Protective Effects of Maternal Education against Low Birth Weight Deliveries: Blacks' Diminished Returns.

Background: Racial and economic disparities in low birth weight (LBW) deliveries is among the most well-established differences between Blacks and Whites. As LBW is an established risk factor for chronic diseases such as asthma and diabetes, it is particularly important to understand drivers of racial and economic disparities in LBW deliveries in urban areas.

Aims: Built on the Minorities' Diminished Returns framework, which argues that educational attainment generates fewer positive health outcomes for Black than White Americans, we conducted this study with three aims: 1) to test the association between mothers' educational attainment and LBW of babies born in urban areas, 2) to compare Blacks and Whites for the effect of mothers' educational attainment on LBW, and 3) to test whether LBW is predictive of future chronic diseases 15 years later.

Nucleus Accumbens Functional Connectivity with the Frontoparietal Network Predicts Subsequent Change in Body Mass Index for American Children.

The epidemiological observation that NAc functional connectivity is associated with BMI changes in children is an extension of well-controlled laboratory studies that have established the role of the NAc in the brain reward processing. More research is needed on sex differences in the brain regions that contribute to childhood obesity.

Reconnecting Homeless Adolescents and Their Families: Correlates of Participation in a Family Intervention.

Behavioral family interventions are an effective way to intervene to prevent negative developmental outcomes for adolescents. Participation in family interventions encompasses behavioral and cognitive/attitudinal dimensions, among others, indicated by retention and engagement, respectively. Two dimensions of participation, retention and engagement, in a family intervention were examined in a sample of newly homeless adolescents and their parents or guardians.

Race, Socioeconomic Status, and Sex Hormones among Male and Female American Adolescents.

Although early sexual initiation and childbearing are major barriers against the upward social mobility of American adolescents, particularly those who belong to a low socioeconomic status (SES) and racial minorities such as Blacks, less is known on how SES and race correlate with adolescents' sex hormones. An understanding of the associations between race and SES with adolescents' sex hormones may help better understand why racial, and SES gaps exist in sexual risk behaviors and teen pregnancies. To extend the existing knowledge on social patterning of adolescents' sex hormones, in the current study, we studied social patterning of sex hormones in a national sample of male and female American adolescents, with a particular interest in the role of race and SES.

A Dream Deferred: African American Women's Diminished Socioeconomic Returns of Postponing Childbearing from Teenage to Adulthood.

Background: Brookings Institution has identified postponing childbirth from teenage to adulthood as a major strategy that is needed for upward social mobility of women. However, according to the Minorities' Diminished Returns (MDRs), the associations between aspirations, investments, behaviors, and socioeconomic position (SEP) may be diminished for marginalized groups such as African Americans.

Objective: To extend the existing knowledge on the MDRs, the current study had two aims: First to compare White and African American women for the association between postponing childbearing to adulthood and SEP in a national sample of American women.

Evaluation of the In Vitro Damage Caused by Lipid Factors on Stem Cells from a Female Rat Model of Type 2 Diabetes/Obesity and Stress Urinary Incontinence.

Human stem cell therapy for type 2 diabetes/obesity (T2D/O) complications is performedwith stem cell autografts, exposed to the noxious T2D/O milieu, often with suboptimal results.We showed in the Obese Zucker (OZ) rat model of T2D/O that when their muscle-derived stemcells (MDSC) were from long-term T2D/O male rats, their repair ecacy for erectile dysfunctionwas impaired and were imprinted with abnormal gene- and miR-global transcriptional signatures(GTS). The damage was reproduced in vitro by short-term exposure of normal MDSC to dyslipidemicserum, causing altered miR-GTS, fat infiltration, apoptosis, impaired scratch healing, and myostatinoverexpression.

Antia, a Natural Antioxidant Product, Attenuates Cognitive Dysfunction in Streptozotocin-Induced Mouse Model of Sporadic Alzheimer's Disease by Targeting the Amyloidogenic, Inflammatory, Autophagy, and Oxidative Stress Pathways.

Background: Many neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's disease are associated with oxidative stress. Therefore, antioxidant therapy has been suggested for the prevention and treatment of neurodegenerative diseases.

Objective: We investigated the ability of the antioxidant Antia to exert a protective effect against sporadic Alzheimer's disease (SAD) induced in mice.

Bovine HDL and Dual Domain HDL-Mimetic Peptides Inhibit Tumor Development in Mice.

A growing body of literature supports the role of apolipoproteins present in HDL in the treatment of pro-inflammatory diseases including cancer. We examined whether bovine HDL (bHDL) and three dual-domain peptides, namely AEM-28 and its analog AEM-28-2, and HM-10/10, affect tumor growth and development in mouse models of ovarian and colon cancer. We demonstrate that bHDL inhibits mouse colorectal cancer cell line CT26-mediated lung tumor development, and mouse ovarian cancer cell line ID8-mediated tumor burden.

EMP2 Is a Novel Regulator of Stemness in Breast Cancer Cells.

Little is known about the role of epithelial membrane protein-2 (EMP2) in breast cancer development or progression. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that EMP2 may regulate the formation or self-renewal of breast cancer stem cells (BCSC) in the tumor microenvironment. analysis of gene expression data demonstrated a correlation of EMP2 expression with known metastasis-related genes and markers of cancer stem cells (CSC) including aldehyde dehydrogenase (ALDH).

Chemopreventive role of arabinoxylan rice bran, MGN-3/Biobran, on liver carcinogenesis in rats.

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is one of the most common cancers in the world and one of the most lethal. MGN-3/Biobran is a natural product derived from rice bran hemicelluloses and has been reported to possess a potent anticancer effect in a clinical study of patients with HCC. The current study examines the mechanisms by which Biobran protects against chemically induced hepatocarcinogenesis in rats.

The role of PPM1D in cancer and advances in studies of its inhibitors.

A greater understanding of factors causing cancer initiation, progression and evolution is of paramount importance. Among them, the serine/threonine phosphatase PPM1D, also referred to as wild-type p53-induced phosphatase 1 (Wip1) or protein phosphatase 2C delta (PP2Cδ), is emerging as an important oncoprotein due to its negative regulation on a number of crucial cancer suppressor pathways. Initially identified as a p53-regulated gene, PPM1D has been afterwards found amplified and more recently mutated in many human cancers such as breast cancer.

Parental Education and Nucleus Accumbens Response to Reward Anticipation: Minorities' Diminished Returns.

Background: Considerable research has documented the effects of race and socioeconomic status (SES) on reward-seeking behaviors; however, less is known about the multiplicative effects of race and family SES on brain response to reward anticipation. Marginalization-related Diminished Returns (MDRs) suggest that family SES would show weaker effects on brain development of children in non-White families than in White families.

Objective: To test race by SES variation in Nucleus Accumbens (NAcc) response to reward anticipation (NAcc-RA) among American children.

American Indian, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Children's Body Mass Index: Diminished Returns of Parental Education and Family Income.

Background: Socioeconomic status (SES) is associated with several health-related outcomes, such as obesity and body mass index (BMI). However, we do not know whether SES is associated differently with children's BMI from American Indian and Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander (AIAN/NHPI) families when compared to non-Hispanic White (NHW) families.

Aim: To compare AIAN/NHPI and NHW families for associations between parental education, family income, and children's BMI in the United States (U.

Endoplasmic reticulum Ca2+ release causes Rieske iron-sulfur protein-mediated mitochondrial ROS generation in pulmonary artery smooth muscle cells.

Mitochondrial reactive oxygen species (ROS) cause Ca2+ release from the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) via ryanodine receptors (RyRs) in pulmonary artery smooth muscle cells (PASMCs), playing an essential role in hypoxic pulmonary vasoconstriction (HPV). Here we tested a novel hypothesis that hypoxia-induced RyR-mediated Ca2+ release may, in turn, promote mitochondrial ROS generation contributing to hypoxic cellular responses in PASMCs. Our data reveal that application of caffeine to elevate intracellular Ca2+ concentration ([Ca2+]i) by activating RyRs results in a significant increase in ROS production in cytosol and mitochondria of PASMCs.

PP2Cδ inhibits p300-mediated p53 acetylation via ATM/BRCA1 pathway to impede DNA damage response in breast cancer.

Although nuclear type 2C protein phosphatase (PP2Cδ) has been demonstrated to be pro-oncogenic with an important role in tumorigenesis, the underlying mechanisms that link aberrant PP2Cδ levels with cancer development remain elusive. Here, we found that aberrant PP2Cδ activity decreases p53 acetylation and its transcriptional activity and suppresses doxorubicin-induced cell apoptosis. Mechanistically, we show that BRCA1 facilitates p300-mediated p53 acetylation by complexing with these two proteins and that S1423/1524 phosphorylation is indispensable for this regulatory process.

Comparing the Effect of Gabapentin, Ketamine, Dexmedetomidine, and Entonox on Pain Control in Burn Wound Dressing.

This study aimed to evaluate differences in the experience of pain, nausea, and vomiting, as well as the hemodynamic parameters including heart rate (HR) and blood pressure (BP) in burn patients across four pain treatment groups-i.e., gabapentin, ketamine, dexmedetomidine, and entonox.

Helmet use and bicycle-related trauma injury outcomes.

: It is essential to identify factors that predict helmet use, so as to mitigate the injury and mortality from bicycle accidents.: To examine the relationship between helmet use and the bicycle-related trauma injury outcomes among bicyclists with head/neck injury in the US.: Data from the 2002-2012 National Trauma Data Bank were used, including all trauma bicycle riders involved in bicycle-related accidents whose primary reason for the hospital or Intensive Care Unit stay was head or neck injury.

Prevalence, awareness, treatment, and control of hypertension and their determinants: Results from the first cohort of non-communicable diseases in a Kurdish settlement.

Hypertension is a public health issue in Iran. The study aimed to estimate the prevalence, awareness, treatment, and control of hypertension, and to explore their determinants among 10,040 Kurdish adults from Ravansar Non-Communicable Disease (RaNCD) cohort study in Iran. Univariate, and multivariate analyses were used for statistical analysis.

Evaluation of the Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) Standard for Representation of Knowledge Bases Encoded in the Arden Syntax.

Context: Arden Syntax is a standard that encodes knowledge as Medical Logic Modules (MLMs) but lacks a standard query data model and terminology.

Objective: Assess to what extent FHIR can represent MLMs.

Method: A convenience sample of 340 MLMs were examined and tabulated for representation using the PlanDefinition resource.

Stem Cells from a Female Rat Model of Type 2 Diabetes/Obesity and Stress Urinary Incontinence Are Damaged by In Vitro Exposure to its Dyslipidemic Serum, Predicting Inadequate Repair Capacity In Vivo.

Female stress urinary incontinence (FSUI) is prevalent in women with type 2 diabetes/obesity (T2D/O), and treatment is not optimal. Autograph stem cell therapy surprisingly has poor efficacy. In the male rat model of T2D/O, it was demonstrated that epigenetic changes, triggered by long-term exposure to the dyslipidemic milieu, led to abnormal global transcriptional signatures (GTS) of genes and microRNAs (miR), and impaired the repair capacity of muscle-derived stem cells (MDSC).

Pulmonary vs. extra-pulmonary tuberculosis hospitalizations in the US [1998-2014].

Background: Few studies have explored the relative burden and trends in pulmonary (PTB) vs. extra-pulmonary (EPTB) tuberculosis in the United States using a nationally representative sample.

Methods: This study examined trends in hospitalization rates, length-of-stay (LOS), in-hospital mortality and inflation-adjusted charges, for PTB vs.

Association between General Sense of Mastery and Income in White- and African-American Adults.

Background: Some research has shown that general sense of mastery (i.e., sense of control over the forces that impact one's life) does not have universal causes and consequences in racial groups.

A review of the effects of healthcare disparities on the experience and survival of ovarian cancer patients of different racial and ethnic backgrounds.

Ovarian cancer (OC) is a serious condition that often presents at advanced stages and has high mortality rates, with the current mode of early-stage screening lacking sensitivity and specificity. OC often presents asymptomatically, which renders early diagnosis difficult. Furthermore, many patients lack significant risk factors or family history of the disease.

Aldehyde dehydrogenase isoforms and inflammatory cell populations are differentially expressed in term human placentas affected by intrauterine growth restriction.

Objective: Intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR) is a complication of pregnancy that has both short- and long-term sequelae for affected mothers and offspring. The pathophysiology of disease stems from poor nutrient and oxygen provision to the fetus, resulting in increased oxidative stress within the placenta. As the milieu within the local microenvironment alters macrophage differentiation, we hypothesized that macrophage plasticity may be altered in placentas associated with IUGR, and that macrophages would show hallmarks of lipid peroxidation including altered aldehyde metabolism.