Risk Factors for Large for Gestational age Infants in Pregnant Women with Gestational Diabetes Mellitus

Objective: To examine the risk factors for large for gestational age (LGA) infants in pregnant women with gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM). Methods: Data were extracted from antenatal records of 282 GDM women who attended the antenatal clinict and delivered at Ramathibodi Hospital, Mahidol University. Risk factors were analyzed and compared between LGA group and control group. Results:History of previous macrosomia infants, pre-pregnant BMI ≥25 kg/m2, glucosuria on delivery day, fasting plasma glucose (FPG) of oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) ≥ 95 mg/dl and plasma glucose at 1 hr of OGTT ≥ 180 mg/dl were significant risk factors for LGA infants (P < 0.05). Using multivariate analysis, the remained significant factors were the history of prior macrosomia infants, pre-pregnant BMI ≥ 25 kg/m2 and FPG of OGTT ≥ 95 mg/dl (OR 4.86, 95%CI 1.66-14.25, OR 1.94, 95%CI 1.08-3.51 and, OR 3.05, 95%CI 1.61-5.77, respectively).Conclusion: The significant risk factors for LGA infants in GDM women were the history of prior macrosomia infants, pre-pregnant BMI ≥ 25 kg/m2 and FPG ≥ 95 mg/dl.The most important risk factor for LGA infant was the history of prior macrosomia

Identification of hip fracture patients from radiographs using Fourier analysis of the trabecular structure: a cross-sectional study

Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Decorin modulates collagen matrix assembly and mineralization

Decorin (DCN) is one of the major matrix proteoglycans in bone. To investigate the role of DCN in matrix mineralization, the expression of DCN in MC3T3-E1 (MC) cell cultures and the phenotypes of MC-derived clones expressing higher (sense; S-DCN) or lower (antisense; AS-DCN) levels of DCN were characterized. DCN expression was significantly decreased as the mineralized nodules were formed and expanded in vitro. In S-DCN clones, in vitro matrix mineralization was inhibited, whereas in AS-DCN clones, mineralization was accelerated. At the microscopic level, collagen fibers in S-DCN clones were thinner while those of AS-DCN clones were thicker and lacked directionality compared to the controls. At the ultrastructural level, the collagen fibrils in S-DCN clones were markedly thinner, whereas those of AS-DCN clones were larger and irregular in shape. The results from Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy analysis demonstrated that in AS-DCN cultures the mineral content was greater but the crystallinity of mineral was poorer than that of the controls at early stage of mineralization. The in vivo transplantation assay demonstrated that no mineralized matrices were formed in S-DCN transplants, whereas they were readily detected in AS-DCN transplants at 3 weeks of transplantation. The areas of bone-like matrices in AS-DCN transplants were significantly greater than the controls at 3 weeks but became comparable at 5 weeks. The bone-like matrices in AS-DCN transplants exhibited woven bone-like non-lamellar structure while the lamellar bone-like structure was evident in the control transplants. These results suggest that DCN regulates matrix mineralization by modulating collagen assembly

Integration of Expressed Sequence Tag Data Flanking Predicted RNA Secondary Structures Facilitates Novel Non-Coding RNA Discovery

Many computational methods have been used to predict novel non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs), but none, to our knowledge, have explicitly investigated the impact of integrating existing cDNA-based Expressed Sequence Tag (EST) data that flank structural RNA predictions. To determine whether flanking EST data can assist in microRNA (miRNA) prediction, we identified genomic sites encoding putative miRNAs by combining functional RNA predictions with flanking ESTs data in a model consistent with miRNAs undergoing cleavage during maturation. In both human and mouse genomes, we observed that the inclusion of flanking ESTs adjacent to and not overlapping predicted miRNAs significantly improved the performance of various methods of miRNA prediction, including direct high-throughput sequencing of small RNA libraries. We analyzed the expression of hundreds of miRNAs predicted to be expressed during myogenic differentiation using a customized microarray and identified several known and predicted myogenic miRNA hairpins. Our results indicate that integrating ESTs flanking structural RNA predictions improves the quality of cleaved miRNA predictions and suggest that this strategy can be used to predict other non-coding RNAs undergoing cleavage during maturation

Molecular Dynamics Simulation of Oxygen Ion Diffusion in Yttria Stabilized Zirconia Single Crystals and Bicrystals

Molecular dynamics simulation studies have been performed to study the oxygen ion diffusion in yttria stabilized zirconia single crystals and bicrystals separated by tilt grain boundaries (GBs). Two types of GBs which are ?? 5 (3&amp;#8201;1&amp;#8201;0) and ?? 13 (5&amp;#8201;1&amp;#8201;0) are studied at temperatures between 1,000&amp;#8201;K and 2,000&amp;#8201;K. The effect of grain size, which is the distance between two GBs, and the effect of GB orientations are systematically investigated in this study. The oxygen diffusion in the bicrystals is found to be blocked by the GB, and the blocking effect increases with decreasing grain size and is affected by different grain orientations. In addition, the oxygen diffusion along the GB plane is most hindered.close