Effects of soil moisture and aeration on the biodegradation of pentachlorophenol contaminated soil.
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Biomedical subjects
Publications and source records attributed to M N Miller.
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A collegiate athlete population was surveyed for alcohol abuse as well as self-reported depression, anxiety, and other psychiatric symptoms. This study revealed that in a group of 262 athletes there were 21 percent who reported high alcohol use and problems associated with its use. Significant correlations were found between reported alcohol abuse and self-reported symptoms of depression and general psychiatric symptoms. Subjects with positive depression and psychiatric symptom ratings in the "severe" range had a significantly higher rate of alcohol abuse than subjects who had low depression and low or mild symptom ratings. Conversely, subjects reporting higher rates of alcohol misuse had more psychiatric symptoms. These findings suggest a possible causal link between psychopathology and serious alcohol abuse among college athletes. They also point to the need for routine depression and anxiety screening in college students who are typically beginning a significant exposure to alcohol.
Cultural beliefs and attitudes have been identified as significant contributing factors in the development of eating disorders. Rates of these disorders appear to vary among different racial/ethnic and national groups, and they also change across time as cultures evolve. Eating disorders are, in fact, more prevalent within various cultural groups than previously recognized, both within American ethnic minorities and those in other countries. This review examines evidence for the role of culture as an etiological factor for the development of eating disorders. Historical and cross-cultural experiences suggest that cultural change itself may be associated with increased vulnerability to eating disorders, especially when values about physical aesthetics are involved. Such change may occur across time within a given society, or on an individual level, as when an immigrant moves into a new culture. Further research into the cultural factors that promote the development of eating disorders is much needed. Understanding how cultural forces contribute to the development of disorders is needed so that preventive interventions can be created.
Premenstrual exacerbation of mood disorders has received little attention, despite the recent interest in premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) and premenstrual syndrome (PMS). Differentiating between PMDD/PMS and other disorders, which worsen premenstrually, is a poorly understood diagnostic challenge. Controversy also focuses on a possible coexistence of PMDD and other mood disorders. This review discusses the differences between mood-disorder exacerbations and premenstrual disorders, evidence for premenstrual magnification of mood disorders, and possible mechanisms for these variations as well as clinical implications.
We discuss specific problems in implementing research to evaluate exercise treatment for premenstrual syndrome (PMS). Modifications of lifestyle, such as implementing exercise regimens, frequently are recommended as treatment for PMS, but evidence supporting this treatment is largely anecdotal. Originally, we designed a study to examine the effects of physical exercise on the symptoms of PMS. Despite initial enthusiasm, the majority of participants dropped out before beginning the active intervention segment of the study. This unexpected attrition resulted in a review of methodology, including recruitment and study design, in an attempt to understand factors related to research on exercise-based treatments of PMS so future researchers would be cognizant of the obstacles inherent in such research. Such understanding will allow research to advance more efficiently by enabling investigators to avoid the pitfalls we identified.
OBJECTIVE: Students from 5 public schools in east Tennessee in grades 6 through 10 were assessed for their risk of eating disorder. METHOD: The Eating Attitudes Test (EAT40), a self-administered questionnaire, was given anonymously to 1,302 male and female adolescents. RESULTS: The results showed that 19.8% of females and 3.7% of males scored above 29, indicating high risk for development of an eating disorder. There was also a trend toward increased prevalence of risk in areas that are more rural. CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggest that the risk for eating disorders may be greater in rural areas than has previously been believed. This has implications for understanding the etiology of these diseases as well as demonstrating the need for more research in these often underserved areas.
The authors examined the dose response relationship between plasma ACTH and cortisol concentrations after the administration of various doses of ACTH1-24 (0.025 micrograms, 0.125 micrograms, 0.25 micrograms, 1 microgram, 250 micrograms) in dexamethasone-suppressed normal volunteers. A logarithmic dose-response relationship between the dose of ACTH administered and plasma cortisol concentration was found. Although there was considerable variability in plasma ACTH concentrations, there was, however, a definite correlation between area under the curve for ACTH and area under the curve for cortisol after the various doses of ACTH.
Surface components of virulent and attenuated Leptospira interrogans serovar grippotyphosa were compared by using Triton X-114 solubilization and phase partitioning, immunoprecipitation of intact organisms, and freeze-fracture electron microscopy. Removal of the leptospiral outer membrane by using 0.1% Triton X-114 was demonstrated by whole-mount electron microscopy and by essentially complete solubilization of a lipopolysaccharidelike substance (LLS) from the outer membrane. Triton X-114 (0.1%) did not solubilize subsurface proteins, such as endoflagellar filaments or penicillin-binding proteins, which are markers for the periplasmic space and inner membrane, respectively. Triton X-114 solubilized material from both the virulent and attenuated strains, which partitioned into the hydrophobic, detergent phase, contained LLS and major proteins of 41 and 44 kDa, which were also immunoprecipitable from intact organisms. The virulent strain contained greater amounts of an LLS component with an apparent molecular mass of 30 kDa (R(f) = 0.57), whereas the attenuated strain contained larger amounts of an LLS component with an apparent molecular mass of 20 kDa (R(f) = 0.74). Differences in protein components between virulent and attenuated organisms were also detected; whereas the 41- and 44-kDa proteins were immunoprecipitated in equal amounts from both the virulent and attenuated strains, a 33-kDa protein was immunoprecipitated in significantly greater amounts from the attenuated strain. Quantitation of outer membrane particle density by freeze-fracture electron microscopy showed that both strains had a low transmembrane outer membrane protein content compared with that of typical gram-negative bacteria. The virulent and attenuated strains had 443 and 990 particles (P less than 0.000001) per micron, respectively, in the concave outer membrane fracture face. These findings suggest that in vitro cultivation of L. interrogans is accompanied by quantitative and qualitative changes in both LLS and outer membrane-associated proteins.
The level of an endogenous opioid (peak B endorphin) was measured in chromatographically fractionated cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) sampled from two groups of chronic pain patients before and after intrathecal saline (placebo) injection. As assessed by a verbal rating scale, one group reported no change in their level of pain (non-responders, NR; n = 6) while the other group reported complete or greater than 50% pain relief (placebo responders, PR; n = 14). We find, as has been reported previously, that initial peak B levels were lower (by 50%) in these chronic pain patients' CSF than in CSF from pain-free (PF) normal controls (P less than 0.001, t-test). Peak B levels measured from CSF of the NR group undergoing this procedure did not change (P greater than 0.4, paired t-test). In contrast, a significant 2.3-fold increase was measured in the CSF peak B level of the PR group (P less than 0.05, paired t-test). This is the first direct evidence that a CSF opioid is correlated with placebo pain relief in chronic pain patients. Peak B is a potent analgesic substance when administered by the intracerebroventricular route in mice and its level is related to the patients' pain status in a presumably causal manner.
The renal biopsies of 372 children with various glomerular disorders were reviewed and crescent formation was seen in 56 cases (15%). Four disorders, i.e. systemic lupus erythematosus, membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis (MPGN) types I and II and Henoch-Schönlein disease accounted for 74% of 10 diagnostic categories. Idiopathic rapidly progressive glomerulonephritis (RPGN) was seen in only 2 cases. Crescents associated with MPGN types I or II or idiopathic RPGN had a bad renal prognosis, whereas the presence of crescents in other disorders did not necessarily affect the renal outcome. Immunofluorescent and electron microscopic findings are essential to distinguish many conditions which may be associated with crescent formation in childhood renal disease.
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