associated with Kidmed-test score. Our data suggest that AP-Q is a complete and robust questionnaire to assess HFP adherence, with several advantages: easy to complete, cost-e ective, timesaving and has the competency to assess, besides diet, several features a ecting health status, lacking in other instruments. We suggest that AP-Q could be useful in epidemiological research, although it requires additional calibration to analyze its reproducibility and validation in other populationsFinanced by Universidad Autónoma de Madrid-Khon Kaen University (KKU: 0514.7.I.12-1948

The diplomat's dilemma: Maximal power for minimal effort in social networks

Closeness is a global measure of centrality in networks, and a proxy for how influential actors are in social networks. In most network models, and many empirical networks, closeness is strongly correlated with degree. However, in social networks there is a cost of maintaining social ties. This leads to a situation (that can occur in the professional social networks of executives, lobbyists, diplomats and so on) where agents have the conflicting objectives of aiming for centrality while simultaneously keeping the degree low. We investigate this situation in an adaptive network-evolution model where agents optimize their positions in the network following individual strategies, and using only local information. The strategies are also optimized, based on the success of the agent and its neighbors. We measure and describe the time evolution of the network and the agents' strategies.Comment: Submitted to Adaptive Networks: Theory, Models and Applications, to be published from Springe

Comparable endocrine and neuromuscular adaptations to variable vs. constant gravity-dependent resistance training among young women.

BACKGROUND:Variable resistance has been shown to induce greater total work and muscle activation when compared to constant resistance. However, little is known regarding the effects of chronic exposure to variable resistance training in comparison with constant resistance training. The aim of the present study was therefore to examine the effects of chain-loaded variable and constant gravity-dependent resistance training on resting hormonal and neuromuscular adaptations. METHODS:Young women were randomly assigned to variable resistance training (VRT; n = 12; age, 23.75 ± 3.64 years; and BMI, 26.80 ± 4.21 kg m-2), constant resistance training (CRT; n = 12; age, 23.58 ± 3.84 years; BMI, 25.25 ± 3.84 kg m-2), or control (Con; n = 12; age, 23.50 ± 2.93 years; BMI, 27.12 ± 12 kg m-2) groups. CRT performed 8-week total-body free-weight training three times per week with moderate-to-high intensity (65-80% 1RM; periodized). VRT was the same as CRT but included variable resistance via chains (15% of total load). Resting serum samples were taken before and after the 8-week intervention for GH, IGF-1, cortisol, myostatin, and follistatin analyses. RESULTS:Both VRT and CRT groups displayed moderate-to-large significant increases in GH (197.1%; ES = 0.78 vs. 229.9%; ES = 1.55), IGF-1 (82.3%; ES = 1.87 vs. 66%; ES = 1.66), and follistatin (58.8%; ES = 0.80 vs. 49.15%; ES = 0.80) and decreases in cortisol (- 19.9%; ES = - 1.34 vs. - 17.1%; ES = - 1.05) and myostatin (- 26.9%; ES = - 0.78 vs. - 23.2%; ES = - 0.82). Also, VRT and CRT resulted in large significant increases in bench press (30.54%; ES = 1.45 vs. 25.08%; ES = 1.12) and squat (30.63%; ES = 1.28 vs. 24.81%; ES = 1.21) strength, with no differences between groups. CONCLUSIONS:Implementing chain-loaded VRT into a periodized resistance training program can be an effective alternative to constant loading during free-weight RT among untrained young women

Self-supervised Blur Detection from Synthetically Blurred Scenes

Blur detection aims at segmenting the blurred areas of a given image. Recent deep learning-based methods approach this problem by learning an end-to-end mapping between the blurred input and a binary mask representing the localization of its blurred areas. Nevertheless, the effectiveness of such deep models is limited due to the scarcity of datasets annotated in terms of blur segmentation, as blur annotation is labour intensive. In this work, we bypass the need for such annotated datasets for end-to-end learning, and instead rely on object proposals and a model for blur generation in order to produce a dataset of synthetically blurred images. This allows us to perform self-supervised learning over the generated image and ground truth blur mask pairs using CNNs, defining a framework that can be employed in purely self-supervised, weakly supervised or semi-supervised configurations. Interestingly, experimental results of such setups over the largest blur segmentation datasets available show that this approach achieves state of the art results in blur segmentation, even without ever observing any real blurred image.This research was partially funded by the Basque Government’s Industry Department under the ELKARTEK program’s project ONKOIKER under agreement KK2018/00090. We thank the Spanish project TIN2016- 79717-R and mention Generalitat de Catalunya CERCA Program

Prader-Willi syndrome: A primer for clinicians

The advent of sensitive genetic testing modalities for the diagnosis of Prader-Willi syndrome has helped to define not only the phenotypic features of the syndrome associated with the various genotypes but also to anticipate clinical and psychological problems that occur at each stage during the life span. With advances in hormone replacement therapy, particularly growth hormone children born in circumstances where therapy is available are expected to have an improved quality of life as compared to those born prior to growth hormone

Fluorogenic Substrates for In Situ Monitoring of Caspase-3 Activity in Live Cells

The in situ detection of caspase-3 activity has applications in the imaging and monitoring of multiple pathologies, notably cancer. A series of cell penetrating FRET-based fluorogenic substrates were designed and synthesised for the detection of caspase-3 in live cells. A variety of modifications of the classical caspase-3 and caspase-7 substrate sequence Asp-Glu-Val-Asp were carried out in order to increase caspase-3 affinity and eliminate caspase-7 cross-reactivity. To allow cellular uptake and good solubility, the substrates were conjugated to a cationic peptoid. The most selective fluorogenic substrate 27, FAM-Ahx-Asp-Leu-Pro-Asp-Lys(MR)-Ahx, conjugated to the cell penetrating peptoid at the C-terminus, was able to detect and quantify caspase-3 activity in apoptotic cells without cross-reactivity by caspase-7.This work was supported by the Ramon Areces and Caja Madrid Foundations to AMPL and Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness to MLSG (graduate student fellowships FPI BES-2010-030257 and EEBB-I-13-07131)

Development and Validation of a Questionnaire to Assess Adherence to the Healthy Food Pyramid in Spanish Adults

We aimed to design and validate a new questionnaire of adherence to healthy food pyramid (HFP) (AP-Q), to improve previous instruments. The questionnaire was self-administered and included 28 questions from 10 categories (physical activity, health habits, hydration, grains, fruits, vegetables, oil type, dairy products, animal proteins, and snacks). A population of 130 Spanish adults answered it, obtaining scores from each category and a global score of HFP adherence (AP-Q score). Validation was performed through principal components analysis (PCA) and internal consistency by Cronbach’s alpha. AP-Q was also externally validated with Kidmed-test, answered by 45 individuals from the cohort. The global AP-Q score was 5.1 ± 1.3, with an internal consistency of 64%. The PCA analysis extracted seven principal components, which explained 68.5% of the variance. The global AP-Q score was positively associated with Kidmed-test score. Our data suggest that AP-Q is a complete and robust questionnaire to assess HFP adherence, with several advantages: easy to complete, cost-effective, timesaving and has the competency to assess, besides diet, several features affecting health status, lacking in other instruments. We suggest that AP-Q could be useful in epidemiological research, although it requires additional calibration to analyze its reproducibility and validation in other populations

Silver nanoparticles for the inhibition of Staphylococcus aureus

Existe un gran ecosistema microbiano en la cavidad oral donde Staphylococcus aureus ( S. aureus ) se puede encontrar, causando patologías orales tales como quelitis angular, las paperas y la mucositis estafilocócica. Estas enfermedades producidas por S. aureus en la cavidad oral son consecuencia de los factores de virulencia, toxinas y multiresistencia a los antibióticos, lo que contribuye a la infección. La colonización en la cavidad oral por S. aureus en pacientes sanos es de 24% a 36%. Sin embargo, la incidencia aumenta a 48% en pacientes con prótesis debido a la formación de biofilms en la superficie de las dentaduras postizas. Actualmente, no existe ningún tratamiento para infecciones orales sin el uso de antibióticos. Investigaciones recientes indican que las nanopartículas de plata (AgNPs) son un material o estrategia para eliminar S. aureus debido a su efecto antibacteriano. Sin embargo, el mecanismo del efecto inhibidor de los iones de Ag sobre S. aureus es sólo parcialmente conocida y muy poco se ha informado. Por lo tanto, el propósito de la presente revisión sistemática es determinar las estrategias y retos de la utilización de biomateriales antimicrobianos con AgNPs frente a las infecciones orales de S. aureus