A Longitudinal Study of Physical Activity Patterns and Change Trajectory during Pregnancy

BackgroundPhysical activity during pregnancy has recently been considered as an essential part of reproductive health, and pregnant women are encouraged to adopt an active lifestyle instead of traditionally restricting their activities. Studies from abroad have shown that pregnancy physical activity gradually decreases with the progress of pregnancy. Domestic studies on the patterns and changes of pregnancy physical activity are still insufficient.ObjectiveTo explore the pattern of physical activity in the first, second and third trimesters of pregnancy, and its change trajectory, providing a reference for the formulation of targeted interventions.MethodsConvenience sampling was used to select low-risk pregnant women from Obstetric Clinic, Jiangmen Wuyi Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine from May 2017 to May 2018. All had a health file created at 6-13+6 weeks' gestation at the first antenatal examination. A self-developed questionnaire was used to collect general demographic data. The Chinese version of the Pregnancy Physical Activity Questionnaire was used to investigate physical activity in the first, second and third trimesters of pregnancy. Patterns and changes of physical activity were analyzed by the stage of pregnancy.ResultsAmong the 312 participants, except for 48 excluded cases and 15 dropouts, the other 249 who completed the survey were finally included. The average weekly metabolic equivalent of task (MET) values for the respondents in the first, second and third trimesters of pregnancy were 201.7, 188.6, and 177.2 MET-hours, respectively. Sedentary activity, light-intensive activity, moderate-intensive activity, and vigorous-intensive activity accounted for 17%, 60%, 21.2%-24.4%, and less than 1% of the energy expenditure attributable to total activity, respectively. In terms of activity type, household/caregiving, occupational, transportation and sports/exercise accounted for 48%, 40%, 9%, and less than 3% of the energy expenditure attributable to total activity, respectively. The differences in MET values of sedentary activity, light-intensive activity, moderate-intensive activity, and vigorous-intensive activity, household activity, sports/exercise, and total activity across three stages of pregnancy were statistically significant (P<0.05) . Among which, the MET values of sedentary activity, moderate-intensive activity, household activity, and total activity in the third trimester were much lower than those in the first trimester, with a statistically significant difference (P<0.05) .ConclusionTo improve maternal and infant health, healthcare workers should encourage pregnant women to reduce their sedentary time, and give them individualized physical activity recommendations and guidance. The second trimester may be the best time to promote physical activity

External Validation of Risk Prediction Models for Postpartum Stress Urinary Incontinence

BackgroundOur research team developed two prediction models of postpartum stress urinary incontinence (PSUI) , one for primiparas, and the other for multiparae, aiming at early identifying women at high risk of PSUI, and providing effective interventions, but they have not yet been externally validated.ObjectiveTo externally validate the risk prediction models of PSUI previously developed by us to assess their clinical applicability.MethodsThis study was conducted between July and September 2020. Participants were 6-month postpartum women (validation group) who were selected from the electronic medical record system of Shenzhen Hospital of Southern Medical University, and the University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen Hospital. Information about age, height, pre-pregnancy weight, abortion history, and delivery history was collected from the electronic medical record system of the two hospitals. A telephone follow-up was conducted to investigate the incidence of stress urinary incontinence within 6-month postpartum. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) was computed to estimate the value of the predictive models in discriminating PSUI. Hosmer-Lemeshow goodness-of-fit test was used to examine the calibration of the prediction models.ResultsA total of 298 cases were included, and 203 of them (68.1%) were primiparas (158 with PSUI, and other 45 without) , other 95 (31.9%) were multiparae (72 with PSUI, and other 23 without) . The AUC of the risk prediction model for PSUI in primiparas was 0.719〔95%CI (0.643, 0.795) 〕, and that of the risk prediction model for PSUI in multiparae was 0.833〔95%CI (0.738, 0.928) 〕. Hosmer-Lemeshow goodness-of-fit test suggested that the PSUI risk prediction model for primiparas had poor calibration (χ2=34.11, P<0.001) , while that for multiparae had satisfactory calibration (χ2=9.62, P=0.293) .ConclusionThe PSUI risk prediction model for primiparas could effectively distinguish PSUI, but its applicability needs to be further improved. The PSUI risk prediction model for multiparae had acceptable performance, which may be used and promoted as an evaluation tool for early pelvic floor rehabilitation in multiparae

Perceptions, behaviours and attitudes towards smoking held by the male partners of Chinese pregnant women:a qualitative study

Abstract Background Direct associations of tobacco exposure during pregnancy with pregnancy complications and adverse birth outcomes have been proven. Previous studies suggest that expecting a child provides a valuable opportunity to promote behavioural changes, such as smoking cessation, among the male partners of pregnant women. Thorough understandings of Chinese expectant fathers’ smoking behaviour during the transition to fatherhood is a prerequisite to the development of appropriate interventions to facilitate smoking cessation. This study aimed to explore the perceptions, behaviours and attitudes related to smoking among male partners of pregnant women in China. Methods A descriptive phenomenological approach was adopted. A purposive sample of expectant fathers aged 18 years or older who had a tobacco use history within the past year were recruited at obstetrics and gynaecology clinics and invited to participate in one-to-one, 20–30-min semi-structured interviews. The data analysis followed Colaizzi’s descriptive phenomenological method. Results Twenty-five expectant fathers were interviewed. Four themes were generated: 1) the benefits of smoking and respondents’ misperceptions of the impact of smoking and SHS and neglectful attitude of the impact of smoking, which were given as the major reasons for continuing to smoke; 2) factors contributing to smoking cessation, including concern for the potential health impact of continued smoking on the pregnant partner and baby, the role of being father, and the encouragement to quit from family members; and 3) perceived barriers to smoking cessation, including withdrawal symptoms or cigarette cravings, absence of smoking cessation support, and increasing stress. Conclusion This study provides a comprehensive understanding of the perception, behaviours, and attitudes related to smoking among Chinese expectant fathers. The findings of this study can guide healthcare professionals and policymakers in combining the distribution of educational information about the hazards of SHS for maternal and neonatal health with smoking cessation assistance for expectant fathers through policy initiatives and other types of incentives and programmes targeted to enhance smoking cessation among this population. Trial registration Prospectively registered at clinicaltrial.org ( NCT03401021 ) on 8 Jan 2018

Factors affecting the production of sugarcane yield and sucrose accumulation: suggested potential biological solutions

Environmental stresses are the main constraints on agricultural productivity and food security worldwide. This issue is worsened by abrupt and severe changes in global climate. The formation of sugarcane yield and the accumulation of sucrose are significantly influenced by biotic and abiotic stresses. Understanding the biochemical, physiological, and environmental phenomena associated with these stresses is essential to increase crop production. This review explores the effect of environmental factors on sucrose content and sugarcane yield and highlights the negative effects of insufficient water supply, temperature fluctuations, insect pests, and diseases. This article also explains the mechanism of reactive oxygen species (ROS), the role of different metabolites under environmental stresses, and highlights the function of environmental stress-related resistance genes in sugarcane. This review further discusses sugarcane crop improvement approaches, with a focus on endophytic mechanism and consortium endophyte application in sugarcane plants. Endophytes are vital in plant defense; they produce bioactive molecules that act as biocontrol agents to enhance plant immune systems and modify environmental responses through interaction with plants. This review provides an overview of internal mechanisms to enhance sugarcane plant growth and environmental resistance and offers new ideas for improving sugarcane plant fitness and crop productivity

Vitamin C Enhances the Generation of Mouse and Human Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells

SummarySomatic cells can be reprogrammed into induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) by defined factors. However, the low efficiency and slow kinetics of the reprogramming process have hampered progress with this technology. Here we report that a natural compound, vitamin C (Vc), enhances iPSC generation from both mouse and human somatic cells. Vc acts at least in part by alleviating cell senescence, a recently identified roadblock for reprogramming. In addition, Vc accelerates gene expression changes and promotes the transition of pre-iPSC colonies to a fully reprogrammed state. Our results therefore highlight a straightforward method for improving the speed and efficiency of iPSC generation and provide additional insights into the mechanistic basis of the reprogramming process

Programmable Base Editing of the Sheep Genome Revealed No Genome-Wide Off-Target Mutations

Since its emergence, CRISPR/Cas9-mediated base editors (BEs) with cytosine deaminase activity have been used to precisely and efficiently introduce single-base mutations in genomes, including those of human cells, mice, and crop species. Most production traits in livestock are induced by point mutations, and genome editing using BEs without homology-directed repair of double-strand breaks can directly alter single nucleotides. The p.96R > C variant of Suppressor cytokine signaling 2 (SOCS2) has profound effects on body weight, body size, and milk production in sheep. In the present study, we successfully obtained lambs with defined point mutations resulting in a p.96R > C substitution in SOCS2 by the co-injection of BE3 mRNA and a single guide RNA (sgRNA) into sheep zygotes. The observed efficiency of the single nucleotide exchange in newborn animals was as high as 25%. Observations of body size and body weight in the edited group showed that gene modification contributes to enhanced growth traits in sheep. Moreover, targeted deep sequencing and unbiased family trio-based whole genome sequencing revealed undetectable off-target mutations in the edited animals. This study demonstrates the potential for the application of BE-mediated point mutations in large animals for the improvement of production traits in livestock species

Using eDNA to detect the distribution and density of invasive crayfish in the Honghe-Hani rice terrace World Heritage site

The Honghe-Hani landscape in China is a UNESCO World Natural Heritage site due to the beauty of its thousands of rice terraces, but these structures are in danger from the invasive crayfish Procambarus clarkii. Crayfish dig nest holes, which collapse terrace walls and destroy rice production. Under the current control strategy, farmers self-report crayfish and are issued pesticide, but this strategy is not expected to eradicate the crayfish nor to prevent their spread since farmers are not able to detect small numbers of crayfish. Thus, we tested whether environmental DNA (eDNA) from paddy-water samples could provide a sensitive detection method. In an aquarium experiment, Real-time Quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) successfully detected crayfish, even at a simulated density of one crayfish per average-sized paddy (with one false negative). In a field test, we tested eDNA and bottle traps against direct counts of crayfish. eDNA successfully detected crayfish in all 25 paddies where crayfish were observed and in none of the 7 paddies where crayfish were absent. Bottle-trapping was successful in only 68% of the crayfish-present paddies. eDNA concentrations also correlated positively with crayfish counts. In sum, these results suggest that single samples of eDNA are able to detect small crayfish populations, but not perfectly. Thus, we conclude that a program of repeated eDNA sampling is now feasible and likely reliable for measuring crayfish geographic range and for detecting new invasion fronts in the Honghe Hani landscape, which would inform regional control efforts and help to prevent the further spread of this invasive crayfish

Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research.Peer reviewe