Associations of dietary diversity with allergic diseases in Japanese workers: a cross-sectional study.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to determine the associations of dietary diversity with prevalences of allergic diseases. METHODS AND STUDY DESIGN: The participants were 1,317 men and women aged 20 to 63 years who were living in Tokushima Prefecture, Japan during the period 2012-2013. We obtained anthropometric data and information on lifestyle characteristics and current medical histories of allergic diseases using a self-administered questionnaire. Dietary intake was assessed using a food frequency questionnaire, and dietary diversity was determined using the Quantitative Index for Dietary Diversity (QUANTIDD). The ORs and 95% CIs for each of the allergic diseases with a 1 standard deviation (SD) increase in the QUANTIDD score were estimated, controlling for age, family history of allergic diseases, education, smoking, drinking, physical activity, energy intake and BMI. RESULTS: Higher dietary diversity showed significant inverse dose-response relationships with allergic diseases and allergic rhinitis in women. Multivariate-adjusted ORs (95% CI) for allergic diseases and allergic rhinitis with 1 SD increase in the QUANTIDD score were 0.77 (95% CI: 0.60-0.98, p=0.037) and 0.69 (95% CI: 0.53-0.90, p=0.007), respectively, in women. There were no significant associations between dietary diversity and allergic diseases in men. CONCLUSIONS: The results indicate that there is an inverse association between higher dietary diversity and allergic rhinitis in Japanese female workers.

A role of Anabaena sensory rhodopsin transducer (ASRT) in photosensory transduction.

In 2003, Anabaena sensory rhodopsin (ASR), a membrane-bound light sensor protein, was discovered in cyanobacteria. Since then, a large number of functions have been described for ASR, based on protein biochemical and biophysical studies. However, no study has determined the in vivo mechanism of photosensory transduction for ASR and its transducer protein (ASRT). Here, we aimed to determine the role of ASRT in physiological photo-regulation. ASRT is known to be related to photochromism, because it regulates the expression of phycocyanin (cpc-gene) and phycoerythrocyanin (pec gene), two major proteins of the phycobilisome in cyanobacteria. By examining wild type and knockout mutant Anabaena cells, we showed that ASRT repressed the expression of these two genes. We also demonstrated physical interactions between ASRT, ASR, and the promoter regions of cpc, pec, kaiABC (circadian clock gene) and the asr operon, both in vitro and in vivo. Binding assays indicated that ASRT had different sites of interaction for binding to ASR and DNA promoter regions. ASRT also influenced the retinal re-isomerization rate in dark through a physical interaction with ASR, and it regulated reporter gene expression in vivo. These results suggested that ASRT relayed the photosignal from ASR and directly regulated gene expression.

Dietary diversity and characteristics of lifestyle and awareness of health in Japanese workers†:†a cross-sectional study.

The aim of this study was to clarify the characteristics of lifestyle and health awareness according to dietary diversity in a Japanese worksite population. The participants were 1,312 men and women aged 20 to 63 years who were living in Tokushima Prefecture, Japan during the period 2012-2013. We obtained anthropometric data and information on lifestyle characteristics using a self-administered questionnaire. Dietary intake was assessed using a food frequency questionnaire, and dietary diversity was determined using the Quantitative Index for Dietary Diversity (QUANTIDD). The characteristics of lifestyle and health awareness according to quartiles of the QUANTIDD score were assessed using the chi-square test and a general linear model. The higher the QUANTIDD score was, the larger were the proportions of participants who knew the appropriate amount of dietary intake and participants who referred to nutritional component information when choosing and / or buying food. Among participants with higher QUANTIDD scores, the proportion of participants who considered their current diet was good was high in women, whereas the proportion of participants who wanted to improve their diet in the future was high in men. Those results indicate that higher dietary diversity was related to better characteristics of lifestyle and awareness of health. J. Med. Invest. 67 : 255-264, August, 2020.

Biofilm-forming ability of Staphylococcus aureus strains isolated from human skin.

BACKGROUND: Staphylococcus aureus produces various toxins and enzymes, and its presence can exacerbate skin conditions. Previous studies have shown that S. aureus is involved in skin deterioration, even in normal tissue. Biofilm strains show much greater resistance to antimicrobial agents and therefore require a much higher concentration of biocide than planktonic counterparts. OBJECTIVE: As such, alternative strategies and more effective therapeutic agents against biofilm-producing S. aureus in skin are of great interest. Therefore, we turned our attention to differences in 50 clinical biofilm strains isolated from human facial skin. METHODS: Based on S. aureus density on facial skin, we divided donors into two groups: relatively low density (LSG) and high density (HSG). In general, strong biofilm-forming strains were detected in the HSG donors. Two strains from each of the groups were submitted to gene microarray analysis to investigate expression differences and confirmed by RT-PCR. RESULTS: In total, 111 of 7775 genes were differentially expressed between low (SA2 and SA7) vs. high (SA10 and SA33) biofilm-forming clinical strains. These genes include already well-known as biofilm formation related genes like icaABCD and lrgAB, and newly identified genes (sdrC, sspBCP) by RT-PCR. Comparison of gene expression differences between the two groups available at NCBI Gene Expression Omnibus accession number GSE44268. CONCLUSION: Our results suggest that S. aureus density in the skin is closely related to biofilm-forming ability, and we have identified several potential target genes that may be involved in regulating biofilm formation in situ.