Strength training improves heart function, collagen and strength in rats with heart failure

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES

Myocardial infarction (MI) frequently leads to cardiac remodeling and failure with impaired life quality, playing an important role in cardiovascular deaths. Although physical exercise is a well-recognized effective non-pharmacological therapy for cardiovascular diseases, the effects of strength training (ST) on the structural and functional aspects of cardiac remodeling need to be further documented. In this study, we aimed to investigate the role of a linear block ST protocol in the rat model of MI.

METHODS AND RESULTS

After 6 weeks of MI induction or sham surgery, male adult rats performed ST for the following 12 weeks. The ladder-based ST program was organized in three mesocycles of 4 weeks, with one load increment for each block according to the maximal carrying load test. After 12 weeks, the infarcted-trained rats exhibited an increase in performance, associated with reduced cardiac hypertrophy and pulmonary congestion compared with the untrained group. Despite not changing MI size, the ST program partially prevented cardiac dilatation and ventricular dysfunction assessed by echocardiography and hemodynamics, and interstitial fibrosis evaluated by histology. In addition, isolated cardiac muscles from infarcted-trained rats had improved contractility parameters in a steady state, and in response to calcium or stimuli pauses.

CONCLUSIONS

The ST in infarcted rats increased the capacity to carry mass, associated with attenuation of cardiac remodeling and pulmonary congestion with improving cardiac function that could be attributed, at least in part, to the improvement of myocardial contractility.

Identification of volatiles and odor-active compounds of aromatic rice by OSME analysis and SPME/GC-MS

During cooking, aromatic rice has a pleasant and characteristic aroma, a relevant factor to add sale value and attract consumer interest. This work studied the volatile compounds of aromatic rice (IAC 500) aiming at identifying those responsible for the aroma and flavor of the cooked rice. The description of the aromatic notes of the IAC 500 rice was carried out by a trained and selected sensory panel, followed by olfactometry (OSME) and identification by GC-MS of the rice volatile compounds extracted by SPME. A total of 80 volatiles was sensorially perceived and/or detected in the chromatographic effluent, of which 65 were identified, 44 presented some odor, and 36 were odorless. Among the odorous compounds, 15 were not detected by GC-FID or GC-MS. This study confirmed the compound 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline as the impacting volatile compound to the aroma of aromatic rice since it presented a very low percentage of area in the chromatogram and a high odor intensity. Other 43 compounds presented odor in lower intensities, but also contributed to the overall aroma of IAC 500 rice. From the 11 aromatic notes mentioned by the trained panel (cooked vegetable/seed, corn, hominy, green, porridge, popcorn, fresh baked cake/bread, milk, caramel, tapioca flour and flower), eight were related to the volatile compounds responsible for their aroma.

Self-Assembly of Phosphocholine Derivatives Using the ELBA Coarse-Grained Model: Micelles, Bicelles, and Reverse Micelles

The ELBA coarse-grained force field was originally developed for lipids, and its water model is described as a single-site Lennard-Jones particle with electrostatics modeled by an embedded point-dipole, while other molecules in this force field have a three (or four)-to-one mapping scheme. Here, ELBA was applied to investigate the self-assembly processes of dodecyl-phosphocholine (DPC) micelle, 1,2-dipalmitoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine/1,2-dihexaoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine (DPPC/DHPC) bicelles, and DPPC/cyclohexane/water reverse micelles through coarse-grained molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. New parameters were obtained using a simplex algorithm-based calibration procedure to determine the Lennard-Jones parameters for cyclohexane, dodecane, and cyclohexane-dodecane cross-interactions. Density, self-diffusion coefficient, surface tension, and mixture excess volume were found to be in fair agreement with experimental data. These new parameters were used in the simulations, and the obtained structures were analyzed for shape, size, volume, and surface area. Except for the shape of DPC micelles, all other properties match well with available experimental data and all-atom simulations. Remarkably, in agreement with experiments the rodlike shape of the DPPC reverse micelle is well described by ELBA, while all-atom data in the literature predicts a disclike shape. To further check the consistency of the force field in reproducing the correct shapes of reverse micelles, additional simulations were performed doubling the system size. Two distinct reverse micelles were obtained both presenting the rodlike shape and correct aggregation number.

Aroma profile of rice varieties by a novel SPME method able to maximize 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline and minimize hexanal extraction

The solid phase microextraction (SPME) has been the most used technique for the extraction of volatile compounds from rice because of its easy operation and solvent-free. The extraction parameters, sample mass and incubation temperature, were optimized through a central composite rotational design (CCRD), aiming at maximizing the extraction of 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (2AP), the main compound responsible for the aroma in aromatic rice, and minimizing the generation of hexanal, a marker of lipid oxidation. Besides, the time of sample incubation and fiber exposure for the extraction of the volatile compounds from rice were determined. The optimized conditions for SPME were: 2.5 g of ground rice in a 20 mL vial, sample incubation at 80 °C for 60 min and exposure of the divinylbenzene/carboxene/polydimethylsiloxane (DVB/CAR/PDMS) fiber in the headspace for 10 min. The optimized method was sucessfuly applied to 12 varieties of rice and principal component analysis (PCA) was performed to observe similarities in their volatile profile. A total of 152 volatile compounds were identified among the different rice varieties. From these, 42 were identified in arborio rice, 47 in basmati brand A, 43 in basmati brand B, 55 in black rice, 63 in brown rice, 39 in jamine rice, 50 in parboiled brown rice, 43 in parboiled rice, 54 in red rice, 63 in sasanishiki rice, 46 in white rice and 70 in wild rice.

Two new species of Atopophlebia Flowers, 1980 (Ephemeroptera, Leptophlebiidae) from Colombia

Atopophlebia pacis sp. nov. and Atopophlebia caldasi sp. nov. are newly described based on material from Colombia, Putumayo and Caldas, respectively. Both species are known from nymphs and alate stages, male imago for A. pacis, male subimago, female imago and eggs for A. caldasi. This is the first description of eggs of the genus. The following characteristics are useful for distinguishing the males of the new species: A. pacis sp. nov., 1) eyes meeting on meson of head; 2) fore wings hyaline, veins yellow (Fig. 2); 3) fore tibia completely tinged with black; 4) abdominal segments yellowish, terga VIII with conspicuous triangular anterolateral black mark (Fig. 1); 5) apical projection of penis lobe short; A. caldasi sp. nov., 1) eyes meeting on meson of head; 2) fore tibia completely tinged with black; 3) abdominal segments orange, posterior margin of all terga tinged with black, black bands broader on terga V to VIII. Egg of A. caldasi is characterized by presenting a prismatic shape with longitudinal chorionic depressions at the sides and concave polar regions. An updated key for male adults of Atopophlebia is presented.

An overview of molecular dynamics simulations of oxidized lipid systems, with a comparison of ELBA and MARTINI force fields for coarse grained lipid simulations

Biological membranes and model lipid systems containing high amounts of unsaturated lipids and sterols are subject to chemical and/or photo-induced lipid oxidation, which leads to the creation of exotic oxidized lipid products (OxPLs). OxPLs are known to have significant physiological impact in cellular systems and also affect physical properties of both biological and model lipid bilayers. In this paper we (i) provide a perspective on the existing literature on simulations of lipid bilayer systems containing oxidized lipid species as well as the main related experimental results, (ii) describe our new data of all-atom and coarse-grained simulations of hydroperoxidized lipid monolayer and bilayer systems and (iii) provide a comparison of the MARTINI and ELBA coarse grained force fields for lipid bilayer systems. We show that the better electrostatic treatment of interactions in ELBA is able to resolve previous conflicts between experiments and simulations. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Biosimulations edited by Ilpo Vattulainen and Tomasz Róg.

Spatial and temporal variability of canopy cover and understory light in a Cerrado of Southern Brazil

Canopy cover has significant effects on the understory environment, including upon light availability for seedling growth. The aim of the present study was to verify spatial heterogeneity and seasonal changes in the canopy cover of a dense Cerrado area, and their relationship to understory photosynthetic active radiation availability. Leaf area index (LAI) values in the rainy season varied from 0.9 to 4.83, with 40% of the values ranging from 4.0 to 5.0, while in the dry season LAI varied from 0.74 to 3.3, with 53% of the values oscillating from 2.0 to 3.0. Understory light (Q(i)) and the Lambert-Beer ratio (Q(i)/Q(o)) were taken around noon on sunny days (between 11:00 AM and 1:00 PM). They were also statistically different (p < 0.01) between the dry and wet seasons, with 72% of sampled points in the rainy season presenting photosynthetic photon flux density (PPFD) values lower than 250 micromol x m(-2)/s around noon, whereas in the dry season, most PPFD values varied from 1500 to 1817 micromol x m(-2)/s, thus providing high light availability for understory plants. In most of the studied sites, understory plants did not even receive enough light for 50% of their photosynthetic capacity in the wet season. In contrast during the dry season, Q(i)/Q(o) values of 0.8 to 1.0 were observed in more than 50% of the points, thereby allowing for photosynthetic light saturation. Thus, light variability around noon was higher during the dry season than in the wet season, its heterogeneity being related to spatial complexity in the canopy cover.

Predicting Hydration Free Energies of Neutral Compounds by a Parametrization of the Polarizable Continuum Model

A parametrization of the polarizable continuum model (PCM) is presented having the experimental hydration free energies of 215 neutral molecules as target. The cavitation and dispersion contributions were based on the Tuñon-Silla-Pascual-Ahuir (Tuñon; et al. Chem. Phys. Lett. 1993, 203, 289) and Floris-Tomasi (Floris, F.; Tomasi, J. J. Comput. Chem. 1989, 10, 616) expressions, respectively. Both the polar and nonpolar contributions were evaluated on the same solvent-excluding molecular surface that used unscaled Bondi atomic radii. The parametrization was provided for the HF, Xalpha, LSDA, B3LYP, and mPW1PW91 methods at the 6-31G(d) basis set, and the results are in fair agreement with the experimental data. For the sake of comparison, the PCM(UAHF) and our parametrization (PCM2), both at HF level, have produced DeltaG(PCM(UAHF)) = aDeltaGexp (a = 1.02 +/- 0.02, r = 0.945, sd = 0.987, Ftest = 1778) and DeltaG(PCM2) = aDeltaGexp (a = 0.95 +/- 0.02, r = 0.952, sd = 0.843, Ftest = 2070), respectively. The mean absolute deviations from experimental data were 0.67 and 0.68 kcal/mol for PCM(UAHF) and PCM2, respectively.

Single-beam interface thermal lensing

A single-beam photothermal-lensing technique to study interfaces is presented. By analysis of the reflection from a quartz-solution interface with a low-power laser in a single-beam configuration, a photothermal signal is detected. The data were fitted with a conventional thermal lens model, and the results show that the optical element formed at the interface resembles an inverted thermal lens.