(Press-News.org) A UK study published in the American Journal of Human Biology has found that smoking during pregnancy has discernible effects on the growth of a woman's future grandkids.
With non-smoking mothers, if a paternal grandmother smoked during pregnancy, her granddaughters tended to be taller and both her granddaughters and grandsons tended to have greater bone mass and lean (muscle) mass. If a maternal grandmother smoked during pregnancy, her grandsons became heavier than expected during adolescence, with increased lean mass, grip strength and cardiovascular fitness. When both the maternal grandmother and the mother had smoked, girls had reduced height and weight compared with girls whose mothers, but not grandmothers, smoked.
"These likely transgenerational effects from the grandmothers' smoking in pregnancy need to be taken into account in future studies of the effects of maternal smoking on child growth and development. If replicated, such studies could be a useful model for the molecular analysis of human transgenerational responses," said senior author Prof. Marcus Pembrey.
INFORMATION:
Smoking during pregnancy may affect grandchildren's growth
2014-08-18
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Ebola has profound effects on wildlife population dynamics
2014-08-18
New research in gorillas that were affected by an Ebola virus outbreak shows that disease can influence reproductive potential, immigration and social dynamics, and it highlights the need to develop complex models that integrate all the different impacts of a disease.
This approach requires long-term monitoring of wildlife populations to understand the responses of populations to emerging changes in the environment, according to the Journal of Animal Ecology study.
"Along with the decrease in survival and in reproduction, Ebola outbreak perturbed social dynamics in ...
Pigs' hearts transplanted into baboon hosts remain viable more than a year
2014-08-18
Beverly, MA, August 18, 2014 – Investigators from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have successfully transplanted hearts from genetically engineered piglets into baboons' abdomens and had the hearts survive for more than one year, twice as long as previously reported. This was achieved by using genetically engineered porcine donors and a more focused immunosuppression regimen in the baboon recipients, according to a study published in The Journal of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, an official publication ...
Ocean warming could drive heavy rain bands toward the poles
2014-08-18
In a world warmed by rising atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, precipitation patterns are going to change because of two factors: one, warmer air can hold more water; and two, changing atmospheric circulation patterns will shift where rain falls. According to previous model research, mid- to high-latitude precipitation is expected to increase by as much as 50%. Yet the reasons why models predict this are hard to tease out.
Using a series of highly idealized model runs, Lu et al. found that ocean warming should cause atmospheric precipitation bands to shift toward ...
New mouse model points to therapy for liver disease
2014-08-18
Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is a common affliction, affecting almost 30 percent of Americans, with a significant number suffering from its most severe form, called non-alcoholic steatohepatitis or NASH, which can lead to cirrhosis and liver cancer. In recent years, NASH has become the leading cause of liver transplantation.
Development of effective new therapies for preventing or treating NASH has been stymied by limited small animal models for the disease. In a paper published online in Cancer Cell, scientists at the University of California, San Diego ...
Blood pressure medication does not cause more falls
2014-08-18
It's time to question the common belief that patients receiving intensive blood pressure treatment are prone to falling and breaking bones. A comprehensive study in people ages 40 to 79 with diabetes, led by Karen Margolis, MD, of HealthPartners Institute for Education and Research in the US, found no evidence supporting this belief. The study¹ appears in the Journal of General Internal Medicine², published by Springer.
Evidence from various clinical trials shows that cardiovascular events such as strokes can be prevented by treating high blood pressure (hypertension). ...
Study: World's primary forests on the brink
2014-08-18
August 18, 2014: An international team of conservationist scientists and practitioners has published new research showing the precarious state of the world's primary forests.
The global analysis and map are featured in a paper appearing in the esteemed journal Conservation Letters and reveals that only five percent of the world's pre-agricultural primary forest cover is now found in protected areas.
Led by Professor Brendan Mackey, Director of the Climate Change Response Program at Griffith University in Queensland, Australia, the authors are experts in forest ecology, ...
Study reveals immune system is dazed and confused during spaceflight
2014-08-18
There is nothing like a head cold to make us feel a little dazed. We get things like colds and the flu because of changes in our immune system. Researchers have a good idea what causes immune system changes on Earth—think stress, inadequate sleep and improper nutrition. But the results of two NASA collaborative investigations—Validation of Procedures for Monitoring Crewmember Immune Function (Integrated Immune) and Clinical Nutrition Assessment of ISS Astronauts, SMO-016E (Clinical Nutrition Assessment)—recently published in the Journal of Interferon & Cytokine Research ...
New tool makes online personal data more transparent
2014-08-18
New York, NY—August 18, 2014—The web can be an opaque black box: it leverages our personal information without our knowledge or control. When, for instance, a user sees an ad about depression online, she may not realize that she is seeing it because she recently sent an email about being sad. Roxana Geambasu and Augustin Chaintreau, both assistant professors of computer science at Columbia Engineering, are seeking to change that, and in doing so bring more transparency to the web. Along with their PhD student, Mathias Lecuyer, the researchers have developed XRay, a new ...
A new species of endemic treefrog from Madagascar
2014-08-18
A new species of the Boophis rappiodes group is described from the hidden streams of Ankarafa Forest, northwest of Madagascar. The study was published in the open access journal ZooKeys.
The new species Boophis ankarafensis is green in colour with bright red speckling across its head and back, but what truly distinguishes this species is a high genetic divergence and different call with a triple click, compared to the usual double.
All individuals were detected from the banks of two streams in Ankarafa Forest. The new species represents the only member of the B. ...
Project serves up big data to guide managing nation's coastal waters
2014-08-18
When it comes to understanding America's coastal fisheries, anecdotes are gripping – stories of a choking algae bloom, or a bay's struggle with commercial development. But when it comes to taking action, there's no beating big data.
In this week's edition of Estuaries and Coasts, a Michigan State University doctoral student joins with others to give a sweeping assessment to understand how human activities are affecting estuaries, the nation's sounds, bays, gulfs and bayous. These are places where freshwater flows into the oceans, and the needs of the people blend with ...