Dietary Quality and Associated Factors among Factory Workers in the Metropolitan Region of Sao Paulo, Brazil

The workplace is a manageable community-based setting for ensuring proper nutrition. This study aimed to evaluate dietary quality and associated factors among adult workers at a cosmetics factory in the metropolitan area of Sao Paulo, Brazil. This factory was actively participating in the Brazilian Workers` Meal Program, which was created to ensure workers` nutritional health. In this cross-sectional study, data on 202 adult workers were assessed using questionnaires (sociodemographic, anthropometric, and lifestyle characteristics) administered during August and September 2006. Dietary intake, measured by 24-hour dietary recall, was used to calculate the modified Healthy Eating Index (HEI). A repeated administration of the 24-hour dietary recall was applied in a random subsample to calculate the modified HEI adjusted for the within-person variation in intake. Mean adjusted modified HEI scores were analyzed using multiple linear regression adjusted for energy. The mean adjusted modified HEI score was 72.3 +/- 8.0. The lowest adjusted modified HEI components scores were ""milk and dairy products"" (4.4 +/- 3.2) and ""sodium"" (3.7 +/- 3.1). Two percent of workers had ""poor diet"" (adjusted modified HEI score <51 points) and the majority (87%) had ""diet that needs modification"" (adjusted modified HEI score between 51 and 80), despite their participation in the meal program. Adjusted modified HEI scores were considerably higher for men (74.7 +/- 7.0) than for women (66.9 +/- 8.2) and for normal body mass index (calculated as kg/m(2)) (73.3 +/- 7.8) than for overweight/obese (70.9 +/- 8.1). Based on these results, the vast majority of workers were found to have diets that needed improvement. Individuals with higher-quality diets were more likely to have lower body mass index and to be male. J Am Diet Assoc. 2010;110:786-790.

Impacts of climate changes on crop physiology and food quality

Carbon emissions related to human activities have been significantly contributing to the elevation of atmospheric [CO(2)] and temperature. More recently, carbon emissions have greatly accelerated, thus much stronger effects on crops are expected. Here, we revise literature data concerning the physiological effects of CO(2) enrichment and temperature rise on crop species. We discuss the main advantages and limitations of the most used CO(2)-enrichment technologies, the Open-Top Chambers (OTCs) and the Free-Air Carbon Enrichment (FACE). Within the conditions expected for the next few years, the physiological responses of crops suggest that they will grow faster, with slight changes in development, such as flowering and fruiting, depending on the species. There is growing evidence suggesting that C(3) crops are likely to produce more harvestable products and that both C(3) and C(4) crops are likely to use less water with rising atmospheric [CO(2)] in the absence of stressful conditions. However, the beneficial direct impact of elevated [CO(2)] on crop yield can be offset by other effects of climate change, such as elevated temperatures and altered patterns of precipitation. Changes in food quality in a warmer, high-CO(2) world are to be expected, e.g., decreased protein and mineral nutrient concentrations, as well as altered lipid composition. We point out that studies related to changes in crop yield and food quality as a consequence of global climatic changes should be priority areas for further studies, particularly because they will be increasingly associated with food security. (c) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Generating Segmented Quality Meshes from Images

Techniques devoted to generating triangular meshes from intensity images either take as input a segmented image or generate a mesh without distinguishing individual structures contained in the image. These facts may cause difficulties in using such techniques in some applications, such as numerical simulations. In this work we reformulate a previously developed technique for mesh generation from intensity images called Imesh. This reformulation makes Imesh more versatile due to an unified framework that allows an easy change of refinement metric, rendering it effective for constructing meshes for applications with varied requirements, such as numerical simulation and image modeling. Furthermore, a deeper study about the point insertion problem and the development of geometrical criterion for segmentation is also reported in this paper. Meshes with theoretical guarantee of quality can also be obtained for each individual image structure as a post-processing step, a characteristic not usually found in other methods. The tests demonstrate the flexibility and the effectiveness of the approach.

Regression analysis of mean quality-adjusted survival time based on pseudo-observations

Regression models for the mean quality-adjusted survival time are specified from hazard functions of transitions between two states and the mean quality-adjusted survival time may be a complex function of covariates. We discuss a regression model for the mean quality-adjusted survival (QAS) time based on pseudo-observations, which has the advantage of directly modeling the effect of covariates in the QAS time. Both Monte Carlo Simulations and a real data set are studied. Copyright (C) 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.