Cigarette smoking is associated with reduced neuroinflammation and better cognitive control in people living with HIV.

People living with HIV (HIV+) are roughly twice as likely to smoke cigarettes (Smok+) as the general population. With the advent of effective antiretroviral therapies, it is increasingly important to understand the effects of chronic HIV infection and cigarette smoking on brain function and cognition since HIV+ individuals have heightened neuroinflammation and cognitive deficits even with such therapies. Based on prior studies demonstrating that smoking reduces a marker for neuroinflammation in HIV- individuals, we hypothesized that HIV+/Smok+ individuals would have less neuroinflammation and better cognitive control than HIV+/Smok- individuals.

Assessing the relationship between mental health and AUDIT score among older sexual and gender minorities.

Introduction: Alcohol use, and its relationship with mental health outcomes, remains a public health priority. Yet, little research has focused on this association among aging sexual and gender minority (SGM) populations with even less dedicated to the unique issues of those aging with HIV, a gap we begin to fill here.

Methods: Data for this analysis originated from the Columbus Healthy Aging Project (CHAP), a cross-sectional survey among adults ≥50 years who reside in the Columbus, Ohio.

Introducing "Identification Probability" for Automated and Transferable Assessment of Metabolite Identification Confidence in Metabolomics and Related Studies.

Methods for assessing compound identification confidence in metabolomics and related studies have been debated and actively researched for the past two decades. The earliest effort in 2007 focused primarily on mass spectrometry and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and resulted in four recommended levels of metabolite identification confidence─the Metabolite Standards Initiative (MSI) Levels. In 2014, the original MSI Levels were expanded to five levels (including two sublevels) to facilitate communication of compound identification confidence in high resolution mass spectrometry studies.

Childhood sexual abuse, alcohol problem scores, and race are associated with syphilis incidence in a prospective cohort of young sexual and gender minority adults assigned male at birth.

Background: Syphilis rates in the United States have dramatically increased in recent years and are high among young men who have sex with men and transgender women. Yet, few studies have examined a wide-range of risk factors for syphilis incidence prospectively in young sexual and gender minority (YSGM) populations in the U.S.

Mammalian hydroxylation of microbiome-derived obesogen, delta-valerobetaine, to homocarnitine, a 5-carbon carnitine analogue.

The recently discovered microbiome-generated obesogen, δ-valerobetaine (5-(trimethylammonio)pentanoate), is a 5-carbon structural analogue of the carnitine precursor, γ-butyrobetaine. Here, we report that δ-valerobetaine is enzymatically hydroxylated by mammalian γ-butyrobetaine dioxygenase (BBOX) to form 3-hydroxy-5-(trimethylammonio)pentanoate, a 5-carbon analogue of carnitine, which we term homocarnitine. Homocarnitine production by human liver extracts depends upon the required BBOX cofactors, 2-oxoglutarate, Fe, and ascorbate.