Explorations, Vol. 4, No. 3

Articles include: Cover: Trophy: MooseHorn, from the Trophy Series, by Caellaigh B. Desrosiers. Editorial Reflections, by Carole J. Bombard North Cascade Glacier Climate Project, by Mauri Pelto Stained Glass Molecules, by Anne P. Sherblom Lobsters Inside-Out: A Guide to the Maine Lobster Community Forestry: UMaine Cooperative Extension Service, by Nancy E. Coverstone and William D. Lilley Where Are They Now? — Robert F. LaPrade, M.D. ’81 Little Critters with a Big Job: Ciliated Protozoa and the Gulf of Maine Food Chain, by Marcia Gauvin from a paper by Charles Gregory The Innovation of Tradition: Low-Cost, Low-Input Alternatives for Maine Farmers, by Marcia Gauvin Just What IS An Animal? Preschoolers Investigate Merging Two Cultures: Our Cover Artist, by Caellaigh Bennett Derosiers Freezing and Photosynthesis, by Steven R. Dudgeon, Ian R. Davison, and Robert L. Vada

The association of maternal-fetal attachment with smoking and smoking cessation during pregnancy in The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study

BackgroundSmoking in pregnancy constitutes a preventable risk factor for fetal/child development and maternal-fetal attachment (MFA) seems to contain a momentum that can break the chain of adverse outcomes by promoting maternal prenatal health practices. This study aimed to explore the association of MFA with smoking at any time during pregnancy and smoking cessation in early pregnancy, and the modifying role of MFA on the expected effects of education and prenatal psychological distress (PPD) on prenatal smoking behavior.MethodsThe pregnant women (n=3766) participated in the The FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study in Finland between December 2011 and April 2015. The binary outcomes, smoking at any time during pregnancy and smoking cessation in early pregnancy, were obtained from self-reports at gestational weeks (gwks) 14 and 34 and The Finnish Medical Birth Register. MFA was assessed with the Maternal-Fetal Attachment Scale (MFAS) at gwks 24 and 34. Logistic regression analyses were used to determine the association between MFA and maternal prenatal smoking behavior.FindingsThe prevalence of smoking was 16.5%, and 58.1% of the smokers quit smoking during pregnancy. The independent associations of total MFA scores with prenatal smoking behavior were not established (aOR=1.00-1.02, multiplicity adjusted p>0.05). A higher score in the altruistic subscale of MFA, Giving of self, associated with a higher probability of smoking cessation (24 gwks: aOR=1.13, 95% CI [1.04, 1.24], p=0.007, multiplicity adjusted p=0.062; 34 gwks: aOR=1.17, 95% CI [1.07, 1.29], p<0.001, multiplicity adjusted p=0.008). The modifying effect of MFA on the observed associations between PPD and smoking in pregnancy and between maternal education and smoking in pregnancy / smoking cessation in early pregnancy was not demonstrated. ConclusionsThe altruistic dimension of maternal-fetal attachment associates with an increased probability of smoking cessation during pregnancy and therefore strengthening altruistic maternal-fetal attachment may constitute a promising novel approach for interventions aiming at promoting smoking cessation during pregnancy

Prenatal maternal distress associates with a blunted cortisol response in rhinovirus-positive infants

Introduction: Prenatal exposure to maternal psychological distress (PD) may have programming effects on the fetus/infant hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis and subsequently on the development of the fetus’ immune function. Therefore, our aim was to study whether prenatal exposure to PD is related to early infant HPA axis reactivity in the context of a subclinical rhinovirus infection that challenges infants HPA axis postnatally.Methods: This study included 336 10-week-old infants from the nested case control Focus Cohort of the FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study. The outcome was infant HPA axis reactivity in a stress test. The acute stressor comprised of pediatric examination with venipuncture and nasal swabs for virus assessment. Saliva cortisol samples were collected at 5 time points: baseline, 0, 15, 25 and 35 min after the stressor. HPA axis reactivity was defined by the cumulative post-stressor cortisol concentration.Results: HPA axis reactivity was blunted in the PD/rhinovirus + group compared to the average of control/rhinovirus+, PD/rhinovirus-, and control/rhinovirus- groups (difference: 14.7 ln [nmol/L] × min, 95% confidence interval 3.8–25.6, p =  .008). HPA axis reactivity was significantly blunted only in boys with rhinovirus detected when separately tested for boys and girls (p =  .04).Conclusion: Our finding of PD-exposed rhinovirus-positive infants having blunted cortisol secretion gives rise to a hypothesis that maternal PD during pregnancy influences infant HPA axis functioning and the functioning of the immune system. Future studies are needed to test whether this suppression of the HPA axis that co-occurs with rhinovirus infection associates with later disease development (e.g., asthma).</p

The role of care in nutrition programmes: current research and a research agenda

The importance of cultural and behavioural factors in children's nutrition, particularly with regard to feeding, has been recognized only recently. The combination of evidence regarding the importance of caregiving behaviour for good nutrition, and improved strategies for measuring behaviour have led to a renewed interest in care. The UNICEF conceptual framework suggests that care, in addition to food security and health care services, are critical for children's survival, growth and development. The present paper focuses on the care practice of complementary feeding, specifically behavioural factors such as parental interaction patterns, feeding style and adaptation of feeding to the child's motor abilities (self-feeding or feeding by others). Three kinds of feeding styles (Birch & Fisher, 1995) are identified: controlling; laissez-faire; responsive. Probable effects of each feeding style on nutrient intake are described. A number of studies of feeding behaviour have suggested that the laissez-faire style is most frequently observed among families and communities with a higher prevalence of malnourished children. Nutrition interventions that have been able to show significant effects on outcomes, such as the Hearth Model in Vietnam (Sternin et al. 1997), have usually incorporated behavioural components in their intervention. At this time, there have been no tests of the efficacy of behavioural interventions to improve feeding practices. Research is needed to understand behavioural factors in complementary feeding, and to identify and test intervention strategies designed to improve nutrient intake of young children. Finally, the paper concludes with a discussion of how nutrition programmes might change if care were incorporated

Two loop electroweak corrections to Bˉ→Xsγ\bar B\rightarrow X_s\gamma and Bs0→μ+μ−B_s^0\rightarrow \mu^+\mu^- in the B-LSSM

The rare decays $\bar B\rightarrow X_s\gamma$ and $B_s^0\rightarrow \mu^+\mu^-$ are important to research new physics beyond standard model. In this work, we investigate two loop electroweak corrections to $\bar B\rightarrow X_s\gamma$ and $B_s^0\rightarrow \mu^+\mu^-$ in the minimal supersymmetric extension of the SM with local $B-L$ gauge symmetry (B-LSSM), under a minimal flavor violating assumption for the soft breaking terms. In this framework, new particles and new definition of squarks can affect the theoretical predictions of these two processes, with respect to the MSSM. Considering the constraints from updated experimental data, the numerical results show that the B-LSSM can fit the experimental data for the branching ratios of $\bar B\rightarrow X_s\gamma$ and $B_s^0\rightarrow \mu^+\mu^-$. The results of the rare decays also further constrain the parameter space of the B-LSSM.Comment: 33 pages, 9 figures, Published in EPJ

Accelerating glacier volume loss on Juneau icefield driven by hypsometry and melt-accelerating feedbacks

Globally, glaciers and icefields contribute significantly to sea level rise. Here we show that ice loss from Juneau Icefield, a plateau icefield in Alaska, accelerated after 2005 AD. Rates of area shrinkage were 5 times faster from 2015–2019 than from 1979–1990. Glacier volume loss remained fairly consistent (0.65–1.01 km3 a−1) from 1770–1979 AD, rising to 3.08–3.72 km3 a−1 from 1979–2010, and then doubling after 2010 AD, reaching 5.91 ± 0.80 km3 a−1 (2010–2020). Thinning has become pervasive across the icefield plateau since 2005, accompanied by glacier recession and fragmentation. Rising equilibrium line altitudes and increasing ablation across the plateau has driven a series of hypsometrically controlled melt-accelerating feedbacks and resulted in the observed acceleration in mass loss. As glacier thinning on the plateau continues, a mass balance-elevation feedback is likely to inhibit future glacier regrowth, potentially pushing glaciers beyond a dynamic tipping point

Foodways in transition: food plants, diet and local perceptions of change in a Costa Rican Ngäbe community

Background Indigenous populations are undergoing rapid ethnobiological, nutritional and socioeconomic transitions while being increasingly integrated into modernizing societies. To better understand the dynamics of these transitions, this article aims to characterize the cultural domain of food plants and analyze its relation with current day diets, and the local perceptions of changes given amongst the Ngäbe people of Southern Conte-Burica, Costa Rica, as production of food plants by its residents is hypothesized to be drastically in recession with an decreased local production in the area and new conservation and development paradigms being implemented. Methods Extensive freelisting, interviews and workshops were used to collect the data from 72 participants on their knowledge of food plants, their current dietary practices and their perceptions of change in local foodways, while cultural domain analysis, descriptive statistical analyses and development of fundamental explanatory themes were employed to analyze the data. Results Results show a food plants domain composed of 140 species, of which 85 % grow in the area, with a medium level of cultural consensus, and some age-based variation. Although many plants still grow in the area, in many key species a decrease on local production–even abandonment–was found, with much reduced cultivation areas. Yet, the domain appears to be largely theoretical, with little evidence of use; and the diet today is predominantly dependent on foods bought from the store (more than 50 % of basic ingredients), many of which were not salient or not even recognized as ‘food plants’ in freelists exercises. While changes in the importance of food plants were largely deemed a result of changes in cultural preferences for store bought processed food stuffs and changing values associated with farming and being food self-sufficient, Ngäbe were also aware of how changing household livelihood activities, and the subsequent loss of knowledge and use of food plants, were in fact being driven by changes in social and political policies, despite increases in forest cover and biodiversity. Conclusions Ngäbe foodways are changing in different and somewhat disconnected ways: knowledge of food plants is varied, reflecting most relevant changes in dietary practices such as lower cultivation areas and greater dependence on food from stores by all families. We attribute dietary shifts to socioeconomic and political changes in recent decades, in particular to a reduction of local production of food, new economic structures and agents related to the State and globalization

Prenatal maternal depressive symptoms are associated with smaller amygdalar volumes of four-year-old children

Prenatal maternal depressive symptoms are related to an increased offspring susceptibility to psychiatric disorders over the life course. Alterations in fetal brain development might partly mediate this association. The relation of prenatal depressive symptoms with child's amygdalar volumes is still underexplored, and this study aimed to address this gap. We explored the association of prenatal maternal depressive symptoms with amygdalar volumes in 28 4-year-old children (14 female). Amygdalar volumes were assessed using the volBrain pipeline and manual segmentation. Prenatal depressive symptoms were self-reported by mothers at gestational weeks 14, 24 and 34 (Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale). Sex differences were probed, and possible pre- and postnatal confounders, such as maternal general anxiety, were controlled for. We observed that elevated depressive symptoms of the early second trimester, after controlling for prenatal maternal general anxiety, were significantly related to smaller right amygdalar volumes in the whole sample. Higher depressive symptoms of the third trimester were associated with significantly smaller right amygdalar volumes in boys compared to girls. Altogether, our data suggest that offspring limbic brain development might be affected by maternal depressive symptoms in early pregnancy, and might also be more vulnerable to depressive symptoms in late pregnancy in boys compared to girls

Dark matter scenarios in the minimal SUSY B-L model

We perform a study of the dark matter candidates of a constrained version of the minimal R-parity-conserving supersymmetric model with a gauged $U(1)_{B-L}$. It turns out that there are four additional candidates for dark matter in comparison to the MSSM: two kinds of neutralino, which either correspond to the gaugino of the $U(1)_{B-L}$ or to a fermionic bilepton, as well as "right-handed" CP-even and -odd sneutrinos. The correct dark matter relic density of the neutralinos can be obtained due to different mechanisms including new co-annihilation regions and resonances. The large additional Yukawa couplings required to break the $U(1)_{B-L}$ radiatively often lead to large annihilation cross sections for the sneutrinos. The correct treatment of gauge kinetic mixing is crucial to the success of some scenarios. All candidates are consistent with the exclusion limits of Xenon100.Comment: 45 pages, 22 figures; v2: extended discussion of direct detection cross section, matches published versio