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Former Ghanaian President Named World Food Programme Ambassador
John Kofi Agyekum Kufuor, a former president of Ghana, has been named a global ambassador against hunger for the U.N."s World Food Programme (WFP), Xinhua reports. According to the news service, Kufuor will "help to underline the importance of fighting hunger on several fronts - by investing in long-term agricultural development, but also by funding WFP"s work in tackling urgent hunger needs and helping the hungry poor to access affordable and nutritious food" (Ooko, 7/20).
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Vets Not Adequately Trained For Dog-owners' "customer Care" Expectations
Vets are not being adequately trained to deal with the increasing "customer care" expectations of dog-owners, reveals a small study published in this week"s Veterinary Record.
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Advocates Say Rise In Inquires About Adoption, Abortion Linked To Recession
Several large adoption agencies are reporting an increase in the number of women with unintended pregnancies who are considering adoption, a trend that some advocates say is tied to the recession, USA Today reports. Scott Mars of American Adoptions said that he has observed a 10% to 12% increase in the past year in the number of women asking about adoption and a 7% to 10% increase in actual placements. Mars said that the economy has led women to "take a second look at adoption." Adam Pertman of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute, a research group, said, "Finances are one of the major reasons women feel compelled to place their children for adoption." According to USA Today, more women also are considering delaying pregnancy or inquiring about abortion because of financial factors. A recent Gallup poll found that the economy has prompted one in 10 married women to delay pregnancy. Vicki Saporta of the National Abortion Federation, which represents abortion providers, said that calls to the group"s hotline have increased nearly threefold since 2008 and that many of the calls have come from women who have experienced job loss in their families.According to Joan Jaeger of the Chicago-area adoption agency The Cradle, about 30% more women are asking about placing a child for adoption than in 2008. She noted that many of the women inquiring about adoption are in their 20s and have at least one child. Joseph Sica of Adoption by Shepherd Care said he has seen a "dramatic increase in girls calling us from the hospital" who are interested in placing a child for adoption. Sica said that many of these women expect to receive assistance in raising their infants but inquire about adoption after they give birth and find that little help is available. He said that in 2008 his agency facilitated 14 such adoptions, an increase from 11 in 2007 and four in 2006. However, Chuck Johnson -- chief operating officer of the advocacy group the National Council for Adoption -- said that the percentage of women who place a child for adoption remains low overall, which he attributed to access to legal abortion and greater societal acceptance of single parenthood. Data from the National Center for Health Statistics show that before abortion became legal in 1973, one in five never-married white women and one in 10 never-married women overall placed a child for adoption after giving birth. Since then, that rate has "plummeted," USA Today reports. A 2002 survey, the most recent available, found that only 1% of such women placed a child for adoption (Koch, USA Today, 5/19).
Public Health

How Oxidative Stress May Help Prolong Life

Oxidative stress has been linked to aging, cancer and other diseases in humans. However, researchers have suggested that small exposure to oxidative conditions may actually offer protection from acute doses. Now, scientists at the University of California, San Diego, have discovered the gene responsible for this effect. Their study, published May 29 in the open-access journal PLoS Genetics, explains the underlying mechanism of the process that prevents cellular damage by reactive oxygen species (ROS). "We may drink pomegranate juice to protect our bodies from so-called "free radicals" or look at restricting calorie intake to extend our lifespan," said senior author Trey Ideker. "But our study suggests why humans may actually be able to prolong the aging process by regularly exposing our bodies to minimal amounts of oxidants." Reactive oxygen species (ROS), ions that form as a natural byproduct of the metabolism of oxygen, play important roles in cell signaling. However, during times of environmental stress (for example, ultraviolet radiation or heat or chemical exposure), ROS levels can increase dramatically. This can result in significant damage to DNA, RNA and proteins - cumulating in an effect called oxidative stress. One major contributor is hydrogen peroxide, converted from a type of free radical that leaks from the mitochondria as they produce energy. While the cell has ways to help minimize the damaging effects of hydrogen peroxide by converting it to oxygen and water, this conversion isn"t 100 percent successful. Ideker and first author Ryan Kelley used yeast to identify pathways involved in the cell"s adaptation to hydrogen peroxide. Adaptation (or hormesis) is an effect where a toxic substance acts like a stimulant in small doses, but is an inhibitor in large doses. Ideker and Kelley elicited adaptation by pre-treating cells with a mild dose of hydrogen peroxide, followed by a high dose. They observed that the cells undergoing this adaptation protocol exhibited a smaller reduction in viability than cells exposed to only an acute treatment protocol (in which about half of the cells died.) To determine which genes might control this adaptation mechanism, Kelley and Ideker ran a series of experiments in which cells were forced to adapt while each gene in the genome was removed, one by one - covering a total of nearly 5,000 genes. By systematically removing genes, they identified novel factor called Mga2 - and discovered that this transcription factor is essential for adaptation. "This was a surprise, because Mga2 is found at the control point of a completely different pathway than those which respond to acute exposure of oxidative agents," said Ideker. "This second pathway is only active at lower doses of oxidation. Our next step is to figure out how Mga2 works to create a separate pathway - to discover the upstream mechanism that senses low doses of oxidation and triggers a protective mechanism downstream." Further efforts to understand this process may have broad implications on models of aging and disease. CITATION: "Genome-Wide Fitness and Expression Profiling Implicate Mga2 in Adaptation to Hydrogen Peroxide." Kelley R, Ideker T (2009) PLoS Genet 5(5): e1000488. doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1000488 PLoS Genetics


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