Sexual dimorphic effects of a keystone predator on prey communities.

The importance of trait variation has long been recognized in ecological and evolutionary research. The divergence of sexually dimorphic traits (e.g.

Medical Students' Attitudes Toward the COVID-19 Vaccine and Medical School Vaccine Education: A Survey Study.

Objective: The aim of this study is to investigate how demographic factors influence medical students' attitudes toward COVID-19 vaccines and their perceptions of vaccine education in medical school curricula.

Methods: A 28-question anonymous online survey was distributed to 640 medical students at one academic medical institution. Individual attitudes toward vaccines were evaluated using a 5-point Likert scale.

Alternative splicing expands the antiviral IFITM repertoire in Chinese rufous horseshoe bats.

Species-specific interferon responses are shaped by the virus-host arms race. The human interferon-induced transmembrane protein (IFITM) family consists of three antiviral IFITM genes that arose by gene duplication. These genes restrict virus entry and are key players in antiviral interferon responses.

Schistosome esophageal gland factor MEG-8.2 drives host cell lysis and interacts with host immune proteins.

Schistosomes are blood flukes that ingest large amounts of host blood during their intra-mammalian stage. The ingested blood contains leukocytes that can be harmful, yet the parasites survive inside the host for decades, reflecting superb immune evasion mechanisms that remain poorly understood. Our previous work discovered that FoxA, a forkhead transcription factor, drives the production of the esophageal gland, an anterior digestive organ essential for degrading the ingested leukocytes and for survival.

Value-Based Healthcare in Practice: IDEATE, a Collaboration to Design and Test an Outcomes-Based Agreement for a Medicine in Wales.

Objective: To develop a sustainable, scalable methodology for the design of outcome-based agreements (OBAs) that works on the ground and dynamically overcomes historical challenges.

Methods: Project IDEATE co-created solutions to known (and emergent) challenges via iterative workshops and real-world data analysis to develop and refine a hypothetical model for an OBA in a trusted research environment. A cross-disciplinary collaboration between National Health Service (NHS) Wales, industry and academia was developed.

An observational human laboratory assessment of nicotine delivery, vaping topography and subjective effects of usual brand electronic cigarette use among young adults.

Aims: To measure nicotine delivery, vaping topography and subjective effects of current generations of disposable, cartridge-based and other types of electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) among young adults.

Design, Setting, Participants: Observational, human laboratory assessment of e-cigarette use in Columbus, Ohio, USA (July 2020 to June 2021). Participants (n = 96, 60.

Estimated Cardiorespiratory Fitness and Metabolic Risks.

This review focuses on the emerging evidence for the association between non-exercise fitness testing, estimated cardiorespiratory fitness (eCRF), and metabolic risk factors. Given the challenges associated with directly measuring cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) in large populations, eCRF presents a practical alternative for predicting metabolic health risks. A literature search identified seven relevant cohort studies from 2020 to 2024 that investigated the association of eCRF with hypertension, hyperglycemia, dyslipidemia, and obesity.

The Energetic Stress Marker GDF15 is Induced by Acute Psychosocial Stress.

GDF15 (growth differentiation factor 15) is a marker of cellular and mitochondrial energetic stress linked to physical-mental illness, aging, and mortality. Here, we describe the psychobiological regulation of plasma and saliva GDF15 in four human studies including 3,599 samples from 148 healthy individuals. We report two main observations establishing GDF15 as a novel tractable biomarker of psychosocial stress.

Molecular Transducers of Physical Activity Consortium (MoTrPAC): human studies design and protocol.

Physical activity, including structured exercise, is associated with favorable health-related chronic disease outcomes. Although there is evidence of various molecular pathways that affect these responses, a comprehensive molecular map of these molecular responses to exercise has not been developed. The Molecular Transducers of Physical Activity Consortium (MoTrPAC) is a multicenter study designed to isolate the effects of structured exercise training on the molecular mechanisms underlying the health benefits of exercise and physical activity.

The innate immune factor RPRD2/REAF and its role in the Lv2 restriction of HIV.

Intracellular innate immunity involves co-evolved antiviral restriction factors that specifically inhibit infecting viruses. Studying these restrictions has increased our understanding of viral replication, host-pathogen interactions, and pathogenesis, and represent potential targets for novel antiviral therapies. Lentiviral restriction 2 (Lv2) was identified as an unmapped early-phase restriction of HIV-2 and later shown to also restrict HIV-1 and simian immunodeficiency virus.

Cardiovascular variability, sociodemographics, and biomarkers of disease: the MIDUS study.

Like heart rate, blood pressure (BP) is not steady but varies over intervals as long as months to as short as consecutive cardiac cycles. This blood pressure variability (BPV) consists of regularly occurring oscillations as well as less well-organized changes and typically is computed as the standard deviation of multiple clinic visit-to-visit (VVV-BP) measures or from 24-h ambulatory BP recordings (ABPV). BP also varies on a beat-to-beat basis, quantified by methods that parse variation into discrete bins, e.

An Insurance Value Modeling Approach That Captures the Wider Value of a Novel Antimicrobial to Health Systems, Patients, and the Population.

Traditional health economic evaluations of antimicrobials currently underestimate their value to wider society. They can be supplemented by additional value elements including insurance value, which captures the value of an antimicrobial in preventing or mitigating impacts of adverse risk events. Despite being commonplace in other sectors, constituents of the impacts and approaches for estimating insurance value have not been investigated.

Multivitamin Supplementation Improves Memory in Older Adults: A Randomized Clinical Trial.

Background: Maintenance of cognitive abilities is of critical importance to older adults, yet few effective strategies to slow cognitive decline currently exist. Multivitamin supplementation is used to promote general health; it is unclear whether it favorably affects cognition in older age.

Objectives: To examine the effect of daily multivitamin/multimineral supplementation on memory in older adults.

Association between Estimated Cardiorespiratory Fitness and Abnormal Glucose Risk: A Cohort Study.

Background: Cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) is a predictor of chronic disease that is impractical to routinely measure in primary care settings. We used a new estimated cardiorespiratory fitness (eCRF) algorithm that uses information routinely documented in electronic health care records to predict abnormal blood glucose incidence.

Methods: Participants were adults (17.

Obstructive sleep apnea, myocardial perfusion and myocardial blood flow: A study of older male twins.

Background: Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) has been associated with incidence of cardiovascular disease and with nocturnal angina, but evidence of a link with coronary atherosclerosis and myocardial ischemia is limited and previous studies may have been affected by selection bias or unmeasured confounding factors.

Methods: We performed overnight polysomnography in 178 older male twins. The Apnea/Hypopnea Index (AHI) was calculated to assess OSA from the overnight sleep evaluation.

Anatomical biology guides a search for nutrients for the aging brain.

Considerable evidence has established the importance of specific nutrients that have been found vital for the developing brain. We hypothesize that in a similar manner there should be nutrients vital to the aging brain and that based on aging's distinct pathophysiology they should be different than those essential to development. Specific brain networks that govern cognition are particularly vulnerable to the aging process, resulting in what is referred to as 'cognitive aging'.

Enzyme 1 of the phosphoenolpyruvate:sugar phosphotransferase system is involved in resistance to MreB disruption in wild-type and ∆envC cells.

Cell wall synthesis in bacteria is determined by two protein complexes: the elongasome and divisome. The elongasome is coordinated by the actin homolog MreB while the divisome is organized by the tubulin homolog FtsZ. While these two systems must coordinate with each other to ensure that elongation and division are coregulated, this cross talk has been understudied.

Variations in comorbidity burden in people with type 2 diabetes over disease duration: A population-based analysis of real world evidence.

Background: The prevalence of type 2 diabetes (T2DM) is increasing, but increasing longevity among persons with diagnosed diabetes may be is associated with more extensive and diverse types of morbidity. The extent and breadth of morbidity and how this varies across sub-groups is unclear and could have important clinical and public health implications. We aimed to estimate comorbidity profiles in people with T2DM and variations across sub-groups and over time.