Attenuating effects of fractions on glycemo-impaired-associated dyslipidemia, hepatopathy, and nephropathy.

Objectives: The use of medicinal plants for diabetes treatment is increasing owing to their effectiveness and safety compared to synthetic drugs. Thus, the ameliorative effects of (F. Hoffm.

Neurobehavioural challenges experienced by HIV exposed infants: a study in South Africa.

Background: The newborn infant is a complexly organized, competent being, who plays an active role in shaping their environment through their increasing skills in autonomic regulation, motor control, regulation of state and social interaction. Infants born to HIV positive mothers, are exposed to HIV and antiretroviral therapy inutero, and may experience adverse effects from this.

Methods: A cross-sectional study of 132 mother-infant dyads from a large public health hospital in South Africa.

Nanotechnology-enhanced edible coating application on climacteric fruits.

Climacteric fruits continue to ripen after harvest and produce ethylene, coupled with an increase in respiration rate, which contributes to more rapid perishability. Inhibition of ethylene biosynthesis has been shown to be an efficient way to delay the onset of ripening and lengthen shelf life. The use of edible materials as coatings presents an efficient approach in preserving the quality of fruits.

Direct-to-Consumer Genetic Testing in South Africa: Stumbling Over the First Legal Hurdle?

Despite the growing popularity of direct-to-consumer genetic testing, there is minimal South African literature on the topic. The limited available research suggests that direct-to-consumer genetic testing is unregulated. However, we suggest that direct-to-consumer genetic testing is indeed regulated, and unusually so.

The Medical Education Partnership Initiative (MEPI): Innovations and Lessons for Health Professions Training and Research in Africa.

MEPI was a $130 million competitively awarded grant by President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and National Institutes of Health (NIH) to 13 Medical Schools in 12 Sub-Saharan African countries and a Coordinating Centre (CC). Implementation was led by Principal investigators (PIs) from the grantee institutions supported by Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), NIH and the CC from September, 2010 to August, 2015. The goals were to increase the capacity of the awardees to produce more and better doctors, strengthen locally relevant research, promote retention of the graduates within their countries and ensure sustainability.

The HIV and AIDS Tribunal of Kenya: An Effective Mechanism for the Enforcement of HIV-related Human Rights?

Established under Section 25 of the HIV Prevention and Control Act of 2006, the HIV and AIDS Tribunal of Kenya is the only HIV-specific statutory body in the world with the mandate to adjudicate cases relating to violations of HIV-related human rights. Yet, very limited research has been done on this tribunal. Based on findings from a desk research and semi-structured interviews of key informants conducted in Kenya, this article analyzes the composition, mandate, procedures, practice, and cases of the tribunal with the aim to appreciate its contribution to the advancement of human rights in the context of HIV.

Understanding Family Migration in Rural South Africa: Exploring Children's Inclusion in the Destination Households of Migrant Parents.

Despite the removal of restrictions on movement and increasing female participation in migration, only a minority of migrant parents in South Africa include their children in their destination household. Quantitative analyses of the circumstances in which children accompany a migrant parent have been limited by the lack of available data that document family arrangements from the perspective of more than one household. This paper uses data about members of rural households in a demographic surveillance population in KwaZulu-Natal and a linked sample survey of adult migrants to examine factors associated with children's inclusion in the destination household of migrant parents, analyse the timing and sequence of children's moves to parental destination households, and describe the composition of parental origin and destination households.

Improved particle swarm optimization with a collective local unimodal search for continuous optimization problems.

A new local search technique is proposed and used to improve the performance of particle swarm optimization algorithms by addressing the problem of premature convergence. In the proposed local search technique, a potential particle position in the solution search space is collectively constructed by a number of randomly selected particles in the swarm. The number of times the selection is made varies with the dimension of the optimization problem and each selected particle donates the value in the location of its randomly selected dimension from its personal best.