Calcium requirements for the athlete

There is oftentimes a notion of "the more, the better" with regard to vitamin and mineral intake among individuals, and especially among athletes. Although adequate calcium intake is necessary to promote bone health and prevent osteoporosis, increased physical activity alone does not necessarily demand an increased intake of dietary calcium or other micronutrients. Athletes may lose calcium via sweat, in which case replenishment is advocated either via dietary intake of calcium-rich foods or a commercial calcium supplement. The important message to athletes is to consume a diet adequate in energy, protein, fat, vitamins, minerals, and fluids to support the physical demands and replenish the physiologic losses incurred with physical training.     

Chronic smoke exposure alters the phenotype pattern and the metabolic response in human alveolar macrophages

Smoking induces a chronic inflammatory process in the lower respiratory tract, where the alveolar macrophages (AM) are the main phagocytes. In the present study, the expressions of different membrane glycoproteins (CD11abc, CD71, CD54, CD14 and CD16) were determined by flow cytometry in AM from smokers and non-smokers after quenching of the intracellular autofluorescence. The metabolic activity of the AM was quantified as a functional test. The expressions of CD11a, CD54 and CD71 were higher in non-smokers' AM than in smokers'. The expressions of CD11b and CD16 were similar between the groups, while the CD11c was higher in smokers' AM compared with non-smokers’. The expression of CD14 was weak in both groups, therefore there was no clear-cut difference between the background and positively labelled cell populations. The metabolic response after in vitro stimulation with the phorbol ester phorbol myristate acetate (PMA) was higher in non-smokers' than in smokers' AM. Our results indicate that chronic exposure to tobacco smoke influences both the expression of AM membrane antigens and the metabolic activity. AM from non-smokers express a phenotype more related to cell proliferation and an accessory function. In contrast, receptors reflecting adhesion and phagocytosis were unaltered or even increased in smokers' AM. The findings suggest a functional change in the AM population after chronic smoke exposure.     

Alterations of the rat mesentery vasculature in experimental diabetes

The alteration induced by diabetes on vascular permeability to serum albumin was investigated in the mesentery of streptozotocin-induced hyperglycemic rats. Double-tagged ((125)I and dinitrophenol-haptenated) heterologous albumin was intravenously administered in normal and hyperglycemic animals, and the extravasation of the tracer was evaluated by radioactivity measurements and by morphometry at the ultrastructural level using quantitative protein A-colloidal gold immunocytochemistry. The results demonstrate that diabetes induces a significant increase in the permeability of the mesentery vessels to albumin. This increase is due to a more efficient transport of macromolecules by endothelial plasmalemmal vesicles and not to leakier interendothelial junctions. Passage across the endothelial basement membranes did not appear to be restricted in either the control or diabetic condition. However, in diabetes, the mesothelial basement membrane appeared to become modified and to restrain the passage of albumin toward the peritoneal cavity. After 3 months of diabetes, the rats presented a net increase in the average diameter of the blood vessels localized in the mesentery arcada (macrovascular hyperplasy) and a notable angiogenesis, manifested at the level of the microvasculature in the mesenteric windows.     

Hyperactivation may assist human spermatozoa to detach from intimate association with the endosalpinx

The behaviour of human spermatozoa was observed during incubationwith epithelial cells isolated from the isthmic and ampullarysections of human uterine (Fallopian) tubes.During incubation,spermatozoa were observed to bind to the epithelial cells ofthe tube (the endosalpinx), and individual spermatozoa attachedand detached at intervals.The kinematic characteristics of spermatozoaduring these behaviour patterns were determined. The resultsshowed that detached spermatozoa typically had an increasedcurvilinear velocity and amplitude of lateral head displacement,accompaniedby a decrease in their linearity. Significantly (P<0.01)more of the detaching spermatozoa were hyperactivated than werespermatozoa prior to attachment for both isthmic (35.3 ±5.5 versus 4.0 ± 3.3%mean ± SEM) and ampullary(26.0 ± 7.0 versus 2.0 ±1.4%) regions. Incubationwith epithelial cells from either region produced no differencesin any category of sperm behaviour. Furthermore, there was nosignificant difference between regions in the amount of timespermatozoa spent bound (33.6 ± 12.9 and 20.6 ±3.0 s for isthmic and ampullary tissue respectively). Theseresults support the hypothesis that hyperactivation may assistspermatozoa in breaking connections with epithelial cells.     

Longitudinal evaluation the pulmonary function of the pre and postoperative periods in the coronary artery bypass graft surgery of patients treated with a physiotherapy protocol

Background  

The treatment of coronary artery disease (CAD) seeks to reduce or prevent its complications and decrease morbidity and mortality. For certain subgroups of patients, coronary artery bypass graft surgery (CABG) may accomplish these goals. The objective of this study was to assess the pulmonary function in the CABG postoperative period of patients treated with a physiotherapy protocol.     

Use of I-131 labeled, murine Fab against a high molecular weight antigen of human melanoma: preliminary experience

High molecular weight antigen (HMWA) is a tumor-associated proteoglycan of human malignant melanoma. I-131 labeled Fab fragments of these specific antibodies were used for preliminary feasibility studies for radioimmunodetection and therapy of human subjects who had inoperable metastatic melanoma. Ten patients received tracer doses of 5-13 mCi (185-481 MBq) of I-131 (anti-HMWA) Fab. All patients (8/8) who had melanoma lesions greater than 1 cm by correlative diagnostic methods had one or more lesions that had localization to tumor of the radiolabeled Fab. In all, 17 of 23 (74%) documented metastases were seen. There were no false positives in this series. Two patients who had avid uptake received potentially radiotherapeutic doses of 142 mCi (5,254 MBq) (one patient) and 181 mCi (6,697 MBq) and 193 (7,141 MBq) (total: 374 mCi or 13,838 MBq) (one patient). For both of these patients, whole body imaging studies showed that the localization of the high dose I-131 Fab was predominantly in tumor. The patient who received the larger dose showed a greater than 50% reduction in the size of pelvic and pericaval nodes, with stabilization of disease at the smaller nodal size for a period of three months. On whole body images, the anti-Fab HMWA appears to be more tumor selective than Fab preparations that target the p97 antigen for melanoma, and there is less uptake in liver.