Effects of Extra Virgin Olive Oil Phytochemicals Supplementation and Aerobic Exercise Training on Inflammatory and Hormonal Markers in Rats Fed Atherogenic Diet

Westernized diet and sedentary lifestyle may exacerbate systemic inflammation and provoke hormonal changes. Extra virgin olive oil (EVOO) derived phytochemicals Oleocanthal (Oleo) and Oleacein (Olea) demonstrate anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects. PURPOSE: The purpose of the study is to evaluate the effects of Oleo/Olea supplementation and aerobic exercise training (AET) on plasma inflammatory cytokines and hormones in rats fed high fat atherogenic diet. METHODS: Forty-eight female Sprague-Dawley rats were fed an atherogenic diet consisting of 1.25% cholesterol and 0.5% cholic acid for 12 weeks. Half of the rats were supplemented with 20% EVOO containing high Oleo/Olea (1000 mg/kg, HO, n=24) or low Oleo/Olea (100 mg/kg, LO, n=24). In each dietary group, half group was trained (T) on treadmill for 12 weeks (25m/min, 10% grade for 60 min/day, 5 days/week), while the other half remained sedentary. Two separate groups of rats were fed a chow diet (C, n=6) and atherogenic diet (A, n=12), respectively without EVOO or T. Inflammatory cytokines (interleukin (IL)-1β, monocyte chemoattractant protein (MCP)-1 and tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α) and hormones (leptin and insulin) were measured in plasma using Bioplex 200 Multiplex immunoassay. RESULTS: IL-1β and TNF-α were increased in A vs. C (P=\u3c0.01). LO increased IL-1β compared to A (P\u3c0.05) but not HO. HO showed a trend to lower IL-1β vs.LO (P=0.064). Although MCP-1 and TNF-α were both decreased in EVOO vs. A (P\u3e0.05), significant differences were only found in EVOO+T compared to A (P\u3c0.05). Insulin was also decreased in LO vs. A (P\u3c0.05), but elevated in HO vs. LO (P\u3c0.05). CONCLUSION: High-fat atherogenic diet induced plasma inflammatory cytokines but were ameliorated by EVOO supplementation and AET. Hormones leptin and insulin were decreased by EVOO supplementation and AET

The infrared dust bubble N22: an expanding HII region and the star formation around it

Aims. To increase the observational samples of star formation around expanding Hii regions, we analyzed the interstellar medium and star formation around N22. Methods. We used data extracted from the seven large-scale surveys from infrared to radio wavelengths. In addition we used the JCMT observations of the J = 3-2 line of 12CO emission data released on CADC and the 12CO J = 2-1 and J =3-2 lines observed by the KOSMA 3 m telescope. We performed a multiwavelength study of bubble N22. Results. A molecular shell composed of several clumps agrees very well with the border of N22, suggesting that its expansion is collecting the surrounding material. The high integrated 12CO line intensity ratio (ranging from 0.7 to 1.14) implies that shocks have driven into the molecular clouds. We identify eleven possible O-type stars inside the Hii region, five of which are located in projection inside the cavity of the 20 cm radio continuum emission and are probably the exciting-star candidates of N22. Twenty-nine YSOs (young stellar objects) are distributed close to the dense cores of N22. We conclude that star formation is indeed active around N22; the formation of most of YSOs may have been triggered by the expanding of the Hii region. After comparing the dynamical age of N22 and the fragmentation time of the molecular shell, we suggest that radiation-driven compression of pre-existing dense clumps may be ongoing.Comment: accepted in A&A 30/05/2012. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1010.5430 by other author

Medium dependence of the bag constant in the quark-meson coupling model

Possible variations of the quark-meson coupling (QMC) model are examined in which the bag constant decreases in the nuclear medium. The reduction is supposed to depend on either the mean scalar field or the effective mass of the nucleon. It is shown that the electric and magnetic radii of the bound nucleon are almost linearly correlated with the bag constant. Using the fact that the size of the bound nucleon inside a nucleus is strongly constrained by $y$-scaling data in quasielastic, electron-nucleus scattering, we set a limit for the reduction allowed in the bag constant for these two models. The present study implies that the bag constant can decrease up to 10--17 % at average nuclear density, depending on the details of the model.Comment: 31 pages including 4 ps figures, to appear in Nucl.Phys.

Photo-stability study of a solution-processed small molecule solar cell system: correlation between molecular conformation and degradation

<p>Solution-processed organic small molecule solar cells (SMSCs) have achieved efficiency over 11%. However, very few studies have focused on their stability under illumination and the origin of the degradation during the so-called burn-in period. Here, we studied the burn-in period of a solution-processed SMSC using benzodithiophene terthiophene rhodamine:[6,6]-phenyl C₇₁ butyric acid methyl ester (BTR:PC₇₁BM) with increasing solvent vapour annealing time applied to the active layer, controlling the crystallisation of the BTR phase. We find that the burn-in behaviour is strongly correlated to the crystallinity of BTR. To look at the possible degradation mechanisms, we studied the fresh and photo-aged blend films with grazing incidence X-ray diffraction, UV–vis absorbance, Raman spectroscopy and photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy. Although the crystallinity of BTR affects the performance drop during the burn-in period, the degradation is found not to originate from the crystallinity changes of the BTR phase, but correlates with changes in molecular conformation – rotation of the thiophene side chains, as resolved by Raman spectroscopy which could be correlated to slight photobleaching and changes in PL spectra.</p

Resistance to autosomal dominant Alzheimer's disease in an APOE3 Christchurch homozygote: a case report.

We identified a PSEN1 (presenilin 1) mutation carrier from the world's largest autosomal dominant Alzheimer's disease kindred, who did not develop mild cognitive impairment until her seventies, three decades after the expected age of clinical onset. The individual had two copies of the APOE3 Christchurch (R136S) mutation, unusually high brain amyloid levels and limited tau and neurodegenerative measurements. Our findings have implications for the role of APOE in the pathogenesis, treatment and prevention of Alzheimer's disease

Using self-organizing maps to investigate environmental factors regulating colony size and breeding success of the White Stork (Ciconia ciconia)

We studied variations in the size of breeding colonies and in breeding performance of White Storks Ciconia ciconia in 2006–2008 in north-east Algeria. Each colony site was characterized using 12 environmental variables describing the physical environment, land-cover categories, and human activities, and by three demographic parameters: the number of breeding pairs, the number of pairs with chicks, and the number of fledged chicks per pair. Generalized linear mixed models and the self-organizing map algorithm (SOM, neural network) were used to investigate effects of biotic, abiotic, and anthropogenic factors on demographic parameters and on their relationships. Numbers of breeding pairs and of pairs with chicks were affected by the same environmental factors, mainly anthropogenic, which differed from those affecting the number of fledged chicks per pair. Numbers of fledged chicks per pair was not affected by colony size or by the number of nests with chicks. The categorization of the environmental variables into natural and anthropogenic, in connection with demographic parameters, was relevant to detect factors explaining variation in colony size and breeding parameters. The SOM proved a relevant tool to help determine actual dynamics in White Stork colonies, and thus to support effective conservation decisions at a regional scale

Ferromagnetic supramolecular metal-organic frameworks for active capture and magnetic sensing of emerging drug pollutants

Capture and sensing of emerging pollutants is one of the increasing environmental concerns due to the adverse ecological and human health effects. Here, we report the synthesis of a supramolecular metal-organic framework (SMOF) [CrCu6(m-H2O)6(m3-OH)6(m-adeninato-kN33:kN9)6](SO4)1.5 which is able to capture anionic drugs and exhibits magnetic properties useful for sensing purposes. The features of the nucleobase decorated CrCu6 building block allow the incorporation of up to 9 drug molecules (i.e., ibuprofen and naproxen in this work) per heptameric entity. In addition, we provide a simple way to quantify the incorporated number of drug molecules through a magnetic sustentation experiment in which the field required to keep the particles attached to the electromagnet pole is linearly related to the total mass of the anionic counterion. In this way, it also provides an easy way to determine the amount of entrapped drug molecules, making this SMOF a promising candidate for environmental remediation technologies.This work has been funded by the Universidad del País Vasco/Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea (GIU17/50), the Gobierno Vasco/Eusko Jaurlaritza (PIBA18/14; IT1291-19), the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (MAT2016-75883-C2-1-P), the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (PID2019-108028GB-C21), and FEDER funds. Technical and human support provided by SGIker (UPV/EHU, MICINN, GV/EJ, and ESF) is also acknowledged

Planetary Candidates Observed by Kepler VI: Planet Sample from Q1-Q16 (47 Months)

\We present the sixth catalog of Kepler candidate planets based on nearly 4 years of high precision photometry. This catalog builds on the legacy of previous catalogs released by the Kepler project and includes 1493 new Kepler Objects of Interest (KOIs) of which 554 are planet candidates, and 131 of these candidates have best fit radii <1.5 R_earth. This brings the total number of KOIs and planet candidates to 7305 and 4173 respectively. We suspect that many of these new candidates at the low signal-to-noise limit may be false alarms created by instrumental noise, and discuss our efforts to identify such objects. We re-evaluate all previously published KOIs with orbital periods of >50 days to provide a consistently vetted sample that can be used to improve planet occurrence rate calculations. We discuss the performance of our planet detection algorithms, and the consistency of our vetting products. The full catalog is publicly available at the NASA Exoplanet Archive.Comment: 18 pages, to be published in the Astrophysical Journal Supplement Serie

Pregnancy outcomes in antiphospholipid antibody positive patients: prospective results from the AntiPhospholipid Syndrome Alliance for Clinical Trials and InternatiOnal Networking (APS ACTION) Clinical Database and Repository ('Registry').

Objectives: To describe the outcomes of pregnancies in antiphospholipid antibody (aPL)-positive patients since the inception of the AntiPhospholipid Syndrome Alliance for Clinical Trials and InternatiOnal Networking Registry. Methods: We identified persistently aPL-positive patients recorded as 'pregnant' during prospective follow-up, and defined 'aPL-related outcome' as a composite of: (1) Preterm live delivery (PTLD) at or before 37th week due to pre-eclampsia (PEC), eclampsia, small-for-gestational age (SGA) and/or placental insufficiency (PI); or (2) Otherwise unexplained fetal death after the 10th week of gestation. The primary objective was to describe the characteristics of patients with and without aPL-related composite outcomes based on their first observed pregnancies following registry recruitment. Results: Of the 55 first pregnancies observed after registry recruitment among nulliparous and multiparous participants, 15 (27%) resulted in early pregnancy loss <10 weeks gestation. Of the remaining 40 pregnancies: (1) 26 (65%) resulted in term live delivery (TLD), 4 (10%) in PTLD between 34.0 weeks and 36.6 weeks, 5 (12.5%) in PTLD before 34th week, and 5 (12.5%) in fetal death (two associated with genetic anomalies); and (2) The aPL-related composite outcome occurred in 9 (23%). One of 26 (4%) pregnancies with TLD, 3/4 (75%) with PTLD between 34.0 weeks and 36.6 weeks, and 3/5 (60%) with PTLD before 34th week were complicated with PEC, SGA and/or PI. Fifty of 55 (91%) pregnancies were in lupus anticoagulant positive subjects, as well as all pregnancies with aPL-related composite outcome. Conclusion: In our multicentre, international, aPL-positive cohort, of 55 first pregnancies observed prospectively, 15 (27%) were complicated by early pregnancy loss. Of the remaining 40 pregnancies, composite pregnancy morbidity was observed in 9 (23%) pregnancies

Cognitive Trajectory Changes Over 20 Years Before Dementia Diagnosis: A Large Cohort Study.

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES: Longitudinal studies have shown an increase in cognitive decline many years before clinical diagnosis of dementia. We sought to estimate changes, relative to normal aging, in the trajectory of scores on a global cognitive function test-the Cognitive Abilities Screening Instrument (CASI). DESIGN: A prospective cohort study. SETTING: Community-dwelling members of a U.S. health maintenance organization. PARTICIPANTS: Individuals aged 65 and older who had no dementia diagnosis at baseline and had at least two visits with valid CASI test score (N = 4,315). MEASUREMENTS: Average longitudinal trajectories, including changes in trajectory before clinical diagnosis in those who would be diagnosed with dementia, were estimated for CASI item response theory (IRT) scores. The impact of sex, education level, and APOE genotype on cognitive trajectories was assessed. RESULTS: Increased cognitive decline relative to normal aging was evident in CASI IRT at least 10 years before clinical diagnosis. Male gender, lower education, and presence of ≥1 APOE ε4 alleles were associated with lower average IRT scores. In those who would be diagnosed with dementia, a trajectory change point was estimated at an average of 3.1 years (95% confidence interval 3.0-3.2) before clinical diagnosis, after which cognitive decline appeared to accelerate. The change point did not differ by sex, education level, or APOE ε4 genotype. There were subtle differences in trajectory slopes by sex and APOE ε4 genotype, but not by education. CONCLUSION: Decline in average global cognitive function was evident at least 10 years before clinical diagnosis of dementia. The decline accelerated about 3 years before clinical diagnosis