Babies who breathe in polluted air tend to have higher rates of peanut allergy as they grow up, but the same wasn’t true for immune-based conditions like egg allergy or eczema, Australian researchers report. Why the connection to peanut allergy in particular? That’s not yet clear, said study lead author Dr. Diego Lopez, of the University of Melbourne. “Air pollutants have an irritant and inflammatory effect that may boost the immune systems pro-allergic response, potentially triggering the development of food allergies,” said Lopez, a researcher at the university’s School of Population and Global Health. “However, the underlying mechanisms of how air pollution increases the risk of a peanut allergy, and why eczema and egg allergy aren’t impacted in the same way, need to be explored further,” he said in a news release from the Murdoch Childrens Research Institute (MCRI). The new research involved nearly 5,300 children living in Melbourne who’d been enrolled at the age of 1 and then followed up at ages 4, 6 and 10. Lopez’ team was able to track local data on air pollution for whatever neighborhood the child lived in. They looked specifically at two types of pollution: fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and nitrogen dioxide (NO2). As rates of air pollution rose, so did a child’s odds of developing a peanut allergy, the team found. Food allergies were diagnosed using…  read on >  read on >

Experiments in sheep are hinting that doses of caffeine given to women in pregnancy, as well as their newborns after birth, could prevent cerebral palsy. Cerebral palsy is a disabling condition often caused by asphyxia — reductions in oxygen supply — around the time of birth. Asphyxia can cause other neurodevelopmental disorders, as well. Researcher Dr. Emin Maltepe, a neonatologist at the University of California, San Francisco’s Benioff Children’s Hospital, explained how caffeine might prevent asphyxia damage. “Caffeine has previously proven to be safe in stimulating the respiratory centers of preterm babies and helping them remember to breathe,” said Maltepe, who is senior author of the new study. Caffeine “easily crosses the blood-brain barrier and is a potent antioxidant and anti-inflammatory molecule,” added first study author Dr. Jana Mike, a pediatric intensivist at the same hospital. Maltepe and Mike published their findings Oct. 21 in the journal Stroke. In the new study, 30 pregnant sheep received either a single intravenous dose of one gram of caffeine, which is equal to about 10 cups of coffee, or a placebo IV shot. Then, after their lambs were born and asphyxia was induced, some lambs got a large dose of caffeine followed by lesser doses each day for two days. The other lambs received the placebo.   Measures of systemic inflammation, called cytokines, were significantly less among lambs…  read on >  read on >

A healthy diet can help keep prostate cancer in check, a new study finds. The better a man eats, the less likely his low-grade prostate cancer will progress to a more dangerous state, researchers reported Oct. 17 in the journal JAMA Oncology. For every increase of 12.5 points in a zero-to-100 healthy eating scale, men were 15% less likely to have their grade 1 prostate cancer progress to at least grade 2, and 30% less likely to have it progress to grade 3 or greater, results show. “While there have been previous research studies looking at diet and its relationship to prostate cancer, we believe that ours is the first to provide statistically significant evidence that a healthy diet is associated with a reduction in risk of prostate cancer progressing to a higher grade group, as shown by a reduction in the percentage of men on active surveillance experiencing grade reclassifications over time,” said co-senior researcher Dr. Christian Pavlovich. He’s a professor in urologic oncology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore. For the study, researchers tracked the data on 886 men diagnosed with grade 1 prostate cancer between January 2005 and February 2017. Grade 1 prostate cancers are indolent, don’t look very different than normal tissue, and haven’t spread to other parts of the body. All of the men completed a…  read on >  read on >

Studies in mice have shown that the fungal toxin zearalenone can mimic estrogen, and it might hamper reproduction. It’s not yet clear if the “mycoestrogen” compound can do the same in women. However, a new study finds that nearly all pregnant women ingest zearalenone as part of their daily diets. Researchers at Rutgers University and the University of Rochester say they detected traces of zearalenone in 97% of urine samples they received from pregnant women. The toxin appears to be more common among folks who eat lots of “ultraprocessed” foods, they added. “For every 1 percent higher ultra-processed food consumption, there was a higher exposure to mycoestrogen,” noted study lead author Carolyn Kinkade, who studied zearalenone for her PhD thesis at Rutgers. Kinkade’s team published its findings recently in the Journal of Exposure Science & Environment Epidemiology. As the researchers explained, mycoestrogens are produced by various fungi that commonly contaminate grains, meats and processed foods. Zearalenone, in particular, can be found on corn, wheat and barley. Animal studies suggest that zearalenone can disrupt reproduction because it acts similarly to estrogen. In fact, it’s so similar to the estrogenic hormone17β-estradiol “that it binds with estrogen receptors” on cells, according to a Rutgers news release. High concentrations of zearalenone have already been linked to smaller numbers of offspring for mammals such as cattle, pigs, mice and rats. On…  read on >  read on >

Did you know that sodium is the bad guy in salt, raising your risks for high blood pressure and other heart ills? Luckily for Americans, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is working to make it easier for you and your family to eat food with less sodium. Because more than 70% of the sodium you eat comes from processed foods and restaurant fare, the FDA is working closely with the food industry to slowly lower sodium levels across a wide range of foods. In the meantime, you and your family can also find ways to lower the amount of sodium you eat. The recommended limit for sodium is 2,300 milligrams (mg) per day for people aged 14 and older. Unfortunately, Americans consume about 3,400 mg of sodium each day, on average. That’s more than 50% above than the recommended limit, the FDA noted in a news release.  Consuming too much salt can trigger high blood pressure, a leading cause of heart disease and stroke, and 90% of Americans are eating more sodium than is recommended. While almost 5 in 10 Americans have high blood pressure, almost 6 in 10 Black adults have the condition. Even children and adolescents eat too much sodium. Evidence shows that children who eat foods higher in sodium can carry those poor eating habits into adulthood, the FDA added. What can…  read on >  read on >

Folks who struggle to reduce their carb intake might be able to blame ancient DNA still lurking in humans, a new study suggests. Humans carry multiple copies of the salivary amylase gene (AMY1), which helps begin breaking down starch in the mouth — the first step in digesting carb-laden foods like bread and pasta, researchers said. The duplication of this gene might have occurred as far back as more than 800,000 years ago, long before the advent of farming, and it helped shape human adaptation to starchy foods, researchers argue. Amylase is an enzyme that breaks down starch into glucose, and it also gives bread its distinctive taste, researchers said. “The idea is that the more amylase genes you have, the more amylase you can produce and the more starch you can digest effectively,” said researcher Omer Gokcumen, a professor of biological sciences with the University of Buffalo. For the study, researchers analyzed the genetics of 68 ancient human bodies, including a person who lived 45,000 years ago in Siberia. They found that pre-agricultural hunter-gatherers carried an average of four to eight AMY1 copies in their genetic makeup, suggesting that people already had adapted to eating starchy foods long before they began growing foods like wheat and potatoes. AMY1 gene duplications also were found in ancient human ancestors like Neanderthals and Denisovans, the researchers added.…  read on >  read on >

Checking your blood pressure at home? Pay attention to arm position. A new study by Johns Hopkins researchers confirms that it makes a “huge difference” when it comes to getting an accurate measurement. And, the authors add, health care providers need to be more careful about it, too. “[Patients] must advocate for themselves in the clinical setting and when measuring their BP at home,” said senior study author Dr. Tammy Brady, vice chair for clinical research in the department of pediatrics at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Nearly half of U.S. adults have elevated blood pressure, according to the American Heart Association (AHA).  The diagnosis is made when the force of blood flowing through blood vessels is higher than normal (120/80, on average). Left untreated, hypertension puts a person at increased risk of stroke, heart attack and other serious heart conditions. The new study looked at the effects of three arm positions during a blood pressure test: supported on a desk; supported on a lap; and hanging at the patient’s side. The study found that lap support overestimated systolic blood pressure (the top number in a blood pressure reading) by nearly 4 mmHg, while an arm hanging at the patients side overestimated it by nearly 7 mmHg. Systolic pressure is the pressure against artery walls when the heart beats. AHA guidelines for measuring blood…  read on >  read on >