Prevalence and determinants of obesity among school going adolescents: A systematic review

Adolescence is considered as critical period for the development of obesity. The frequency of childhood obesity has increased over the last 3 decades, and it has emerged as a public health concern in multiple places around the world. A number of factors interact in a complex way to cause obesity, which is still not fully understood. Therefore, the purpose of this review was to identify and assess the scientific literature on the prevalence of obesity, and behavioural, contextual and biological factors associated with obesity in adolescents. The search was carried out using PubMed, Web of Science, Embase and Scopus considering articles published from the establishment of the databanks until December, 2022. Data on the prevalence of overweight and obesity among children and adolescents, and articles on the determinants and factors affecting obesity were reviewed. The results obtained and the association observed among the factors studied will be helpful to support the planning, implementation and evaluation of preventive activities and interventions

The Brodmann Area 39/40 of the Brain in Alzheimer’s, Mild Cognitive Impairment, and No Cognitive Impairment Subjects at Advanced Age Demonstrate Comparable Levels of Blood-Brain Barrier Breach

• Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is one of the most common form of dementia • Mild cognitive impairment (MCI), specifically amnestic subtype, more likely to progress to AD • Pathogenesis Theories: o Accumulation of amyloid-beta peptides and neurofibrillary tangles containing hyperphosphorylated neuronal tau protein o Blood Brain Barrier (BBB) dysfunction is associated with AD pathogenesis • Brodmann area 39/40: regions of parietal cortex are responsible for language, spatial cognition, memory retrieval, attention, phonological processing, and emotional processing • Hypothesis: An increased BBB permeability in Brodmann area 39/40 of AD and age-matched MCI and no cognitive impairment (NCI) subject

Potential biological role of poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) in male gametes

Maintaining the integrity of sperm DNA is vital to reproduction and male fertility. Sperm contain a number of molecules and pathways for the repair of base excision, base mismatches and DNA strand breaks. The presence of Poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP), a DNA repair enzyme, and its homologues has recently been shown in male germ cells, specifically during stage VII of spermatogenesis. High PARP expression has been reported in mature spermatozoa and in proven fertile men. Whenever there are strand breaks in sperm DNA due to oxidative stress, chromatin remodeling or cell death, PARP is activated. However, the cleavage of PARP by caspase-3 inactivates it and inhibits PARP's DNA-repairing abilities. Therefore, cleaved PARP (cPARP) may be considered a marker of apoptosis. The presence of higher levels of cPARP in sperm of infertile men adds a new proof for the correlation between apoptosis and male infertility. This review describes the possible biological significance of PARP in mammalian cells with the focus on male reproduction. The review elaborates on the role played by PARP during spermatogenesis, sperm maturation in ejaculated spermatozoa and the potential role of PARP as new marker of sperm damage. PARP could provide new strategies to preserve fertility in cancer patients subjected to genotoxic stresses and may be a key to better male reproductive health

Cultivation-independent comprehensive survey of bacterial diversity in Tulsi Shyam Hot Springs, India

A taxonomic description of bacteria was deduced from 5.78 Mb metagenomic sequence retrieved from Tulsi Shyam hot spring, India using bacterial tag-encoded FLX amplicon pyrosequencing (bTEFAP). Metagenome contained 10,893 16S rDNA sequences that were analyzed by MG-RAST server to generate the comprehensive profile of bacteria. Metagenomic data are available at EBI under EBI Metagenomics database with accession no. ERP009559. Metagenome sequences represented the 98.2% bacteria origin, 1.5% of eukaryotic and 0.3% were unidentified. A total of 16 bacterial phyla demonstrating 97 families and 287 species were revealed in the hot spring metagenome. Most abundant phyla were Firmicutes (65.38%), Proteobacteria (21.21%) and unclassified bacteria (10.69%). Whereas, Peptostreptococcaceae (37.33%), Clostridiaceae (23.36%), and Enterobacteriaceae (16.37%) were highest reported families in metagenome. Ubiquitous species were Clostridium bifermentans (17.47%), Clostridium lituseburense (13.93%) and uncultured bacterium (10.15%). Our data provide new information on hot spring bacteria and shed light on their abundance, diversity, distribution and coexisting organisms

Slow and ultrarapid cryopreservation of biopsied mouse blastocysts and its effect on DNA integrity index

Abstract Purpose To evaluate the effect of slow and ultra-rapid freezing on biopsied blastocysts' DNA integrity. Methods Forty eight mouse blastocysts were biopsied of which 16 were cryopreserved by slowly freezing and 17 by vitrification. Fourteen intact blastocysts were slowly cryopreserved and 24 were vitrified. Eighteen fresh intact blastocysts and fifteen biopsied blastocysts served as controls. The DNA integrity index of all blastocysts was evaluated using (TUNEL) staining and confocal imaging Results Both slow freezing and vitrification of biopsied blastocysts induced apoptosis to a similar extent. Biopsying blastocysts before vitrification resulted in less apoptosis than vitrification of intact blastocysts. Conclusion Slow freezing and vitrification are equal options for preservation of biopsied blastocysts as regards the DNA integrity index (DII). Biopsied blastocysts better tolerate vitrification than intact expanded blastocysts

Shotgun metagenomic sequencing based microbial diversity assessment of Lasundra hot spring, India

This is the first report on the metagenomic approach for unveiling the microbial diversity of Lasundra hot spring, Gujarat State, India. High-throughput sequencing of community DNA was performed on an Ion Torrent PGM platform. Metagenome consisted of 606,867 sequences represent 98,567,305 bps size with an average length of 162 bps and 46% G + C content. Metagenome sequence information is available at EBI under EBI Metagenomic database with accession no. ERP009313. MG-RAST assisted community analysis revealed that 99.21% sequences were bacterial origin, 0.43% was fit to eukaryotes and 0.11% belongs to archaea. A total of 29 bacterial, 20 eukaryotic and 4 archaeal phyla were detected. Abundant genera were Bacillus (86.7%), Geobacillus (2.4%), Paenibacillus (1.0%), Clostridium (0.7%) and Listeria (0.5%), that represent 91.52% in metagenome. In functional analysis, Cluster of Orthologous Group (COG) based annotation revealed that 45.4% was metabolism connected and 19.6% falls in poorly characterized group. Subsystem based annotation approach suggests that the 14.0% was carbohydrates, 7.0% was protein metabolism and 3.0% genes for various stress responses together with the versatile presence of commercially useful traits