Trial protocol OPPTIMUM : does progesterone prophylaxis for the prevention of preterm labour improve outcome?

Background Preterm birth is a global problem, with a prevalence of 8 to 12% depending on location. Several large trials and systematic reviews have shown progestogens to be effective in preventing or delaying preterm birth in selected high risk women with a singleton pregnancy (including those with a short cervix or previous preterm birth). Although an improvement in short term neonatal outcomes has been shown in some trials these have not consistently been confirmed in meta-analyses. Additionally data on longer term outcomes is limited to a single trial where no difference in outcomes was demonstrated at four years of age of the child, despite those in the “progesterone” group having a lower incidence of preterm birth. Methods/Design The OPPTIMUM study is a double blind randomized placebo controlled trial to determine whether progesterone prophylaxis to prevent preterm birth has long term neonatal or infant benefit. Specifically it will study whether, in women with singleton pregnancy and at high risk of preterm labour, prophylactic vaginal natural progesterone, 200 mg daily from 22 – 34 weeks gestation, compared to placebo, improves obstetric outcome by lengthening pregnancy thus reducing the incidence of preterm delivery (before 34 weeks), improves neonatal outcome by reducing a composite of death and major morbidity, and leads to improved childhood cognitive and neurosensory outcomes at two years of age. Recruitment began in 2009 and is scheduled to close in Spring 2013. As of May 2012, over 800 women had been randomized in 60 sites. Discussion OPPTIMUM will provide further evidence on the effectiveness of vaginal progesterone for prevention of preterm birth and improvement of neonatal outcomes in selected groups of women with singleton pregnancy at high risk of preterm birth. Additionally it will determine whether any reduction in the incidence of preterm birth is accompanied by improved childhood outcome

Management Impacts on Forest Floor and Soil Organic Carbon in Northern Temperate Forests of the US

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The role of forests in the global carbon cycle has been the subject of a great deal of research recently, but the impact of management practices on forest soil dynamics at the stand level has received less attention. This study used six forest management experimental sites in five northern states of the US to investigate the effects of silvicultural treatments (light thinning, heavy thinning, and clearcutting) on forest floor and soil carbon pools.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>No overall trend was found between forest floor carbon stocks in stands subjected to partial or complete harvest treatments. A few sites had larger stocks in control plots, although estimates were often highly variable. Forest floor carbon pools did show a trend of increasing values from southern to northern sites. Surface soil (0-5 cm) organic carbon content and concentration were similar between treated and untreated plots. Overall soil carbon (0-20 cm) pool size was not significantly different from control values in sites treated with partial or complete harvests. No geographic trends were evident for any of the soil properties examined.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Results indicate that it is unlikely that mineral soil carbon stocks are adversely affected by typical management practices as applied in northern hardwood forests in the US; however, the findings suggest that the forest floor carbon pool may be susceptible to loss.</p

Socio-demographic factors and edentulism: the Nigerian experience

BACKGROUND: The rate of total edentulism is said to be increasing in developing countries and this had been attributed mainly to the high prevalence of periodontal diseases and caries. Several reports have shown that non-disease factors such as attitude, behavior, dental attendance, characteristics of health care systems and socio-demographic factors play important roles in the aetiopathogenesis of edentulism. The aim of this study was to assess the relationship between socio-demographic factors and edentulism. METHODS: A total of 152 patients made up of 80 (52.6%) males and 72 (47.4%) females who presented in two prosthetic clinics located in an urban and a rural area were included in the study. The relationship between gender, age, socio-economic status and edentulism in this study population was established. RESULTS: No significant relationship between gender and denture demand was noted in the study. The demand for complete dentures increased with age while the demand for removable partial dentures also increased with age until the 3(rd )decade and then started to decline. A significant relationship was found between denture demand and the level of education with a higher demand in lower educational groups (p < 0.001). In addition, the lower socio-economic group had a higher demand more for prostheses than the higher group. CONCLUSIONS: The findings in this study revealed a significant relationship between socio-demographic variables and edentulism with age, educational level and socio-economic status playing vital roles in edentulism and denture demand

Baltic Salmon, Salmo salar, from Swedish River Lule Älv Is More Resistant to Furunculosis Compared to Rainbow Trout

BACKGROUND: Furunculosis, caused by Aeromonas salmonicida, continues to be a major health problem for the growing salmonid aquaculture. Despite effective vaccination programs regular outbreaks occur at the fish farms calling for repeated antibiotic treatment. We hypothesized that a difference in natural susceptibility to this disease might exist between Baltic salmon and the widely used rainbow trout. STUDY DESIGN: A cohabitation challenge model was applied to investigate the relative susceptibility to infection with A. salmonicida in rainbow trout and Baltic salmon. The course of infection was monitored daily over a 30-day period post challenge and the results were summarized in mortality curves. RESULTS: A. salmonicida was recovered from mortalities during the entire test period. At day 30 the survival was 6.2% and 34.0% for rainbow trout and Baltic salmon, respectively. Significant differences in susceptibility to A. salmonicida were demonstrated between the two salmonids and hazard ratio estimation between rainbow trout and Baltic salmon showed a 3.36 higher risk of dying from the infection in the former. CONCLUSION: The finding that Baltic salmon carries a high level of natural resistance to furunculosis might raise new possibilities for salmonid aquaculture in terms of minimizing disease outbreaks and the use of antibiotics

Production of phi mesons at mid-rapidity in sqrt(s_NN) = 200 GeV Au+Au collisions at RHIC

We present the first results of meson production in the K^+K^- decay channel from Au+Au collisions at sqrt(s_NN) = 200 GeV as measured at mid-rapidity by the PHENIX detector at RHIC. Precision resonance centroid and width values are extracted as a function of collision centrality. No significant variation from the PDG accepted values is observed. The transverse mass spectra are fitted with a linear exponential function for which the derived inverse slope parameter is seen to be constant as a function of centrality. These data are also fitted by a hydrodynamic model with the result that the freeze-out temperature and the expansion velocity values are consistent with the values previously derived from fitting single hadron inclusive data. As a function of transverse momentum the collisions scaled peripheral.to.central yield ratio RCP for the is comparable to that of pions rather than that of protons. This result lends support to theoretical models which distinguish between baryons and mesons instead of particle mass for explaining the anomalous proton yield.Comment: 326 authors, 24 pages text, 23 figures, 6 tables, RevTeX 4. To be submitted to Physical Review C as a regular article. Plain text data tables for the points plotted in figures for this and previous PHENIX publications are (or will be) publicly available at http://www.phenix.bnl.gov/papers.htm

Rapid Assembly of Multiple-Exon cDNA Directly from Genomic DNA

Backgrouud. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is extensively applied in gene cloning. But due to the existence of introns, low copy number of particular genes and high complexity of the eukaryotic genome, it is usually impossible to amplify and clone a gene as a full-length sequence directly from the genome by ordinary PCR based techniques. Cloning of cDNA instead of genomic DNA involves multiple steps: harvest of tissues that express the gene of interest, RNA isolation, cDNA synthesis (reverse transcription), and PCR amplification. To simplify the cloning procedures and avoid the problems caused by ubiquitously distributed durable RNases, we have developed a novel strategy allowing the cloning of any cDNA or open reading frame (ORF) with wild type sequence in any spliced form from a single genomic DNA preparation. Methodology. Our Genomic DNA Splicing technique contains the following steps: first, all exons of the gene are amplified from a genomic DNA preparation, using software-optimized, highly efficient primers residing in flanking introns. Next, the tissue-specific exon sequences are assembled into one full-length sequence by overlapping PCR with deliberately designed primers located at the splicing sites. Finally, software-optimized outmost primers are exploited for efficient amplification of the assembled full-length products. Conclusions. The Genomic DNA Splicing protocol avoids RNA preparation and reverse transcription steps, and the entire assembly process can be finished within hours, Since genamic DNA is more stable than RNA, it may be a more practical cloning strategy for many genes, especially the ones that are very large and difficult to generate a full length cDNA using oligo-dT primed reverse transcription. With this technique, we successfully doned the full-length wild type coding sequence of human polymeric immunoglobulin receptor, which is 2295 bp in length and composed of 10 exons. © 2007 An et al.published_or_final_versio

Win-stay, lose-switch and public information strategies for patch fidelity of songbirds with rare extra-pair paternity

Determining where organisms breed and understanding why they breed in particular locations are fundamental biological questions with conservation implications. Breeding-site fidelity is common in migratory, territorial songbirds and is typically thought to occur following reproductive success with a social mate and success of nearby conspecifics. It is currently unknown if frequency of extra-pair paternity in a population influences use of information about reproductive success of nearby conspecifics for site fidelity decisions. We investigated patch fidelity of white-eyed vireos (Vireo griseus) based on reproductive success and quantified frequency of extra-pair paternity. We found support only for females making patch fidelity decisions following reproductive success with a social mate. Patch fidelity of males was not associated with reproductive success of nearby conspecifics, suggesting males may not use this information when extra-pair paternity is infrequent or the association is non-existent in this species

Evaluating the Effects of Cutoffs and Treatment of Long-range Electrostatics in Protein Folding Simulations

The use of molecular dynamics simulations to provide atomic-level descriptions of biological processes tends to be computationally demanding, and a number of approximations are thus commonly employed to improve computational efficiency. In the past, the effect of these approximations on macromolecular structure and stability has been evaluated mostly through quantitative studies of small-molecule systems or qualitative observations of short-timescale simulations of biological macromolecules. Here we present a quantitative evaluation of two commonly employed approximations, using a test system that has been the subject of a number of previous protein folding studies–the villin headpiece. In particular, we examined the effect of (i) the use of a cutoff-based force-shifting technique rather than an Ewald summation for the treatment of electrostatic interactions, and (ii) the length of the cutoff used to determine how many pairwise interactions are included in the calculation of both electrostatic and van der Waals forces. Our results show that the free energy of folding is relatively insensitive to the choice of cutoff beyond 9 Å, and to whether an Ewald method is used to account for long-range electrostatic interactions. In contrast, we find that the structural properties of the unfolded state depend more strongly on the two approximations examined here

Reading comprehension in autism spectrum disorders: The role of oral language and social functioning

Reading comprehension is an area of difficulty for many individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). According to the Simple View of Reading, word recognition and oral language are both important determinants of reading comprehension ability. We provide a novel test of this model in 100 adolescents with ASD of varying intellectual ability. Further, we explore whether reading comprehension is additionally influenced by individual differences in social behaviour and social cognition in ASD. Adolescents with ASD aged 14-16 years completed assessments indexing word recognition, oral language, reading comprehension, social behaviour and social cognition. Regression analyses show that both word recognition and oral language explain unique variance in reading comprehension. Further, measures of social behaviour and social cognition predict reading comprehension after controlling for the variance explained by word recognition and oral language. This indicates that word recognition, oral language and social impairments may constrain reading comprehension in ASD