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“Ninety-two exclusively breast-fed Japanese infants with atopic dermatitis were studied to see whether tree nut-related foods (chocolate and coffee) and fermented foods (cheese, yogurt, bread, soy sauce, miso soup and fermented soy beans) eaten by their mothers affected their Liproxstatin1 skin condition. Of the 92 infants, 67 (73%) showed improvement

of skin lesions when their mothers avoided these foods and showed aggravation of skin lesions when these foods were reintroduced. The predominant offending foods were chocolate, yogurt, soy sauce and miso soup. A long-term maternal exclusion of the trigger foods brought about progressive improvement of skin lesions in the majority of the infants. These findings suggest that tree nut-related foods and fermented foods are important offending foods of atopic dermatitis in breast-fed infants.”
“The plasma B-type natriuretic peptide (BNP) concentration was recently shown to be inversely correlated with body mass index (BMI). However, very few attempts have been made to associate abdominal obesity and BNP in the Japanese general population. Here, we conducted a cross-sectional study, Bafilomycin A1 in vivo and examined 339 male and 429 female residents without heart disease in a rural Japanese

community who received an annual health checkup in 2006. BNP was inversely associated with both BMI and abdominal circumference (AC) in the age-adjusted regression analysis selleck compound ( < 0.05). Following adjustment for traditional risk factors, multiple regression analysis revealed that BNP was negatively correlated with AC ( < 0.05), but not BMI. Although metabolic syndrome was not associated with BNP levels, AC had an influence on low BNP levels in the multiple regression analysis using both AC and BMI concurrently ( < 0.05 for AC and > 0.60 for BMI). These effects were more prominent in men than in women. Collectively, plasma BNP levels are inversely related with obesity, as measured by AC, in Japanese community-based

subjects.”
“Cocaine dependence is associated with orbitofrontal cortex (OFC)-dependent cognitive inflexibility in both humans and laboratory animals. A critical question is whether cocaine self-administration affects pre-existing individual differences in cognitive flexibility. Serotonin transporter knockout (5-HTT/) mice show improved cognitive flexibility in a visual reversal learning task, whereas 5-HTT/ rats self-administer increased amounts of cocaine. Here we assessed: (1) whether 5-HTT/ rats also show improved cognitive flexibility (next to mice); and (2) whether this is affected by cocaine self-administration, which is increased in these animals. Results confirmed that naive 5-HTT/ rats (n=8) exhibit improved cognitive flexibility, as measured in a sucrose reinforced reversal learning task.