Refine
Has Fulltext
- no (222)
Year of publication
- 2018 (222) (remove)
Document Type
- Article (222) (remove)
Is part of the Bibliography
- yes (222)
Keywords
- Arabidopsis (5)
- Arabidopsis thaliana (4)
- nitrogen deposition (4)
- Germany (3)
- ancient DNA (3)
- climate change (3)
- competition (3)
- palaeogenomics (3)
- phototaxis (3)
- strategic growth adjustments (3)
Institute
- Institut für Biochemie und Biologie (222) (remove)
Body height has traditionally been looked upon as a mirror of the condition of society, short height being an indicator of poor nutritional status, poor education, and low social status and income. This view has recently been questioned. We aimed to quantify the effects of nutrition, education, sibship size, and household income, factors that are conventionally considered to be related to child growth, on body height of children and adolescents raised under urban Indian conditions. Sample and methods: We re-analyzed several anthropometric measurements and questionnaires with questions on sibship size, fathers’ and mother’s education, and monthly family expenditure, from two cross-sectional growth studies performed in Kolkata, India. The first Kolkata Growth Study (KG1) took place in 1982-1983, with data on 825 Bengali boys aged 7 to 16 years; and the second Kolkata Growth Study (KG2) between 1999 and 2011 with data of 1999 boys aged 7 to 21 years from Bengali Hindu families, and data of 2195 girls obtained between 2005 and 2011. Results: Indian children showed positive insignificant secular trends in height and a significant secular trend in weight and BMI between between 1982 and 2011. Yet, multiple regression analysis failed to detect an association between nutritional status (expressed in terms of skinfold thickness), monthly family expenditure and sibship size with body height of these children. The analysis only revealed an influence of parental education on female, but not on male height. Conclusion: We failed to detect influences of nutrition, sibship size, and monthly family expenditure on body height in a large sample of children and adolescents raised in Kolkata, India, between 1982 and 2011. We found a mild positive association between parental education and girls’ height. The data question current concepts regarding the impact of nutrition, and household and economic factors on growth, but instead underscore the effect of parental education.
Background: In our modern world, the way of life in nutritional and activity behaviour has changed. As a consequence, parallel trends of an epidemic of overweight and a decline in external skeletal robusticity are observed in children and adolescents. Aim: We aim to develop reference centiles for external skeletal robusticity of European girls and boys aged 0 to 18 years using the Frame Index as an indicator and identify population specific age-related patterns. Methods: We analysed cross-sectional & longitudinal data on body height and elbow breadth of boys and girls from Europe (0-18 years, n = 41.679), India (7-18 years, n = 3.297) and South Africa (3-18 years, n = 4.346). As an indicator of external skeletal robusticity Frame Index after Frisancho (1990) was used. We developed centiles for boys and girls using the LMS-method and its extension. Results: Boys have greater external skeletal robusticity than girls. Whereas in girls Frame Index decreases continuously during growth, an increase of Frame Index from 12 to 16 years in European boys can be observed. Indian and South African boys are almost similar in Frame Index to European boys. In girls, the pattern is slightly different. Whereas South African girls are similar to European girls, Indian girls show a lesser external skeletal robusticity. Conclusion: Accurate references for external skeletal robusticity are needed to evaluate if skeletal development is adequate per age. They should be used to monitor effects of changes in way of life and physical activity levels in children and adolescents to avoid negative health outcomes like osteoporosis and arthrosis.
As tall as my peers
(2018)
Background: We define migrants as people who move from their place of birth to a new place of residence. Migration usually is directed by "Push-Pull" factors, for example to escape from poor living conditions or to find more prosperous socio-economic conditions. Migrant children tend to assimilate quickly, and soon perceive themselves as peers within their new social networks. Differences exist between growth of first generation and second generation migrants. Methods: We review body heights and height distributions of historic and modern migrant populations to test two hypotheses: 1) that migrant and adopted children coming from lower social status localities to higher status localities adjust their height growth toward the mean of the dominant recipient social network, and 2) social dominant colonial and military migrants display growth that significantly surpasses the median height of both the conquered population and the population of origin. Our analytical framework also considered social networks. Recent publications indicate that spatial connectedness (community effects) and social competitiveness can affect human growth. Results: Migrant children and adolescents of lower social status rapidly adjust in height towards average height of their hosts, but tend to mature earlier, and are prone to overweight. The mean height of colonial/military migrants does surpass that of the conquered and origin population. Conclusion: Observations on human social networks, non-human animal strategic growth adjustments, and competitive growth processes strengthen the concept of social connectedness being involved in the regulation of human migrant growth.
Because of political conflicts and climate change, migration will be increased worldwide and integration in host societies is a challenge also for migrants. We hypothesize that migrants, who take up the challenge in a new social environment are taller than migrants who do not pose this challenge. We analyze by a questionnaire possible social, nutritional and ethnic influencing factors to body height (BH) of adult offspring of Turkish migrants (n = 82, 39 males) aged from 18 to 34 years (mean age 24.6 years). The results of multiple regression (downward selection) show that the more a male adult offspring of Turkish migrants feels like belonging to the Turkish culture, the smaller he is (95% CI, -3.79, -0.323). Further, the more a male adult offspring of Turkish migrants feels like belonging to the German culture, the taller he is (95% CI, -0.152, 1.738). We discussed it comparable to primates taking up their challenge in dominance, where as a result their body size increase is associated with higher IGF-1 level. IGF-1 is associated with emotional belonging and has a fundamental role in the regulation of metabolism and growth of the human body. With all pilot characteristics of our study results show that the successful challenge of integration in a new society is strongly associated with the emotional integration and identification in the sense of a personal sense of belonging to society. We discuss taller BH as a signal of social growth adjustment. In this sense, a secular trend of BH adaptation of migrants to hosts is a sign of integration.
Remote sensing, which is a common method to examine land-use/land-cover (LULC) changes, could be useful in the analysis of livestock ecosystem transformations. In the last two decades, before Landsat images were free, developing countries could not afford monitoring through remote sensing because of the high cost of acquiring satellite imagery and commercial software. However, Landsat time series nowadays allows the characterization of changes in vegetation across large areas over time. The aim of this study is to analyse the LULC changes affecting forest frontiers and traditional silvopastoral systems (TSPS) in a representative livestock area of Nicaragua. Nearly cloud-free Landsat scenes - a Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper (TM) scene from 1986 and a Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) scene from 2015 - have been the data sets used in the study. A process chain following a four-step definition of the remote-sensing process was conceptually developed and implemented based onfree open source software components and by applying the random forest (RF) algorithm. A conceptual LULC classification scheme representing TSPS was developed. Although the imagery shows a heterogeneous surface cover and mixed pixels, it is possible to achieve promising classification results with the RF algorithm with out-of-the-bag (OOB) errors below 13% for both images along with an overall accuracy level of 85.9% for the 2015 subset and 85.2% for the 1986 subset. The classification shows that from 1986 to 2015 (29years) the intervened secondary forest (ISF) increased 2.6 times, whereas the degraded pastures decreased by 34.5%. The livestock landscape in Matiguas is in a state of constant transformation, but the main changes head towards the positive direction of tree-cover recovery and an increased number of areas of natural regeneration.
Bridging metabolomics with plant phenotypic responses is challenging. Multivariate analyses account for the existing dependencies among metabolites, and regression models in particular capture such dependencies in search for association with a given trait. However, special care should be undertaken with metabolomics data. Here we propose a modeling workflow that considers all caveats imposed by such large data sets.
The spatial control of DNA and of self-assembled DNA constructs is a prerequisite for the preparation of DNA-based nanostructures and microstructures and a useful tool for studies on single DNA molecules. Here we describe a protocol for the accumulation of dissolved lambda-DNA molecules between planar microelectrodes by the action of inhomogeneous radiofrequency electric fields. The resulting AC electrokinetic forces stretch the DNA molecules and align them parallel to the electric field. The electrode preparation from off-the-shelf electronic components is explained, and a detailed description of the electronic setup is given. The experimental procedure is controlled in real-time by fluorescence microscopy.
UNC119 and PDE delta are lipid-binding proteins and are thought to form diffusible complexes with transducin-alpha and prenylated OS proteins, respectively, to mediate their trafficking to photoreceptor outer segments. Here, we investigate mechanisms of trafficking which are controlled by Arf-like protein 3 (Arl3), a small GTPase. The activity of ARL3 is regulated by a GEF (ARL13b) and a GAP (RP2). In a mouse germline knockout of RP2, ARL3-GTP is abundant as its intrinsic GTPase activity is extremely low. High levels of ARL3-GTP impair binding and trafficking of cargo to the outer segment. Germline knockout of ARL3 is embryonically lethal generating a syndromic ciliopathy-like phenotype. Retina-and rod-specific knockout of ARL3 allow to determine the precise mechanisms leading to photoreceptor degeneration. The knockouts reveal binary functions of ARL3-GTP as a key molecule in late-stage photoreceptor ciliogenesis and cargo displacement factor.
Bryophytes constitute an important and permanent component of the grassland flora and diversity in Europe. As most bryophyte species are sensitive to habitat change, their diversity is likely to decline following land-use intensification. Most previous studies on bryophyte diversity focused on specific habitats of high bryophyte diversity, such as bogs, montane grasslands, or calcareous dry grasslands. In contrast, mesic grasslands are rarely studied, although they are the most common grassland habitat in Europe. They are secondary vegetation, maintained by agricultural use and thus, are influenced by different forms of land use. We studied bryophyte species richness in three regions in Germany, in 707 plots of 16 m(2) representing different land-use types and environmental conditions. Our study is one of the few to inspect the relationships between bryophyte richness and land use across contrasting regions and using a high number of replicates. Among the managed grasslands, pastures harboured 2.5 times more bryophyte species than meadows and mown pastures. Similarly, bryophyte cover was about twice as high in fallows and pastures than in meadows and mown pastures. Among the pastures, bryophyte species richness was about three times higher in sheep grazed plots than in the ones grazed by cattle or horses. In general, bryophyte species richness and cover was more than 50% lower in fertilized than in unfertilized plots. Moreover, the amount of suitable substrates was linked to bryophyte diversity. Species richness of bryophytes growing on stones increased with stone cover, and the one of bryophytes growing on bark and deadwood increased with larger values of woody plant species and deadwood cover. Our findings highlight the importance of low-intensity land use and high structural heterogeneity for bryophyte conservation. They also caution against an intensification of traditionally managed pastures. In the light of our results, we recommend to maintain low-intensity sheep grazing on sites with low productivity, such as slopes on shallow soils.
Um Themen des Schutzes von Pflanzengemeinschaften wirksamer in der breiten Öffentlichkeit zu kommunizieren wird der Vorstand der „Floristisch-Soziologischen Arbeitsgemeinschaft (FlorSoz)“ ab 2019 eine „Pflanzengesellschaft des Jahres“ ausrufen. Damit sollen politische und administrative Entscheidungs- und Umsetzungsprozesse zur Erhaltung der Vielfalt von Ökosystemen und Pflanzengesellschaften in Deutschlands gezielt unterstützt werden. Für das Jahr 2019 wurde die Glatthaferwiese ausgewählt. Sie zählt aktuell zu den durch Artenverarmung und Flächenrückgang besonders bedrohten Pflanzengesellschaften Deutschlands. Es sind deshalb dringend Maßnahmen zum Schutz und zur Wiederherstellung notwendig. Dieser Artikel gibt einen kurzen Überblick zur naturschutzfachlichen Bedeutung von Glatthaferwiesen und deren Ökosystemleistungen sowie zur floristisch-soziologischen Erforschung, zu Ursachen ihres Rückgangs und zu geeigneten Gegenmaßnahmen.