Surrogates of Long-Term Vitamin D Exposure and Ovarian Cancer Risk in Two Prospective Cohort Studies

Experimental evidence and ecologic studies suggest a protective role of vitamin D in ovarian carcinogenesis. However, epidemiologic studies using individual level data have been inconsistent. We evaluated ultraviolet (UV)-B radiation, vitamin D intake, and predicted plasma 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] levels as long-term surrogates of vitamin D exposure within the Nurses’ Health Study (NHS) and NHSII. We estimated incidence rate ratios (RRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for risk of overall ovarian cancer and by histologic subtype using Cox proportional hazards models. Between 1976 and 2010 in NHS and 1989 and 2011 in NHSII, we identified a total of 1,225 incident epithelial ovarian cancer cases (NHS: 970, NHSII: 255) over 4,628,648 person-years of follow-up. Cumulative average UV-B exposure was not associated with ovarian cancer risk in NHS (Ptrend = 0.08), but was associated with reduced risk in NHSII (highest vs. lowest category RR = 0.67; 95% CI: 0.50, 0.89; Ptrend < 0.01). When stratified by histologic subtype, UV-B flux was positively associated with risk of serous tumors in NHS (Ptrend < 0.01), but inversely associated in NHSII (Ptrend = 0.01). Adjusted for confounders, ovarian cancer risk was not associated with vitamin D intake from food or supplements or with predicted 25(OH)D levels. Our study does not strongly support a protective role for vitamin D in ovarian cancer risk

Gender, livestock and livelihood indicators

This guide is a reference point for some of the important indicators that ILRI can use to monitor the changing role of livestock in livelihoods in different production systems and the impact of livestock-related interventions. While this list of indicators is not comprehensive in covering all the areas in which ILRI works, it provides a starting point for the common objectives which most of our projects, be they in markets, biotechnology or the environment, hope to achieve. Some of these indicators are already commonly used in different surveys but their application has not always been consistent or comparable. With time, we expect to develop further common indicators around other areas of research in ILRI. This document should therefore be considered as a living document to which we will add core indicators around the thematic areas covered by ILRI’s research including such areas as partnerships, capacity building and the key thematic areas of markets, biotechnology and environment. This document should be used to guide your data collection within projects. These may include baseline data, evaluation (both internal and external), impact assessments, project appraisals and any other data collection within the projects and programmes across the institute, including surveys conducted by students where possible. Currently, the indicators are designed for data collection at household level and for integration into household surveys. Project teams should ask for assistance in adapting these indicators for use in other types of surveys such as community surveys, focus group discussions, market agent surveys and key informant interviews. Livestock play multiple roles in livelihoods. In deriving these indicators, we have used both the sustainable livelihoods framework, placing livestock within an assets and capital framework, and as a pathway out of poverty. The latter recognizes that for livestock to translate into poverty reduction the necessary conditions i.e. technologies and services to generate productive, sustainable and profitable markets are a pre-requisite. Section 2 of this document identifies 6 categories of indicators and gives a rationale for each of the indicators and how to measure them covering both the tools for data collection on the indicator and its calculation. Section 3 provides the initial basic survey data to capture in ILRI surveys, Section 4 focuses on study meta-data to document and Section 5 on household sampling

Comparison of characteristics and function of translation termination signals between and within prokaryotic and eukaryotic organisms

Six diverse prokaryotic and five eukaryotic genomes were compared to deduce whether the protein synthesis termination signal has common determinants within and across both kingdoms. Four of the six prokaryotic and all of the eukaryotic genomes investigated demonstrated a similar pattern of nucleotide bias both 5′ and 3′ of the stop codon. A preferred core signal of 4 nt was evident, encompassing the stop codon and the following nucleotide. Codons decoded by hyper-modified tRNAs were over-represented in the region 5′ to the stop codon in genes from both kingdoms. The origin of the 3′ bias was more variable particularly among the prokaryotic organisms. In both kingdoms, genes with the highest expression index exhibited a strong bias but genes with the lowest expression showed none. Absence of bias in parasitic prokaryotes may reflect an absence of pressure to evolve more efficient translation. Experiments were undertaken to determine if a correlation existed between bias in signal abundance and termination efficiency. In Escherichia coli signal abundance correlated with termination efficiency for UAA and UGA stop codons, but not in mammalian cells. Termination signals that were highly inefficient could be made more efficient by increasing the concentration of the cognate decoding release factor

A prospective cohort study of dietary indices and incidence of epithelial ovarian cancer

Background: Several dietary indices have been developed to measure overall diet quality, including the Healthy Eating Index-2005 (HEI-2005), which measures adherence to the 2005 Dietary Guidelines from the USDA; the Alternative Healthy Eating Index-2010 (AHEI-2010), which is based on foods and nutrients predictive of chronic disease risk; and the Alternate Mediterranean Diet Score (aMDS), which is an index that characterizes traditional food patterns of Mediterranean countries. Few studies have evaluated diet quality and ovarian cancer risk. Methods: We assessed the associations of the HEI-2005, AHEI-2010, and aMDS with risk of epithelial ovarian cancer prospectively among women in the Nurses’ Health Study. We used Cox proportional hazards models, adjusting for known ovarian cancer risk factors. Results: During 24 years of follow-up, we documented 696 incident epithelial ovarian cancer cases among 82,948 women with diet information. The multivariate adjusted hazard ratios (95% confidence interval; Ptrend) of epithelial ovarian cancer comparing the highest with the lowest quintile were 1.03 (0.80-1.34; 0.77) for the AHEI-2010, 0.85 (0.65-1.12; 0.57) for the HEI-2005, and 0.91 (0.71-1.18; 0.44) for the aMDS. Conclusions: We did not observe any clear association of three diet quality scores with ovarian cancer risk. Further work should other metrics of evaluating diet quality that may be more relevant cancer risk. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13048-014-0112-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users

Periodontal bone loss and risk of epithelial ovarian cancer

Periodontitis, a chronic inflammatory response to pathogenic bacteria in the oral microbiome, is common among adults. It is associated with several medical conditions, including cardiovascular diseases, and potentially with esophageal, lung, oral and pancreatic cancer. One of the proposed mechanisms behind these associations is systemic inflammation, which has also been implicated in ovarian cancer etiology. The aim of this study was to evaluate association between ovarian cancer and periodontal bone loss