Maternal income-generating activities, child care, and child nutrition in Mali

BACKGROUND: Women in sub-Saharan Africa play a key role in household food security. The income-generating activities of mothers are postulated to be related to the nutritional status of children. OBJECTIVE: The objective of the study was to examine whether maternal income-generating activities, maternal food production, and child care were determinants of the nutritional status of children in rural West Africa. The study hypotheses were that maternal income-generating activities and maternal food production are positively associated with children's dietary intake and anthropometry, and that maternal income-generating activities are not associated with child care. METHODS: Data were collected from a cross-sectional sample of mother-child pairs on maternal time use, child anthropometry, maternal food production, dietary intake, parasitic infection, and household, maternal, and child determinants of child nutritional status. The children were 12 to 36 months of age and included breastfed and nonbreastfed children. Food intake was assessed by the 24-hour recall method. The data were analyzed by multivariate regression and controlled for confounding variables. RESULTS: Time spent by the mother in income-generating activities was negatively associated with children's animal protein intake and height-for-age (p < .05). Maternal cash crop production was positively associated with children's weight-for-height, whereas maternal staple food production was negatively associated with energy intake from non-breastmilk foods (p < .05). The negative relationships observed for children's animal protein intake and children's height-for-age were not mediated by any child-care variable. Maternal supervision of feeding was a positive predictor of children's animal protein intake. Giardia infection was negatively related to children's weight gain (p < .05). CONCLUSIONS: Own-account cash crop farming by mothers benefits children's nutrition. Maternal income-generating activities in the context of extended families, sibling caretaking, and prolonged breastfeeding do not adversely affect child care.     

Processing of Xe-127 regional pulmonary ventilation by factor analysis and compartmental modeling

A regional lung ventilation was modeled in five cases using Xe-127 during the first 3 min of wash-out. A factor analysis of the dynamic structures algorithm allowed estimation of the elementary kinetics and their respective proportions contained in time series images. Each factor was interpreted as the sampling of a compartment. It was associated to a factor image representing its spatial distribution and to a percentage of the total collected information. In the study, three factors were estimated: a fast clearance in the lower lung regions (28.9%), a slower clearance in the upper regions (33.4%), and a slow kinetics in blood and tissues containing dissolved xenon (37%). Estimates of the kinematics components obtained from a factor analysis of dynamic structures (FADSs) were used for compartmental analysis. The authors applied this method to the study of the regional ventilation distribution to establish the model and some possible variations. (FADSs) and region of interest results were used for modeling and compared.     

An interactive software for 81mKr pulmonary ventilation gating

An interactive software to gate scintigraphic list-mode data collected from ventilation studies using a radioisotope of an inert gas (81mKr) has been developed. It allows the detection of end expiration and end inspiration phases in a time activity curve. It involves six phases: filtering of the curve; preselection of local extrema; validation of the preselection; choice of the parameters for the reconstruction; control of the selected cycles and display of parameters such as frequency, expiration time, breath amplitude; reconstruction of images representing the distribution of ventilation during a mean respiratory cycle. This software was tested on 116 data sets without a failure. The interactive definition and control of the selected times made the algorithm useful regardless of the count rate and the frequency. It could be adapted to gate other periodic or semiperiodic physiological phenomena.     

Antihypertensive activity of casein-enriched milk fermented by Lactobacillus helveticus

Milk proteins contain peptidic angiotensin I-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors, which can be released by proteolysis during milk fermentation by some strains of Lactobacillus helveticus. Reconstituted milk media containing skim milk powder (12%), skim milk powder (10%) with added sodium caseinate (5%) or whey protein isolate (5%) were fermented by L. helveticus strains R211 and R389, and further tested for bacterial growth, proteolysis (free NH₃ groups) and ACE-inhibitory activity. The antihypertensive activity in spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR) was also investigated with caseinate-enriched milk unfermented (UFM) and fermented by the two strains of L. helveticus. Caseinate-enriched milk fermented by both strains showed higher proteolysis and ACE-inhibitory activity, indicating that ACE-inhibitory peptides are probably released from caseins during milk fermentation. Significant decreases in mean arterial blood pressure in SHR rats were measured following oral administration of UFM milk at doses of 1.0 and 2.5 g kg⁻¹ of body weight, and milk fermented by R211 or R389 strains at doses of 0.5, 1.0 and 2.5 g kg⁻¹ of body weight. The antihypertensive activity of UFM could be explained by the release of ACE-inhibitory peptides from caseins during the digestion process.     

Wine Analysis and Authenticity Using <Superscript>1</Superscript>H-NMR Metabolomics Data: Application to Chinese Wines

A NMR-based metabolomics method was developed to semiautomatically quantify the main components of wine. The method was applied to discriminate wines from two regions of China, Shanxi and Ningxia, which were produced by 6 wineries and for 6 vintages. Two different cultivars, Cabernet Sauvignon and Beihong, were used for winemaking. The method allowed the quantification of 33 metabolites including sugars, amino acids, organic acids, alcohols, and phenolic compounds. Depending on the compounds, the LOD values were in the range of 0.6 to 116 mg/L. The results showed that NMR-based metabolomics combined with multivariate statistical analysis allowed wine separation as a function of terroir and cultivar. Nevertheless, wine differentiation as a function of wineries and ageing would need to be examined more carefully.