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Excellent Indicator (excellent + indicator)

Distribution by Scientific Domains

Life Sciences	50%

Selected Abstracts

Isokinetic and isometric muscle strength in a healthy population with special reference to age and gender

ACTA PHYSIOLOGICA, Issue 2009
B. Danneskiold-Samsøe
Abstract Aim:, Muscle strength is an excellent indicator of general health when based on reliable measurements. Muscle strength data for a healthy population are rare or non-existent. The aim of the present study was to measure a set of normal values for isometric and isokinetic muscle strength for all the major joint movements of the body and, from these data, to create a basis for comparison of the muscle strength of an individual with the expected value in a normal population. Methods:, A randomly selected group, aged 20,80 years, from the Copenhagen City Heart Study were studied. The group was subgrouped according to age and gender. Isometric and isokinetic muscle strength was measured in each subject across the main joints in the body. A statistical model was developed that encompassed the three main muscle groups: upper limbs, trunk and lower limbs. Results:, Muscle strength in healthy men decreases in a linear fashion from the age of 25 years down to between 54% and 89% at the age of 75 years, and seems not highly dependent on any other parameter than age. For women, the muscle strength is dependent on weight and is only related to age from around 40 years of age. The decrease in muscle strength from the age around 40 to 75 years is 48,92%. For most muscle groups, men are 1.5,2 times stronger than women, with the oldest men having strength similar to that observed among the youngest women. Conclusion:, We developed a model to compare the isometric and isokinetic muscle strength of all the major joint movements of an individual with values for a healthy man or woman at any age in the range of 20,80 years. In all age groups, women have lower muscle strength than men. Men's muscle strength declines with age, while women's muscle strength declines from the age of 41 years. [source]

The impact of mergers on relaxed X-ray clusters , I. Dynamical evolution and emergent transient structures

MONTHLY NOTICES OF THE ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY, Issue 3 2006
Gregory B. Poole
ABSTRACT We report on the analysis of a suite of smoothed particle hydrodynamics simulations (incorporating cooling and star formation) of mergers involving idealized X-ray clusters whose initial conditions resemble relaxed clusters with cool compact cores observed by Chandra and XMM. The simulations sample the most-interesting, theoretically plausible, range of impact parameters and progenitor mass ratios. We find that all mergers evolve via a common progression. We illustrate this progression in the projected gas density, X-ray surface brightness, Sunyaev,Zel'dovich, temperature, and gas-entropy maps. Several different classes of transient ,cold front' like features can arise over the course of a merger. Each class is distinguished by a distinct morphological signature and physical cause. We find that all these classes are present in Chandra and XMM observations of merging systems and propose a naming scheme for these features: ,comet-like' tails, bridges, plumes, streams and edges. In none of the cases considered do the initial cool compact cores of the primary and the secondary get destroyed during the course of the mergers. Instead, the two remnant cores eventually combine to form a new core that, depending on the final mass of the remnant, can have a greater cooling efficiency than either of its progenitors. We quantify the evolving morphology of our mergers using centroid variance, power ratios and offset between the X-ray and the projected mass maps. We find that the centroid variance best captures the dynamical state of the cluster. It also provides an excellent indicator of how far the system is from virial and hydrostatic equilibrium. Placing the system at z= 0.1, we find that all easily identified observable traces of the secondary disappear from a simulated 50-ks Chandra image following the second pericentric passage. The system, however, takes an additional ,2 Gyr to relax and virialize. Observationally, the only reliable indicator of a system in this state is the smoothness of its X-ray surface brightness isophotes, not temperature fluctuations. Temperature fluctuations at the level of ,T/T, 20 per cent, can persist in the final systems well past the point of virialization, suggesting that the existence of temperature fluctuations, in and of themselves, does not necessarily indicate a disturbed or unrelaxed system. [source]

Detection of bone glue treatment as a major source of contamination in ancient DNA analyses

AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY, Issue 2 2002
Graeme J. Nicholson
Abstract Paleogenetic investigations of ancient DNA extracted from fossil material is for many reasons susceptible to falsification by the presence of more recent contamination from several sources. Gelatine-based bone glue that has been used extensively for nearly two centuries by curators to preserve hard tissues contributes nonauthentic DNA to paleontological material. This fact has been frequently neglected and is barely mentioned in the literature. Now paleogeneticists, curators, and conservators are faced with the problem that treatment of samples with adhesives and consolidants for conservatory purposes has seldom been recorded. Here, we show that racemization of amino acids, and in particular serine, is an excellent indicator for the treatment of paleontological samples with glue. Am J Phys Anthropol 118:117,120, 2002. © 2002 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source]

Cytologic features and frequency of plasmacytoid dendritic cells in the lymph nodes of patients with histiocytic necrotizing lymphadenitis (Kikuchi-Fujimoto disease)

DIAGNOSTIC CYTOPATHOLOGY, Issue 7 2010
I.A.C., Koji Kishimoto C.T., Ph.D.
Abstract Histiocytic necrotizing lymphadenitis (HNL), also known as Kikuchi-Fujimoto disease, is a benign and self-limiting disease. It is histologically characterized by nodal lesions that show the infiltration of histiocytes, lymphoid cells, myeloid dendritic cells (mDCs), and plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs), along with either apoptotic or karyorrhexic nuclear debris. pDCs have been proposed to be lymphoid early-committed immature DCs which are positive for CD123, CD303, CD68, and HLA-DR but negative for fascin, a mature DC marker, as well as CD13 and CD33,which are mDC markers. In the present study, we analyzed the cytomorphologic features and frequency of pDCs in the lymph nodes of HNL patients. Because the cytologic apprearance of pDCs with Papanicolau staining was quite similar to that of large lymphocytes, immunocytochemistry against CD123 was necessary for the distinction of pDCs. Counting the number of CD123-positive pDCs in the HNL lymph nodes revealed that pDCs more frequently infiltrated the lymph nodes in the setting of HNL than in either reactive lymphadenitis or T and B cell lymphoma. In addition, interestingly, the numberof pDCs did not depend on the age of the HNL lesion, thus suggesting that pDCs are excellent indicators for the cytologic diagnosis of HNL. Diagn. Cytopathol. 2010. © 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [source]