Cheese-induced body weight gain is not accompanied by an increase of gastric cells producing leptin, ghrelin, gastrin, or pancreastatin in mice

The stomach is a source of several circulating peptides/hormones, such as gastrin, pancreastatin, leptin and ghrelin, which are thought to play important roles in the regulation of food intake and body growth. The present study was undertaken in mice in order to examine the effects of diet composition on the body weight gain and the gastric cells that produce these peptides/hormones.Both young and adult female mice (BALB/cABBom strain) were given a standard pelleted dry diet, with or without cheese ad libitum, during a 7 week period. The diet supplement consisted either of carbohydrate- free white cheese containing 27% fat or sweet-tasting but sucrose-free Norwegian “brown cheese” containing 29% fat and 39% carbohydrate, mainly lactose. The total intake of the various types of food and the change in body weight were recorded. At the end of the observation period, blood samples were obtained for determination of gastric hormone levels by radioimmunoassay, and the stomachs were removed for examination of hormone producing cells by immunohistochemistry.The young mice increased their body weight more than the adult mice. In the groups offered white cheese, both young and adult mice increased their body weight more than the animals kept on the standard diet alone. In contrast, the “brown cheese” supplement led to a relative overweight only in adult mice. Despite the changes in body weight gain, there were no differences with respect to the circulating levels of gastrin, leptin or ghrelin, and to the numbers of cells stained with antibodies to pancreastatin (including ECL cells and G cells), leptin (subpopulation of chief cells) and ghrelin (A-like cells) in all groups.Body weight gain was increased in both young and adult mice by a white cheese diet supplement, whereas ‘brown cheese’ produced overweight only in adult mice. The increased body weight gain was not accompanied by an icrease of gastric cells producing leptin, ghrelin, gastrin, or pancreastatin

Including the Effect of Shielding in Prediction of Weather Window for Offshore Lifting Operations

The offshore industry is constantly seeking to operate in more extreme conditions. DeepOcean is a subsea service company, where offshore lifts is a part of every day operations. To remain competitive, it is important to reduce operational downtime, where time spent waiting on weather is one of the main contributors. The main goal of this thesis is to investigate how shielding effects influence the operational limit for offshore lifting operations at different heading angles. Common practice in the offshore industry is to use long-crested waves when determining the operational limit, and shielding effects are often neglected, which is a conservative approach. A case study of two different structures, a Manifold and a ROV system, has been conducted. Repeated launch and recovery analyzes has been performed in Orcaflex, a time domain finite element program developed for static and dynamic analysis of offshore systems. Irregular waves are applied using a JONSWAP spectrum with $T_{p}=5-19 s$ and $H_{s}=1-4 m$ for the Manifold and $H_{s}=2-8 m$ for the ROV system. Both long- and short-crested waves, as well as 4 heading angles have been investigated. Shielding effects has been accounted for by the use of Sea State RAOs calculated in WADAM, a hydrodynamic analysis program for calculation of wave-structure interaction. The maximum tension in the lifting wire is considered as the dimensioning parameter. Gumbel extreme value statistics has been used to evaluate the distribution of maximum lifting wire tension, based on 20 simulations per sea state. The calculated maximum wire tension was found to be highly dependent on whether or not slack would occur during a simulation. A slack wire result in snap loads with unpredictable magnitude. Incorporation of shielding in the simulations resulted in a significant drop in the occurrence of slack, for both structures. Thus, shielding effects is found to reduce the uncertainty related to the maximum tension due to a reduction in snap loads. The operational limit for the Manifold was increased with 0.5-1.0 m on average when shielding was included for most periods and heading angles, for both long-and short crested waves. The results obtained for the ROV was found to be highly unpredictable in magnitude due to slack occurring in the dominating part of the simulations, especially for steep waves. In contrast shielding showed to have a consistent positive effect, for heading angles with low vessel motion in roll

Blood pressure altering method affects correlation with pulse arrival time

Objective: Pulse arrival time (PAT) is a potential main feature in cuff-less blood pressure (BP) monitoring. However, the precise relationship between BP parameters and PAT under varying conditions lacks a complete understanding. We hypothesize that simple test protocols fail to demonstrate the complex relationship between PAT and both SBP and DBP. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the correlation between PAT and BP during two exercise modalities with differing BP responses using an unobtrusive wearable device. Methods: Seventy-five subjects, of which 43.7% had a prior diagnosis of hypertension, participated in an isometric and dynamic exercise test also including seated periods of rest prior to, in between and after. PAT was measured using a prototype wearable chest belt with a one-channel electrocardiogram and a photo-plethysmography sensor. Reference BP was measured auscultatory. Results: Mean individual correlation between PAT and SBP was −0.82 ± 0.14 in the full protocol, −0.79 ± 0.27 during isometric exercise and −0.77 ± 0.19 during dynamic exercise. Corresponding correlation between PAT and DBP was 0.25 ± 0.35, −0.74 ± 0.23 and 0.39 ± 0.41. Conclusion: The results confirm PAT as a potential main feature to track changes in SBP. The relationship between DBP and PAT varied between exercise modalities, with the sign of the correlation changing from negative to positive between type of exercise modality. Thus, we hypothesize that simple test protocols fail to demonstrate the complex relationship between PAT and BP with emphasis on DBP

Blood pressure altering method affects correlation with pulse arrival time

Objective: Pulse arrival time (PAT) is a potential main feature in cuff-less blood pressure (BP) monitoring. However, the precise relationship between BP parameters and PAT under varying conditions lacks a complete understanding. We hypothesize that simple test protocols fail to demonstrate the complex relationship between PAT and both SBP and DBP. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the correlation between PAT and BP during two exercise modalities with differing BP responses using an unobtrusive wearable device. Methods: Seventy-five subjects, of which 43.7% had a prior diagnosis of hypertension, participated in an isometric and dynamic exercise test also including seated periods of rest prior to, in between and after. PAT was measured using a prototype wearable chest belt with a one-channel electrocardiogram and a photo-plethysmography sensor. Reference BP was measured auscultatory. Results: Mean individual correlation between PAT and SBP was −0.82 ± 0.14 in the full protocol, −0.79 ± 0.27 during isometric exercise and −0.77 ± 0.19 during dynamic exercise. Corresponding correlation between PAT and DBP was 0.25 ± 0.35, −0.74 ± 0.23 and 0.39 ± 0.41. Conclusion: The results confirm PAT as a potential main feature to track changes in SBP. The relationship between DBP and PAT varied between exercise modalities, with the sign of the correlation changing from negative to positive between type of exercise modality. Thus, we hypothesize that simple test protocols fail to demonstrate the complex relationship between PAT and BP with emphasis on DBP.publishedVersio

A Plasma Protein Biomarker Strategy for Detection of Small Intestinal Neuroendocrine Tumors

Background: Small intestinal neuroendocrine tumors (SI-NETs) are difficult to diagnose in the early stage of disease. Current blood biomarkers such as chromogranin A (CgA) and 5-hydroxyindolacetic acid have low sensitivity (SEN) and specificity (SPE). This is a first preplanned interim analysis (Nordic non-interventional, prospective, exploratory, EXPLAIN study [NCT02630654]). Its objective is to investigate if a plasma protein multi-biomarker strategy can improve diagnostic accuracy (ACC) in SI-NETs. Methods: At the time of diagnosis, before any disease-specific treatment was initiated, blood was collected from patients with advanced SI-NETs and 92 putative cancer-related plasma proteins from 135 patients were analyzed and compared with the results of age- and sex-matched controls (n = 143), using multiplex proximity extension assay and machine learning techniques. Results: Using a random forest model including 12 top ranked plasma proteins in patients with SI-NETs, the multi-biomarker strategy showed SEN and SPE of 89 and 91%, respectively, with negative predictive value (NPV) and positive predictive value (PPV) of 90 and 91%, respectively, to identify patients with regional or metastatic disease with an area under the receiver operator characteristic curve (AUROC) of 99%. In 30 patients with normal CgA concentrations, the model provided a diagnostic SPE of 98%, SEN of 56%, and NPV 90%, PPV of 90%, and AUROC 97%, regardless of proton pump inhibitor intake. Conclusion: This interim analysis demonstrates that a multi-biomarker/machine learning strategy improves diagnostic ACC of patients with SI-NET at the time of diagnosis, especially in patients with normal CgA levels. The results indicate that this multi-biomarker strategy can be useful for early detection of SI-NETs at presentation and conceivably detect recurrence after radical primary resection