Is organic food healthier? International research association FQH intensifies research.

The paper gives a brief overview of the activities of the Organic Food Quality and Health Research Association - Organic FQH. The FQH Association encourages, co-ordinates and disseminates research in the field of organic food and health. Offically registered as an international research association in January 2003 in the Netherlands, the FQH Association was founded by 4 European Research Institutes with the support of stakeholders from the Organic Food Trade and Industry. The association distinguishes ordinary members that are research institutions having an active interest in Organic Food Quality, and supporting members that are companies or non governmental organizations. The research institutions work on research concepts and on collective or bilateral research projects. Feedback from supporting members regarding the research direction and specific topics, is regularly obtained during working meetings and/or specific events like the annual BioFach international trade event in Germany

Characterization of milk fatty acids based on genetic and herd parameters

The objective of this study was to characterize the fatty acids (FA) in milk based on genetic and herd parameters to investigate the origin of the different FA in milk. Milk samples of 1912 Dutch Holstein-Friesian cows were analysed for 39 different FA including odd and branched-chain fatty acids. The proportion of variation caused by genetic and herd effects was calculated. In addition, genetic and herd correlations among the fatty acids were estimated and a clustering technique was used to visualise these correlations. The results indicated that in Dutch milk C12:0 is not completely synthesised de novo but also partly blood derived. It was suggested that C20:0 in milk is formed from the action of elongase enzymes on C18:0 and that the odd-chain FA C5:0-C13:0 and a part of C15:0 and C17:0 are synthesised de novo while the other part of C15:0 and C17:0 is blood derived. Furthermore, this work gives an overview of the opportunities to change the concentration of individual FA both by breeding and feeding. It is clearly shown that the extent to which the individual FA can be changed varies greatly and is dependent on the origin of the different FA in milk

Area Environment and Health in the Netherlands

__Abstract__ Geographical differences in health are becoming an increasingly important theme in the field of public health. Studies focusing on health differences between countries, or regions within countries, or even at a smaller geographical scale, provide evidence for geographical variations in health. The unequal distribution of health across geographical areas implies that where one lives does matter to health. The studies in this thesis aim to contribute to this discussion by focusing on the area environment and its relation to health at the small geographical scale. This introduction starts with a brief historical description of the role of place of residence in public health, followed by an explanation for observed geographical health patterns. We then elaborate on the mechanisms that might explain how the area environment can influence health. Next, five area features - which are the focus of this thesis - and their possible relation to health are discussed. Finally, we present an outline of this thesis with a brief summary of the individual chapters

Towards automatic generation of multimodal answers to medical questions: a cognitive engineering approach

This paper describes a production experiment carried out to determine which modalities people choose to answer different types of questions. In this experiment participants had to create (multimodal) presentations of answers to general medical questions. The collected answer presentations were coded on types of manipulations (typographic, spatial, graphical), presence of visual media (i.e., photos, graphics, and animations), functions and position of these visual media. The results of a first analysis indicated that participants presented the information in a multimodal way. Moreover, significant differences were found in the information presentation of different answer and question types

Illustrating answers: an evaluation of automatically retrieved illustrations of answers to medical questions

In this paper we discuss and evaluate a method for automatic text illustration, applied to answers to medical questions. Our method for selecting illustrations is based on the idea that similarities between the answers and picture-related text (the picture’s caption or the section/paragraph that includes the picture) can be used as evidence that the picture would be appropriate to illustrate the answer.In a user study, participants rated answer presentations consisting of a textual component and a picture. The textual component was a manually written reference answer; the picture was automatically retrieved by measuring the similarity between the text and either the picture’s caption or its section. The caption-based selection method resulted in more attractive presentations than the section-based method; the caption-based method was also more consistent in selecting informative pictures and showed a greater correlation between user-rated informativeness and the confidence of relevance of the system.When compared to manually selected pictures, we found that automatically selected pictures were rated similarly to decorative pictures, but worse than informative pictures

Production and evaluation of (multimodal) answers to medical questions

This paper describes two experiments carried out to investigate the production and evaluation of multimodal answer presentations in the context of a medical question answering system. In a production experiment participants had to produce answers to different types of questions. The results show that about one in four produced answers using multiple media. In an evaluation experiment, users had to evaluate different types of multimodal answer presentations. Answers with an informative visual were evaluated as more informative and more attractive than answers with a mere illustrative visual

On the Role of Visuals in Multimodal Answers to Medical Questions

This paper describes two experiments carried out in order to investigate the role of visuals in multimodal answer presentations for a medical question answering system. First, a production experiment was carried out to determine which modalities people choose to answer different types of questions. In this experiment, participants had to create (multimodal) presentations of answers to general medical questions. The collected answer presentations were coded on the presence of visual media (i.e., photos, graphics, and animations) and their function. The results indicated that participants presented the information in a multimodal way. Moreover, significant differences were found in the presentation of different answer and question types. Next, an evaluation experiment was conducted to investigate how users evaluate different types of multimodal answer presentations. In this second experiment, participants had\ud to assess the informativity and attractiveness of answer presentations for different types of medical questions. These answer presentations, originating from the production experiment, were manipulated in their answer length (brief vs. extended) and their type of picture (illustrative vs. informative). After the participants had assessed the answer presentations, they received a post-\ud test in which they had to indicate how much they had recalled from the presented answer presentations. The results showed that answer presentations with an informative picture were evaluated as more informative and more attractive than answer presentations with an illustrative picture. The results for the post-test tentatively indicated that learning from answer presentations with an informative picture leads to a better learning performance than learning from purely textual answer presentations