Effects of cafeteria diet and high fat diet intake on anxiety,learning and memory in adult male rats

Objective: The effects of cafeteria and high fat diets were investigated on animal models of behavior.

Methods: Male Wistar rats were treated with Control (C), Cafeteria (CD) and High Fat (FD) diets and tested in the Elevated Plus-Maze (EPM) and Morris Water Maze (MWM) procedures. Body weight, length, abdominal circumference, retroperitoneal and epididymal adipose tissues were recorded. Physical parameters, weight of tissues, EPM, and MWM data were subjected to ANOVA followed by Newman–Keuls test (P?Results: There were no differences on weight and length parameters between CD and C rats up to 98 days of age. However, abdominal circumferences were higher in CD as compared to C at 35 and 70 days of age, respectively, the 5th and the 7th weeks. FD presented lower measures of weight and abdominal circumference; nevertheless there was an increase on those parameters at the end of the nutritional treatment. Even without an apparent weight gain of CD and FD these animals presented a greater accumulation of retroperitoneal and epididymal adipose tissues. In addition, CD and FD demonstrated behaviors that can suggest lower anxiety. CD showed a better learning performance and FD showed better recall of previous learned information in the memory retention test.

Discussion: According to those data it was concluded that hypercaloric diet ingestion was capable of triggering metabolic alterations and possibly lowering anxiety associated to learning or memory improvement on a spatial task.     

André Toupet: surgeon technician par excellence

André Toupet is best known for the posterior fundoplication that bears his name, currently used for the treatment of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) or completing Heller's myotomy and subject today to intense discussions. This was not different in 1963, when Toupet proposed his technique at a time when the Nissen fundoplication was emerging as the treatment of choice for GERD. Behind the procedure, we discover a man with great surgical talent and meticulous attention to technical details who opposed criticism with hard work and strong family values.     

Asian and non‐Asian origins of Mon‐Khmer‐ and Mundari‐speaking Austro‐Asiatic populations of India

In the present study, we analyzed 1,686 samples from 31 tribal populations of India for the mitochondrial DNA 9‐base‐pair deletion/insertion polymorphism, and characterized them based on the relevant mitochondrial DNA coding‐region single nucleotide polymorphisms and hypervariable region I motifs, to test the genetic origins of the ethnically and linguistically heterogeneous Austro‐Asiatic tribes of India. A comparative analysis of our results with the existing data suggests multiple origins of Austro‐Asiatic tribes in India, and particularly the Asian and non‐Asian origins of the Mon‐Khmer and the Mundari populations. We also identified a novel subclade of haplogroup B in the Mon‐Khmer Khasi tribes that distinguishes them from the Nicobarese, indicating two different waves of migration of the Mon‐Khmer tribes in India. Am. J. Hum. Biol. 18:461–469, 2006. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.