Non-home prepared foods : contribution to energy and nutrient intake of consumers living in two low-income areas in Nairobi

Objective: To determine the nutritional importance of non-home prepared foods for men, women and schoolchildren living in two low-income residential areas of Nairobi, and the sources of these non-home prepared foods. Design, setting and subjects: A survey was conducted in Korogocho, a slum area, and Dandora, a low-middle-income residential area. Some 241 men, 254 women and 146 children aged 9 to 14 years were included in the study. Food intake was measured using three 24-hour recalls per individual, with special attention on the sources of all foods consumed. Results: The median proportion of daily energy intake of consumers provided by non-home prepared foods ranged from 13% for schoolchildren in Korogocho to 36% for men in Dandora. The median contribution to fat intake was higher than to energy, but the contributions to iron and vitamin A intakes were lower than to energy intake. Men consumed more non-home prepared foods on weekdays than at the weekend. Intakes of energy and most nutrients were below Kenyan Recommended Daily Intakes in all groups, but similar for consumers and non-consumers. In Korogocho, street foods were the main source of non-home prepared foods. In Dandora, both kiosks and street foods were major sources. Conclusions: Non-home prepared foods are an important source of energy and nutients for men, women and schoolchildren in Nairobi. In Korogocho, street foods, and in Dandora, both kiosks and street foods are the main sources of non-home prepared foods. The adequacy of energy and nutrient intakes does not differ between consumers and non-consumers of non-home prepared foods

Performance of the Amoeba Distributed Operating System

Amoeba is a capability‐based distributed operating system designed for high‐performance interactions between clients and servers using the well‐known RPC model. The paper starts out by describing the architecture of the Amoeba system, which is typified by specialized components such as workstations, several services, a processor pool, and gateways that connect other Amoeba systems transparently over wide‐area networks. Next the RPC interface is described. The paper presents performance measurements of the Amoeba RPC on unloaded and loaded systems. The time to perform the simplest RPC between two user processes has been measured to be 1‐4 ms. Compared to SUN 3/50's RPC, Amoeba has one ninth of the delay, and over three times the throughput. Finally we describe the Amoeba file server. The Amoeba file server is so fast that it is limited by the communication bandwidth. To the best of our knowledge this is the fastest file server yet reported in the literature for this class of hardware. Copyright © 1989 John Wiley & Sons, Lt

Beyond UNIX - A True Distributed System for the 1990s

UNIX has been around now for almost 20 years. At the time UNIX began, most departments felt themselves well-endowed indeed if they owned a single PDP-11/45 with 256K memory and a 2.5M RK05 disk. Nowadays a laptop would be embarrassed to have only that. It is our hypothesis that UNIX is no longer the appropriate kind of operating system for the 1990s. In this paper, a new system, Amoeba, will be described, that we believe meets the requirements for distributed computing in the 1990s

Amoeba - A distributed Operating System for the 1990s

n the nexi decdde, computer prices will drop 50 low that IO, 20, or per-1 haps IO0 powerful microprocessors per user will be feasible. All this computing power will have to be organized in a simple, efficient, and fault-tolerant system that is easy to use. The basic problem with current networks of PCs and workstations is that they are not transparent; that is, users are aware of the other machines. The user logs into one machine and uses that machine only, until doing a remote login to another machine. Few if any programs take advantage of multiple CPUs, even when all are idle

Molecular profiles of BRCA1-mutated and matched sporadic breast tumours: relation with clinico-pathological features

About 5–10% of breast cancers are hereditary; a genetically and clinically heterogeneous disease in which several susceptibility genes, including BRCA1, have been identified. While distinct tumour features can be used to estimate the likelihood that a breast tumour is caused by a BRCA1 germline mutation it is not yet possible to categorize a BRCA1 mutated tumour. The aim of the present study is to molecularly classify BRCA1 mutated breast cancers by resolving gene expression patterns of BRCA1 and matched sporadic surgical breast tumour specimens. The expression profiles of 6 frozen breast tumour tissues with a proven BRCA1 gene mutation were weighed against those from 12 patients without a known family history but who had similar clinico-pathological characteristics. In addition two fibroblast cultures, the breast cancer cell-line HCC1937 and its corresponding B-lymphoblastoid cell line (heterozygous for mutation BRCA1 5382insC) and an epithelial ovarian cancer cell line (A2780) were studied. Using a high density membrane based array for screening of RNA isolated from these samples and standard algorithms and software, we were able to distinguish subgroups of sporadic cases and a group consisting mainly of BRCA1-mutated breast tumours. Furthermore this pilot analysis revealed a gene cluster that differentially expressed genes related to cell substrate formation, adhesion, migration and cell organization in BRCA1-mutated tumours compared to sporadic breast tumours. © 2001 Cancer Research Campaign http://www.bjcancer.co

Combined vascular endothelial growth factor and TP53 status predicts poor response to tamoxifen therapy in estrogen receptor-positive advanced breast cancer

PURPOSE: In recent studies, we showed that TP53 gene mutation or high levels of cytosolic vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) in estrogen receptor (ER)-alpha-positive primary breast tumors predict a poor disease outcome for patients treated with first-line tamoxifen for advanced disease. Mutant TP53 may up-regulate VEGF, whereas, on the other hand, wild-type TP53 may decrease VEGF production. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN: In the present study, we aimed to assess the combined predictive value of TP53 gene mutation and VEGF status of 160 advanced breast cancer patients with ER-positive tumors who were treated with tamoxifen (median follow-up from start of tamoxifen treatment, 64 months). To assess TP53 gene mutation status, the entire open reading frame was sequenced; for VEGF status, an ELISA was used. RESULTS: In univariate analysis, both TP53 gene mutation (28% of the tumors) and a VEGF level above the median value were significantly associated with a short progression-free survival, post-relapse overall survival, and a poor rate of response to tamoxifen. In Cox multivariate regression analysis including the traditional predictive factors, the addition of TP53 gene mutation and VEGF status, alone or in combination, significantly predicted a poor efficacy of tamoxifen treatment. When the two factors were combined, a significantly decreased odds ratio was seen for the rate of response (odds ratio, 0.27). Similarly, an increased hazard ratio (HR) was seen for progression-free survival (HR, 2.32) and post-relapse overall survival (HR, 1.68) in the group with mutant TP53 and high VEGF compared with the group with both risk factors absent. CONCLUSIONS: Combined TP53 gene mutation status and high VEGF levels of ER-positive primary breast tumors independently predict a poor course of the disease of patients with advanced breast cancer treated with tamoxifen. These patients, having unfavorable tumor characteristics, might benefit more from other types of (individualized) treatment protocols