Sports pharmacology: A medical pharmacologist’s perspective

Abuse of substances or methods to enhance the performance is becoming very common in the sports, which often destroys the spirit of competition. The regulatory bodies for sports have reported rates ranging from 5% to 31% for the use of performance-enhancing substances among athletes. Athletes can have serious injuries and morbidities, leading to poor health with the use of such substances. Commonly abused agents in sports include anabolic–androgenic steroids and its analogs, blood, erythropoietin, growth hormone and its derivatives, nutritional supplements, creatine, amphetamines, beta-hydroxy-beta-methylbutyrate (HMB), stimulants, and analgesics. Health-care professionals need to be careful while prescribing medicines to sportspersons. Knowledge of exercise physiology, pharmacology of the commonly used agents for sports-related injuries, and agents used for doping could help the sportspersons and health-care professionals to avoid the embarrassment arising because of misuse of these agents. Sports pharmacology includes study of the various aspects of the drug use and abuse in sports and treatment of sports-related injuries. Focusing on sports pharmacology in the medical curriculum can help the upcoming health-care professionals to support the sportspersons to improve the quality of their life by using various drugs and other substances within the standardized limits and avoid embarrassment of doping

European scenario studies on future in-stream nutrient concentrations

Large-scale water quality issues have recently become the focus of policy and research. To gain insight into large-scale water quality issues, a scenario analysis was carried out for Europe using the continental water quality model WorldQual with total nitrogen and phosphorus as example pollutants. Future nitrogen and phosphorus loadings and instream concentrations were simulated for an “economy first” scenario and compared to contemporary conditions. Results indicate that future total nitrogen (TN) loadings are likely to decrease in most parts of central Europe by 5 to 25 kg ha-1 year-1 due to land-use change in the form of reduced cropland area as a result of technological changes, as well as improvements in land-use management based on higher efficiencies of application rates. Climate change has less impact on TN loadings, but an increase of future in-stream concentrations is accompanied by reduced river discharge. Future total phosphorus (TP) loadings are similar to contemporary loadings for all of Europe. In-stream TP concentrations do not change in northern and eastern Europe. In central Europe, concentrations increase little (by one class). In a few regions,such as northern Spain, very high changes (up to more than three classes) are apparent as a result of reduced river discharge

Effect of combination of Phyllanthus emblica, Tinospora cordifolia, and Ocimum sanctum on spatial learning and memory in rats

Background: There has been a steady rise in number of patients suffering from dementia including dementia associated with Alzheimer′s disease. Effective treatment of Alzheimer′s disease dementia is an unmet medical need. Objective: To evaluate effects of formulation containing combination of Phyllanthus emblica (Pe) and Tinospora cordifolia (Tc) with and without Ocimum sanctum (Os) on learning and memory performance of normal and memory impaired rats in complex maze and compare with effects of Tinospora cordifolia and Phyllanthus emblica alone. Materials and Methods: Wistar rats; either sex (100-150 g) were divided in seven groups Control, Piracetam, Rivastigmine, Tc, Pe, Formulation 1 (Tc + Pe), and Formulation 2 (Tc + Pe + Os).The study was divided in four parts: In part 1 memory enhancement was tested in normal rats. In part 2, 3, and 4 the effects of drugs were tested in Scopolamine-, Diazepam-, and Cyclosporine-induced amnesia. Hebb-Williams maze was used to test for learning and memory. Time required to trace food and number of errors in maze were noted. Results: In normal rats, all test drugs showed significant reduction in time required to trace the food and number of errors after 24 h compared with vehicle control. Formulations 1 and 2 reduced the time required to trace food and number of errors and the results were comparable with positive control groups and comparators Tc and Pe. Formulations 1 and 2 reversed amnesia produced by Scopolamine, Diazepam, and Cyclosporine when compared with vehicle control and showed comparable results with those of positive control groups and comparators Tc and Pe. Conclusion: Formulations 1 and 2 demonstrated nootropic activity and both the formulations showed comparable nootropic activity with that of Tc and Pe alone

Spatiotemporal analysis of lake chlorophyll-a with combined in situ and satellite data

We estimated chlorophyll-a (Chl-a) concentration using various combinations of routine sampling, automatic station measurements, and MERIS satellite images. Our study site was the northern part of the large, shallow, mesotrophic Lake Pyhäjärvi located in southwestern Finland. Various combinations of measurements were interpolated spatiotemporally using a data fusion system (DFS) based on an ensemble Kalman filter and smoother algorithms. The estimated concentrations together with corresponding 68% confidence intervals are presented as time series at routine sampling and automated stations, as maps and as mean values over the EU Water Framework Directive monitoring period, to evaluate the efficiency of various monitoring methods. The mean Chl-a calculated with DFS in June–September was 6.5–7.5 µg/l, depending on the observations used as input. At the routine monitoring station where grab samples were used, the average uncertainty (standard deviation, SD) decreased from 2.7 to 1.6 µg/l when EO data were also included in the estimation. At the automatic station, located 0.9 km from the routine monitoring site, the SD was 0.7 µg/l. The SD of spatial mean concentration decreased from 6.7 to 2.9 µg/l when satellite observations were included in June–September, in addition to in situ monitoring data. This demonstrates the high value of the information derived from satellite observations. The conclusion is that the confidence of Chl-a monitoring could be increased by deploying spatially extensive measurements in the form of satellite imaging or transects conducted with flow-through sensors installed on a boat and spatiotemporal interpolation of the multisource data

Data fusion system for monitoring water quality : Application to chlorophyll-a in Baltic sea coast

We present an operational system for multi-sensor data fusion implemented at the Finnish Environment Institute. The system uses Ensemble Kalman filter and smoother algorithms, which are often used for probabilistic analysis of multi-sensor data. Uncertainty and spatial and temporal correlations present in the available observation data are accounted for to obtain accurate and realistic results. To test the data fusion system, daily chlorophyll-a concentration has been modelled across northern shoreline of Gulf of Finland over the period of August 1st – October 31st 2011. Chlorophyll-a data from routine monitoring stations, ferrybox measurements, and data derived from Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS) instrument on board the ENVISAT satellite has been used as input. The data fusion system demonstrates the use of existing and well-known Ensemble Kalman filtering and smoothing methods for improving water quality monitoring programs and for ensuring compliance with ecological standards. Highlights • Operational data fusion system for coastal water quality monitoring was implemented. • Remote sensing and in-situ data sources are combined using ensemble Kalman smoother. • Result uncertainty is quantified to improve future data collection. • Simple process model captures relevant dynamics in presence of significant data gaps