Commentary on: Berger-Karin C, Hendricks U, Geyer-Lippmann J. Comparison of natural and artificial aging of ballpoint inks

We would like to comment this study recently published in JFS. It is a short technical note proposing an artificial aging technique for the dating of ballpoint pen inks. This is a very difficult and controversial topic, and we are worried about the nature of this paper. The authors propose several ideas to differentiate fast aging and slow aging inks, but their experimental data is not validly represented and/or discussed. The data is insufficient to draw any conclusions about any potential of the method for ink dating purposes. This lack of information on the subject must be filled before proposing such methods for practical caseworks. These are preliminary and unconvincing results from development research performed in a laboratory on controlled samples without due warnings about potential shortcomings. They cannot be used or even compared to results obtained in real situations on uncontrolled specimens of limited size, unknown composition and undefined storage conditions. This can leave an undeserved feeling that these methods are ready for implementation when the task of ensuring their scientific validity is still far away.

The contribution of aging to the understanding of the dimensionality of executive functions.

It has been reported in the literature that executive functions may be fractioned into updating, shifting, and inhibition. The present study aimed to explore whether these executive sub-components can be identified in a more age-heterogeneous sample and see if they are prone to an age-related decline. We tested the performances of 81 individuals aged from 18 to 88 years old in each executive sub-component, working memory, fluid intelligence and processing speed. Correlation analysis revealed only a slight positive relationship between the two updating measures. A linear decrement with age was observed only for two complex executive tests. Tasks indexing working memory, processing speed and fluid intelligence showed a stronger linear decline with age than executive tasks. In conclusion, our results did not replicate the executive structure known from the literature, and revealed that decrement in executive function is not an unavoidable concomitant of aging but rather concerns specific executive tasks.

A study of the aging of fingerprints by GC/MS analysis.

Determining the time since deposition of fingermarks may prove necessary in order to assess their relevance to criminal investigations. The crucial factor is the initial composition of fingermarks because it represents the starting point of any ageing model. This study mainly aimed to characterize the initial composition of fingerprints, which show a high variability between donors (inter-variability), but also to investigate the variations among fingerprints from the same donor (intra-variability). Solutions to reduce this initial variability using squalene and cholesterol as target compounds are proposed and should be further investigated. The influence of substrates was also evaluated and the initial composition was observed to be larger on porous surface than non-porous surfaces. Preliminary aging of fingerprints over 30 days was finally studied on a porous and a non-porous substrate to evaluate the potential for dating of fingermarks. Squalene was observed to decrease in a faster rate on a non-porous substrate.

Tibial or hip BMD predict clinical fracture risk equally well: results from a prospective study in 700 elderly Swiss women.

SUMMARY: In a randomly selected cohort of Swiss community-dwelling elderly women prospectively followed up for 2.8 +/- 0.6 years, clinical fractures were assessed twice yearly. Bone mineral density (BMD) measured at tibial diaphysis (T-DIA) and tibial epiphysis (T-EPI) using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) was shown to be a valid alternative to lumbar spine or hip BMD in predicting fractures. INTRODUCTION: A study was carried out to determine whether BMD measurement at the distal tibia sites of T-EPI and T-DIA is predictive of clinical fracture risk. METHODS: In a predefined representative cohort of Swiss community-dwelling elderly women aged 70-80 years included in the prospective, multi-centre Swiss Evaluation of the Methods of Measurement of Osteoporotic Fracture risk (SEMOF) study, fracture risk profile was assessed and BMD measured at the lumbar spine (LS), hip (HIP) and tibia (T-DIA and T-EPI) using DXA. Thereafter, clinical fractures were reported in a bi-yearly questionnaire. RESULTS: During 1,786 women-years of follow-up, 68 clinical fragility fractures occurred in 61 women. Older age and previous fracture were identified as risk factors for the present fractures. A decrease of 1 standard deviation in BMD values yielded a 1.5-fold (HIP) to 1.8-fold (T-EPI) significant increase in clinical fragility fracture hazard ratio (adjusted for age and previous fracture). All measured sites had comparable performance for fracture prediction (area under the curve range from 0.63 [LS] to 0.68 [T-EPI]). CONCLUSION: Fracture risk prediction with BMD measurements at T-DIA and T-EPI is a valid alternative to BMD measurements at LS or HIP for patients in whom these sites cannot be accessed for clinical, technical or practical reasons.

Birth records from Swiss married couples analyzed over of the past 35 years reveal an aging of first-time mothers by 5.1 years while the interpregnancy interval has shortened

RésuméIntroduction : Le travail de thèse est un article publié dans le journal « Fertility & Sterility » s'intitulant « Birth records from Swiss married couples analyzed over the past 35 years reveal an aging of first-time mothers by 5.1 years while the interpregnancy interval has shortened ».Méthodes : Les données concernant l'âge auquel les femmes mariées donnaient naissance ont été obtenues de l'Office fédéral de la statistique. Nous avons examiné la période allant de 1969 à 2006. Cet intervalle de temps choisi nous a permis de prendre en considération un total de 2'716'370 naissances. L'âge moyen des parturientes à la naissance de leur 1er, 2ème et 3ème enfant a été calculé pour chaque année à l'aide du logiciel Excel. Grâce à ces données on a pu obtenir les intervalles inter-gestationnels théoriques entre le 1er et 2ème enfant, ainsi qu'entre le 2ème et 3ème enfant.Résultats : Nous pouvons constater que l'intervalle inter-gestationnel théorique entre la première et la deuxième grossesse était de 23.2 mois en 1969 et passait à 13.0 mois en 2006. L'intervalle compris entre la deuxième et la troisième grossesse passait de 22.4 mois en 1969 à 7.9 mois en 2006. Notre analyse suggère donc que c'est le facteur social qui exerce un effet plus important que le facteur biologique sur les intervalles inter-gestationnels, car ces intervalles diminuaient malgré l'augmentation de l'âge des mères à la naissance.

3D gait assessment in young and elderly subjects using foot-worn inertial sensors.

This study describes the validation of a new wearable system for assessment of 3D spatial parameters of gait. The new method is based on the detection of temporal parameters, coupled to optimized fusion and de-drifted integration of inertial signals. Composed of two wirelesses inertial modules attached on feet, the system provides stride length, stride velocity, foot clearance, and turning angle parameters at each gait cycle, based on the computation of 3D foot kinematics. Accuracy and precision of the proposed system were compared to an optical motion capture system as reference. Its repeatability across measurements (test-retest reliability) was also evaluated. Measurements were performed in 10 young (mean age 26.1±2.8 years) and 10 elderly volunteers (mean age 71.6±4.6 years) who were asked to perform U-shaped and 8-shaped walking trials, and then a 6-min walking test (6MWT). A total of 974 gait cycles were used to compare gait parameters with the reference system. Mean accuracy±precision was 1.5±6.8cm for stride length, 1.4±5.6cm/s for stride velocity, 1.9±2.0cm for foot clearance, and 1.6±6.1° for turning angle. Difference in gait performance was observed between young and elderly volunteers during the 6MWT particularly in foot clearance. The proposed method allows to analyze various aspects of gait, including turns, gait initiation and termination, or inter-cycle variability. The system is lightweight, easy to wear and use, and suitable for clinical application requiring objective evaluation of gait outside of the lab environment.

Aging of myelinating glial cells predominantly affects lipid metabolism and immune response pathways.

Both the central and the peripheral nervous systems are prone to multiple age-dependent neurological deficits, often attributed to still unknown alterations in the function of myelinating glia. To uncover the biological processes affected in glial cells by aging, we analyzed gene expression of the Schwann cell-rich mouse sciatic nerve at 17 time points throughout life, from day of birth until senescence. By combining these data with the gene expression data of myelin mouse mutants carrying deletions of either Pmp22, SCAP, or Lpin1, we found that the majority of age-related transcripts were also affected in myelin mutants (54.4%) and were regulated during PNS development (59.5%), indicating a high level of overlap in implicated molecular pathways. The expression profiles in aging copied the direction of transcriptional changes observed in neuropathy models; however, they had the opposite direction when compared with PNS development. The most significantly altered biological processes in aging involved the inflammatory/immune response and lipid metabolism. Interestingly, both these pathways were comparably changed in the aging optic nerve, suggesting that similar biological processes are affected in aging of glia-rich parts of the central and peripheral nervous systems. Our comprehensive comparison of gene expression in three distinct biological conditions including development, aging, and myelin disease thus revealed a previously unanticipated relationship among themselves and identified lipid metabolism and inflammatory/immune response pathways as potential therapeutical targets to prevent or delay so far incurable age-related and inherited forms of neuropathies.

Development of a novel headspace sorptive extraction method to study the aging of volatile compounds in spent handgun cartridges

Estimating the time since the last discharge of firearms and/or spent cartridges may be a useful piece of information in forensic firearm-related cases. The current approach consists of studying the diffusion of selected volatile organic compounds (such as naphthalene) released during the shooting using solid phase micro-extraction (SPME). However, this technique works poorly on handgun car-tridges because the extracted quantities quickly fall below the limit of detection. In order to find more effective solutions and further investigate the aging of organic gunshot residue after the discharge of handgun cartridges, an extensive study was carried out in this work using a novel approach based on high capacity headspace sorptive extraction (HSSE). By adopting this technique, for the first time 51 gunshot residue (GSR) volatile organic compounds could be simultaneously detected from fired handgun cartridge cases. Application to aged specimens showed that many of those compounds presented significant and complementary aging profiles. Compound-to-compound ratios were also tested and proved to be beneficial both in reducing the variability of the aging curves and in enlarging the time window useful in a forensic casework perspective. The obtained results were thus particularly promising for the development of a new complete forensic dating methodology.

Magnetic resonance imaging determinants of intraindividual variability in the elderly: combined analysis of grey and white matter.

Elderly individuals display a rapid age-related increase in intraindividual variability (IIV) of their performances. This phenomenon could reflect subtle changes in frontal lobe integrity. However, structural studies in this field are still missing. To address this issue, we computed an IIV index for a simple reaction time (RT) task and performed magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) including voxel based morphometry (VBM) and the tract based spatial statistics (TBSS) analysis of diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) in 61 adults aged from 22 to 88 years. The age-related IIV increase was associated with decreased fractional anisotropy (FA) as well as increased radial (RD) and mean (MD) diffusion in the main white matter (WM) fiber tracts. In contrast, axial diffusion (AD) and grey matter (GM) densities did not show any significant correlation with IIV. In multivariate models, only FA has an age-independent effect on IIV. These results revealed that WM but not GM changes partly mediated the age-related increase of IIV. They also revealed that the association between WM and IIV could not be only attributed to the damage of frontal lobe circuits but concerned the majority of interhemispheric and intrahemispheric corticocortical connections.

Syndrome des jambes sans repos chez la personne âgée: une affection méconnue [Restless legs syndrome in the elderly: an unrecognized disorder].

The restless legs syndrome (RLS) is a frequent, often unrecognized disorder in the elderly. The diagnosis is essentially based on the clinical history. The RLS is characterized by (1) an urge to move the limbs, usually associated with abnormal sensations in the legs; (2) symptoms are worse at rest; (3) they are relieved by movements; (4) they mainly occur in the evening or at night. Specific diagnostic criteria have been developed for cognitively impaired elderly persons. The RLS is a chronic disorder with high impact on sleep and quality of life. Treatment is symptomatic and recommended drugs are dopaminergic agents, opioids, and gabapentine.

Energy balance in elderly patients after surgery for a femoral neck fracture.

To study energy and protein balances in elderly patients after surgery, spontaneous energy and protein intake and resting energy expenditure (REE) were measured in 20 elderly female patients with a femoral neck fracture (mean age 81 +/- 4, SD, range 74-87 years; weight 53 +/- 8, range 42-68 kg) during a 5-6 day period following surgery. REE, measured over 20-40 min by indirect calorimetry using a ventilated canopy, averaged 0.98 +/- 0.15 kcal/min on day 3 and decreased to 0.93 +/- 0.15 kcal/min on day 8-9 postsurgery (p less than 0.02). REE was positively correlated with body weight (r = 0.69, p less than 0.005). Mean REE extrapolated to 24 hr (24-REE) was 1283 +/- 194 kcal/day. Mean daily food energy intake measured over the 5-day follow-up period was 1097 +/- 333 kcal/day and was positively correlated with 24-REE (r = 0.50, p less than 0.05). Daily energy balance was -235 +/- 351 kcal/day on day 3 (p less than 0.01 vs zero) and -13 +/- 392 kcal/day on day 8-9 postsurgery (NS vs zero) with a mean over the study period of -185 +/- 289 kcal/day (p less than 0.01 vs zero). When an extra 100 kcal/day was allowed for the energy cost of physical activity, mean daily energy balance over the 5-day study period was calculated to be -285 +/- 289 kcal/day (p less than 0.01 vs zero). Measurements of total 24-hr urinary nitrogen (N) excretion were obtained in a subgroup of 14 patients.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)