Mobilization of lead from human bone tissue during pregnancy and lactation--a summary of long-term research

The skeleton is potential endogenous source of lead during pregnancy and lactation. We have undertaken a longitudinal investigation into the mobilization of lead from the human maternal skeleton to determine whether lead is mobilized from the maternal skeleton during pregnancy and lactation, and if so, when and how much is released. Subjects in the study were migrants to Australia (n=15) whose skeletal lead isotopic composition (endogenous lead) was different to that prevailing in the Australian environment (exogenous lead). This migrant cohort was compared with 6 multi-generational Australian controls. Biological and environmental samples were taken pre-pregnancy where possible, throughout pregnancy and postpartum for at least 6 months. Newly-born infants of the migrant and Australian mothers were monitored for 6 months. Blood lead concentrations for the migrant mothers ranged from 1.5 to 20 microg/dl (geometric mean 2.8) and for Australian mothers ranged from 1.9 to 4.3 microg/dl (geometric mean 2.9). There was minimal change in lead isotopic composition of the Australian pregnant controls although there were increases of approximately 40% in blood lead concentration in 3 of 6 cases during the postpartum period and from 0 to 12% in the other 3. In the migrant pregnant subjects, the geometric mean skeletal lead contribution to blood lead using the isotopic composition was approximately 33% (range 10-88%) for 14 subjects using a revised estimate for exogenous lead. Skeletal contribution to blood lead during the postpartum period was significantly greater than during pregnancy (P<0.001). The skeletal contributions to blood lead are higher and the changes are more consistent in those subjects who conceived within 100 days of arrival in Australia compared with those who conceived longer than 100 days. In the migrant subjects, changes in blood lead concentration during pregnancy and postpartum varied from subject to subject with an overall 20% increase; the increases during the postpartum period were greater than during pregnancy (P<0.001). It was estimated that the amount of maternal skeletal lead mobilized during pregnancy and transferred to the infant via cord blood averaged approximately 79%. The increased skeletal contribution to blood lead is attributed to a low daily calcium intake of approximately 500 mgCa/day, a condition which was present in both migrant and Australian subjects. An ongoing clinical trial is providing a new cohort with calcium supplements. A summary of other aspects of the study is included and covers: additional flux released from the skeleton during pregnancy and postpartum; XRF bone lead results; urinary excretion of lead during pregnancy and postpartum; dietary contribution to blood lead in female adults and children; comparison of rates of exchange of lead in blood of newly-born infants and mothers; relationships of lead in breast milk to lead in blood, urine and diet of the infant and mother; changes in blood lead after cessation of breastfeeding; urinary lead isotopes during pregnancy and postpartum indicate no preferential partitioning of endogenous lead into plasma; a comparison of some aspects of the nonhuman primate and human pregnancy studies.     

Porous Li-Na-K niobate bone-substitute ceramics: Microstructure and piezoelectric properties

Disc specimens of a porous ceramic, lithium sodium potassium niobate (Li_0.06Na_0.5K_0.44)NbO₃, were prepared using ammonium oxalate monohydrate or poly(methyl methacrylate) as pore-forming agent, and made piezoelectric using a modified polarizing method to preserve biocompatibility. Scanning electron microscopy showed a bicontinuous 3-3 structure of interconnected pores 150-250 µm in size. The piezoelectric constant (d₃₃) and electromechanical coupling coefficient (Kp) are discussed as a function of porosity and pore shape: d₃₃ fitted the theoretical expectation for shape factor K_s = 1, while Kp was approximately constant (~ 0.23) for porosity of 15-45 vol.%. 50 vol.% AOM gave the highest porosity (~ 45%) without decline of the value of Kp whilst maintaining mechanical integrity. Such materials show promise for use as a piezoelectric composite bone substitute.     

Coalescence and interface diffusion in linear CdTe/CdSe/CdTe heterojunction nanorods

Colloidal nanorods with linear CdTe/CdSe/CdTe heterojunctions were synthesized by sequential reactant injection. After CdTe deposition at the ends of initially formed CdSe nanorods, continued heating in solution leads to Se-Te interdiffusion across the heterojunctions and coalescence to decreased aspect ratio. The Se-Te interdiffusion rates were measured by mapping the composition profile using nanobeam energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS) along the lengths of individual nanorods aged in hot solvent for different amounts of time. The rate of nanorod coalescence was also measured and compared to model predictions using a continuum viscous flow model, which appears to provide a reasonable estimate of the coalescence rate.     

Graphene-based atomic-scale switches

Graphene's remarkable mechanical and electrical properties, combined with its compatibility with existing planar silicon-based technology, make it an attractive material for novel computing devices. We report the development of a nonvolatile memory element based on graphene break junctions. Our devices have demonstrated thousands of writing cycles and long retention times. We propose a model for device operation based on the formation and breaking of carbon atomic chains that bridge the junctions. We demonstrate information storage based on the concept of rank coding, in which information is stored in the relative conductance of graphene switches in a memory cell.     

The response-signal method reveals age-related changes in object working memory.

Sixteen healthy young adults (ages 18-32) and 16 healthy older adults (ages 67-81) completed a delayed response task in which they saw the following visual sequence: memory stimuli (2 abstract shapes; 3,000 ms), a blank delay (5,000 ms), a probe stimulus of variable duration (one abstract shape; 125, 250, 500, 1,000, or 2,000 ms), and a mask (500 ms). Subjects decided whether the probe stimulus matched either of the memory stimuli; they were instructed to respond during the mask, placing greater emphasis on speed than accuracy. The authors used D. L. Hintzman & T. Curran's (1994) 3-parameter compound bounded exponential model of speed-accuracy tradeoff to describe changes in discriminability associated with total processing time. Group-level analysis revealed a higher rate parameter and a higher asymptote parameter for the young adult group, but no difference across groups in x-intercept. Proxy measures of cognitive reserve (Y. Stern et al., 2005) predicted the rate parameter value, particularly in older adults. Results suggest that in working memory, aging impairs both the maximum capacity for discriminability and the rate of information accumulation, but not the temporal threshold for discriminability. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Perceived support and relational effects in psychotherapy process constructs.

Recent research has indicated that only a small portion of supportiveness reflects the objective properties of providers. Instead, supportiveness primarily reflects the unique relationships among specific recipients and providers (i.e., relational effects), thus suggesting new approaches to support interventions. The authors investigated the possibility that similar relational effects occur for therapy process constructs (e.g., working alliance). Isolating relational effects in psychotherapy requires that each client receive treatment from more than one therapist during the same period of time. Therefore, we conducted analog studies in which therapy clients and students viewed videos of therapists and then rated expected therapist supportiveness and expected therapy process constructs for each therapist. Two studies indicated very strong relational effects in therapist supportiveness and therapy process constructs. In addition, process constructs were correlated strongly with supportiveness (Study 1) and favorable affect (Study 2) for relational effects specifically. Implications for integrating research on perceived support and therapy process were discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Comparison of electrokinetics-based multidimensional separations coupled with electrospray ionization-tandem mass spectrometry for characterization of human salivary proteins

The foundation for saliva-based diagnostics is the development of a complete catalog of secreted proteins detectable in saliva. Besides protein complexity, the greatest bioanalytical challenge facing comprehensive analysis of saliva samples is related to the large variation of protein relative abundances including the presence of high-abundance proteins such as amylases, mucins, proline-rich proteins (PRPs), and secretory IgA complex. Among a number of electrokinetic separation techniques, transient capillary isotachophoresis/capillary zone electrophoresis (CITP/CZE) specifically targets trace amounts of proteins and thus reduces the range of relative protein abundances for providing unparallel advantages toward the identification of low-abundance proteins. By employing a CITP/CZE-based multidimensional separation platform coupled with electrospray ionization-tandem mass spectrometry (ESI-tandem MS), a total of 6112 fully tryptic peptides are sequenced at a 1% false discovery rate (FDR), leading to the identification of 1479 distinct human SwissProt protein entries. By comparing with capillary isoelectric focusing (CIEF) as another electrokinetics-based stacking approach, CITP/CZE not only offers a broad field of application but also is less prone to protein/peptide precipitation during the analysis. The ultrahigh resolving power of CITP/CZE is evidenced by the large number of distinct peptide identifications measured from each CITP fraction together with the low peptide fraction overlapping among identified peptides. Furthermore, when evaluating the protein sequence coverage by the number of distinct peptides mapping to each protein identification, the CITP-based proteome technology similarly achieves the superior performance with 674 proteins (46%) having three or more distinct peptides, 288 (19%) having two distinct peptides, and 517 (35%) having a single distinct peptide.