(Review) Body mass index and risk of diabetes mellitus in the Asia-Pacific region

Few prospective data from the Asia Pacific region are available relating body mass index to the risk of diabetes. Our objective was to provide reliable age, sex and region specific estimates of the associations between body mass index and diabetes. Twenty-seven cohort studies from Asia, New Zealand and Australia, including 154,989 participants, contributed 1,244,793 person-years of follow-up. Outcome data included a combination of incidence of diabetes (based on blood glucose measurements) and fatal diabetes events. Hazard ratios were calculated from Cox models, stratified by sex and cohort, and adjusted for age at risk and smoking. During follow-up (mean = 8 years), 75 fatal diabetes events and 242 new cases of diabetes were documented. There were continuous positive associations between baseline body mass index and risk of diabetes with each 2 kg/m(2) lower body mass index associated with a 27% (23-30%) lower risk of diabetes. The associations were stronger in younger age groups, and regional comparisons demonstrated slightly stronger associations in Asian than in Australasian cohorts (P = 0.04). This overview provides evidence of a strong continuous association between body mass index and diabetes in the Asia Pacific region. The results indicate considerable potential for reduction in incidence of diabetes with population-wide lowering of body mass index in this region.

The family attitude scale: Reliability and validity of a new scale for measuring the emotional climate of families

Research on outcomes from psychiatric disorders has highlighted the importance of expressed emotion (EE), but its cost-effective measurement remains a challenge. This article describes development of the Family Attitude Scale (FAS), a 30-item instrument that can be completed by any informant. Its psychometric characteristics are reported in parents of undergraduate students and in 70 families with a schizophrenic member. The total FAS had high internal consistency in all samples, and reports of angry behaviour in FAS items showed acceptable inter-rater agreement. The FAS was associated with the reported anger, anger expression and anxiety of respondents. Substantial associations between the parents' FAS and the anger and anger expression of students was also observed. Parents of schizophrenic patients had higher FAS scores than parents of students, and the FAS was higher if disorder duration was longer or patient functioning was poorer. Hostility, high criticism and low warmth on the Camberwell Family Interview (CFI) were associated with a more negative FAS. The highest FAS in the family was a good predictor of a highly critical environment on the CFI. The FAS is a reliable and valid indicator of relationship stress and expressed anger that has wide applicability. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd.

Population structure of Phytophthora cinnamomi in South Africa

Phytophthora cinnamomi isolates collected from 1977 to 1986 and 1991 to 1993 in two regions in South Africa were analyzed using isozymes. A total of 135 isolates was analyzed for 14 enzymes representing 20 putative loci, of which four were polymorphic. This led to the identification of nine different multilocus isozyme genotypes. Both mating types of P. cinnamomi occurred commonly in the Cape region, whereas, predominantly, the A2 mating type occurred in the Mpumalanga region of South Africa. A2 mating type isolates could be resolved into seven multilocus isozyme genotypes, compared with only two multilocus isozyme genotypes for the A1 mating type isolates. Low levels of gene (0.115) and genotypic (2.4%) diversity and a low number of alleles per locus (1.43) were observed for the South African P. cinnamomi population. The genetic distance between the Cape and Mpumalanga P. cinnamomi populations was relatively low (D-m = 0.165), and no specific pattern in regional distribution of multilocus isozyme genotypes could be observed. The genetic distance between the ''old'' (isolated between 1977 and 1986) and ''new'' (isolated between 1991 and 1993) P. cinnamomi populations from the Cape was low (D-m = 0.164), indicating a stable population over time. Three of the nine multilocus isozyme genotypes were specific to the ''old'' population, and only one multilocus isozyme genotype was specific to the ''new'' population. Significant differences in allele frequencies, a high genetic distance (D-m = 0.581) between the Cape A1 and A2 mating type isolates, significant deviations from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium, a low overall level of heterozygosity, and a high fixation index (0.71) all indicate that sexual reproduction occurs rarely, if at all, in the South African P. cinnamomi population.

Asymmetric page split generalized index search trees for formal concept analysis

Formal Concept Analysis is an unsupervised machine learning technique that has successfully been applied to document organisation by considering documents as objects and keywords as attributes. The basic algorithms of Formal Concept Analysis then allow an intelligent information retrieval system to cluster documents according to keyword views. This paper investigates the scalability of this idea. In particular we present the results of applying spatial data structures to large datasets in formal concept analysis. Our experiments are motivated by the application of the Formal Concept Analysis idea of a virtual filesystem [11,17,15]. In particular the libferris [1] Semantic File System. This paper presents customizations to an RD-Tree Generalized Index Search Tree based index structure to better support the application of Formal Concept Analysis to large data sources.

Improvement of the electrolytic properties of Y2O3-based materials using a crystallographic index

Y2O3 is a c-type rare earth oxide with a fluorite-related structure. This material has been used to refractory because of its high thermal stability and excellent resistance to hydration. In this study, the effective index was suggested in order to improve the electrolytic properties of Y2O3-based oxide. (CexY1-x)(2)O3+delta (x = 0.25 and 0.3) and [LaaSrbCe0.25Y(1-a-b)](2)O3+delta (a = 0.05, 0.1 and 0.15, b = 0, 0.006 and 0.0125) were prepared as the examples with intermediate and high index, respectively. The specimens with high index value such as (La0.15Ce0.25Y0.60)(2)O-3.25 and (La0.1Sr0.0125Ce0.25Y0.6375)(2)O-3.24 consisted of two phases such as c-type and fluorite, although (Ce0.25Y0.75)(2)O-3.25 with intermediate index value had a single phase of c-type rare earth oxide. Microanalysis indicates that a grain in the (La0.1Sr0.0125Ce0.25Y0.6375)(2)O-3.23(7) sintered body consists of c-type and fluorite phases. An interface between c-type and fluorite phases is coherent in a grain. This suggests that this effective index guides the crystal structure in the specimen to fluorite and the examined composition introduces the interface between c-type and fluorite in the microstructure. The electrochemical properties of specimens including Y2O3 were characterized on the basis of the suggested index. The electrical conductivity of Y2O3-based materials increased with an increase of the index. The apparent activation energy of Y2O3-based materials decreased with increasing index. The ionic transport number of oxygen of the specimens was improved by enhancement of the index, confirming validity of the index. The oxide ionic conductive region of (La0.1Sr0.0125Ce0.25Y0.(6375))(2)O-3.23(7) with high effective index extended up to P-O2 = 10(-18) atm at 800 degreesC, although the specimens with low or intermediate index showed p- or n-type semi-conduction in the same P-O2 region at 800 and 1000 degreesC. These results suggest that the interface between c-type and fluorite phases also contributes to improve the electrolytic properties in the grain. It is concluded that the improvement of electrolytic properties in Y2O3-based materials is attributable to the microstructure with interface between two phases in a grain and the fluorite structure guided by the suggested index. (C) 2001 Published by Elsevier Science B.V.