Dairy Products and Metabolic Effects : A Nordic Multicentre Study - Norwegian Part

BACKGROUND: Some epidemiologic studies have suggested inverse relations between intake of dairy products and components of the metabolic syndrome. OBJECTIVE: The objective was to investigate the effects of an increased intake of dairy products in persons, with a habitually low intake of dairy products and with traits of the metabolic syndrome, on body composition and factors related to the metabolic syndrome. STUDY DESIGN: Middle-aged overweight subjects (n = 36) with traits of the metabolic syndrome were recruited at the Lipid Clinic, Rikshospitalet Oslo University and randomly assigned into milk or control groups. The milk group was instructed to consume at least 3 portions of low- to moderate-fat dairy products daily. The control group maintained their habitual diet. Clinical investigations were conducted at baseline and after the six months intervention period. RESULTS: There were no significant differences between changes in body weight or body composition, blood pressure, markers of inflammation, adiponectin, or oxidative stress between the milk and the control groups. There was a significantly decrease in E-selectin, a marker of endothelial function in the milk group at the end of the study compared to the control group (P = 0.008). Among participants with a low calcium intake at baseline (<700 mg/d), there was a significant treatment effect for waist circumference (P = 0.023). CONCLUSIONS: This study gives no clear support to the hypothesis that a moderately increased intake of dairy products beneficially affects aspects of the metabolic syndrome. The apparently positive effects on waist circumference in subjects with a low calcium intake suggest a possible threshold in relation to effects on body composition

Regulatory framework analysis for the unmanned inland waterway vessel

Several research and innovation initiatives have been pursued worldwide for the development of autonomous and unmanned ships. However, these ships’ wider adoption is limited by the existing regulatory framework, which presently does not provide clear guidelines and requirements for the design and operation of autonomous ships. The aim of this study is to comprehensively analyse the existing maritime safety and security regulatory framework including the national and international regulations for designing, building, testing and operating the unmanned next-generation inland waterways (IWW) vessel considered in the AUTOSHIP project operating in the Flemish inland waters. This study initiates with the identification of the regulatory bodies controlling the operation and testing of the investigated vessel and then identifies barriers in regulations where amendments or new developments are required. Subsequently, a strategy for overcoming these barriers is proposed. The main regulatory gaps that are identified include the requirements for navigation, emergency and environment protection functions, where new definitions are required for unmanned ship operations (e.g. master, crew, remote control centre). Moreover, some of the regulations explicitly specify the existence of crew on the ships for navigation, emergency and environment protection functions. A three-phase strategy is proposed to overcome the current regulatory barriers.publishedVersio

A method to identify and rank objects and hazardous interactions affecting autonomous ships navigation

The Autonomous Navigation System (ANS) constitutes a critical key enabling technology required for operating Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships (MASS). To assure the safety of MASS operations, the effective identification of potential objects and target ships interacting with the own MASS is quintessential. This study proposes a systematic method to identify the items interacting with the own MASS. This method is based on a similar approach previously employed for the encountering items' identification in robotics, which is customised herein for the MASS needs. The developed method is applied to a short-sea shipping MASS. The environmental features, agents and objects related to her navigation are identified and ranked based on the frequency of encounter and the potential collision consequences. The results demonstrate the ability of the method to identify additional items in comparison to Automatic Identification System based data. The interactions with the small ships are considered as the most critical, due to their potential accidental consequences and their exhibited high frequency of encounter. This study results are employed to support the ANS design and testing of the investigated ship

Paving the way toward autonomous shipping development for European Waters – The AUTOSHIP project

New developments in maritime industry include the design and operation of autonomous ships. The AUTOSHIP project is one initiative promoting the use of autonomous ships in European waters focusing on two specific use cases, a Short Sea Shipping (SSS) cargo vessel and an Inland Waterways (IWW) barge. The AUTOSHIP objectives include thorough regulatory, societal, financial, safety and security analyses for the two investigated use cases as well as the development of a novel framework and methods for the design of autonomous vessels. This objective is achieved with the support of a number of activities, including supply chain, regulatory, risk and gaps analyses. Some results and findings from these activities are presented in this paper. The results demonstrate that the supply chain analysis is important to understand the complex relationships between different partners and phases for the effective design of maritime autonomous systems. Furthermore, a number of regulatory gaps needs to be addressed for the wider adoption of the AUTOSHIP use cases. There is a number of essential hazards associated with each of the two use cases; measures to mitigate these hazards are presented

A novel risk assessment process : application to an autonomous inland waterways ship

Effectively addressing safety, security and cyber-security challenges is quintessential for progressing the development of next generation maritime autonomous shipping. This study aims at developing a novel hybrid, semi-structured process for the hazardous scenarios identification and ranking. This method integrates the operational and functional hazard identification approaches, whilst considering the safety, security and cybersecurity hazards. This method is applied to comprehensively assess the safety of an autonomous inland waterways ship at a preliminary design phase. The hazardous scenarios are identified and ranked by a number of experts participating in a series of sessions. The identified hazards risk is estimated considering the frequency and severity indices, whereas their uncertainty is estimated by employing the standard deviations in these two indices among the experts ranking results. Epistemic uncertainty is also considered during ranking. Risk control measures are proposed to de-risk the critical hazards. The results reveal that the most critical hazards from the safety, security and cybersecurity perspectives pertain to the situation awareness, remote control and propulsion functions. Based on the derived results, design enhancements along with high-level testing scenarios for the investigated autonomous ship are also proposed

Dairy attentuates oxidative and inflammatory stress in metabolic syndrome123

Background: Oxidative and inflammatory stress are elevated in obesity and are further augmented in metabolic syndrome. We showed previously that dairy components suppress the adipocyte- and macrophage-mediated generation of reactive oxygen species and inflammatory cytokines and systemic oxidative and inflammatory biomarkers in obesity

Whey protein reduces early life weight gain in mice fed a high-fat diet.

An increasing number of studies indicate that dairy products, including whey protein, alleviate several disorders of the metabolic syndrome. Here, we investigated the effects of whey protein isolate (whey) in mice fed a high-fat diet hypothesising that the metabolic effects of whey would be associated with changes in the gut microbiota composition. Five-week-old male C57BL/6 mice were fed a high-fat diet ad libitum for 14 weeks with the protein source being either whey or casein. Faeces were collected at week 0, 7, and 13 and the fecal microbiota was analysed by denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis analyses of PCR-derived 16S rRNA gene (V3-region) amplicons. At the end of the study, plasma samples were collected and assayed for glucose, insulin and lipids. Whey significantly reduced body weight gain during the first four weeks of the study compared with casein (P<0.001-0.05). Hereafter weight gain was similar resulting in a 15% lower final body weight in the whey group relative to casein (34.0±1.0 g vs. 40.2±1.3 g, P<0.001). Food intake was unaffected by protein source throughout the study period. Fasting insulin was lower in the whey group (P<0.01) and glucose clearance was improved after an oral glucose challenge (P<0.05). Plasma cholesterol was lowered by whey compared to casein (P<0.001). The composition of the fecal microbiota differed between high- and low-fat groups at 13 weeks (P<0.05) whereas no difference was seen between whey and casein. In conclusion, whey initially reduced weight gain in young C57BL/6 mice fed a high-fat diet compared to casein. Although the effect on weight gain ceased, whey alleviated glucose intolerance, improved insulin sensitivity and reduced plasma cholesterol. These findings could not be explained by changes in food intake or gut microbiota composition. Further studies are needed to clarify the mechanisms behind the metabolic effects of whey

Vitenskapsmannen som kulturell figur i tidsskriftet Ringeren, 1898-99

Sammendrag Oppgaven er en undersøkelse av tidsskriftet Ringerens fremstilling av vitenskapsmannen, bl.a. gjennom en serie av portretter av «fremragende nutidsforskere», skrevet av Peder N. Engelbrethsen. Som et organ for den «frisinnede» liberale venstresiden tok tidsskriftet opp en rekke aktuelle temaer som unionspolitikk, litteratur og sosialpolitiske spørsmål. Tidsskriftet, som var rettet mot et allment publikum, problematiserte også tradisjonelle institusjoner som kirke og ekteskap. Vitenskapen ble identifisert med frihetskampen mot de gamle autoritetene, og denne politiseringen sammenfalt med resepsjonen av Darwins utviklingslære i Norge. Oppgaven argumenterer for at dette kommer til uttrykk i Ringeren som en ny forståelse av vitenskapsmannens samfunnsmessige og kulturelle relevans, både som formidler og som en aktør på et marked for naturvitenskapelig kunnskap. Vitenskapsmannen som kulturell figur og mottakelsen av utviklingslærens hypotese ble to parallelle prosesser som gjensidig påvirket hverandre. Gjennom å anvende Richard Yeos perspektiver på den vitenskapshistoriske biografien, og Thomas F. Glicks typologisering av resepsjonen, analyseres fremstillingen av vitenskapsmannen som kulturell figur i Ringeren, som gjennom sitt virke uttrykker individualitet, nasjonal identitet og et nytt verdensbilde, heller enn en kumulativ og internasjonal forskerpraksis