Glacially striated, soft sediment surfaces on late Paleozoic tillite at São Luiz do Purunã, PR

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Efeito da radioterapia sobre o estado nutricional, gasto energético e níveis corpóreos de minerais em pacientes com câncer de cabeça e pescoço

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Percepção da imagem corporal em mulheres com depressão

Pós-graduação em Psicologia do Desenvolvimento e Aprendizagem - FC

Sexualidade e envelhecimento na percepção de pessoas idosas

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Desenvolvimento do útero grávido e da glândula mamária e mudanças corporais em cabras leiteiras durante a gestação

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Avaliação sensorial de adolescentes com desenvolvimento normal na faixa etária de 11 a 18 anos

Tactile sensibility allows for adequate neuropsychomotor development. In addition, it enables the understanding of the subject’s own body, actions and explorations of objects, people and the environment. Previous studies have evaluated 3 to 10 year-old children. Herein, we evaluate the tactile sensibility in adolescents. The aim of this study was to verify whether the rapid growth of the body changes the normal pattern of tactile sensibility in adolescents. Furthermore, we provide evaluation material that is easy to use, simple, and secure to handle, designed to attend the specific age range studied. Thirty-two young participants between 11 and 18 years old, sixteen males and sixteen females, were evaluated. The adolescents go to public school and present normal development patterns. Graphesthesia, stereognosia, and Semmes-Weinstein monofilament tests were performed to evaluate the sensibility on the ventral and dorsal sides of the right and left hands. A questionnaire was used to identify the relevant activities performed with the hands during the studied period. The adolescents tested were collaborative during the research and presented curiosity regarding the boxes used in the experiment. Results indicated alterations in the tactile sensibility on the dorsal side of the hands from 13-year- old males. The major activities indicated by the adolescents were writing and sports for males and writing and cleaning for females. First evidences of possible changes in the normal tactile sensibility during adolescence were observed in this study.

O amanhã de quem cresce: influências e valores presentes na constituição de projetos de vida de jovens adolescentes de um curso técnico de uma instituição estadual

Pós-graduação em Educação - FFC

Relação entre área do braço, área do músculo, área de gordura do braço e a menarca em adolescentes do município de Botucatu

The authors show the relations among arm circumference, arm muscle and arm fat areas with or without menarche, by carrying out an anthropometric study in 717 adolescents in the municipality of Botucatu. It must be emphasized that those adolescents who had already menstruated presented significantly higher nutritional indicators than those who had not menstruated yet. There was an increase in fat tissue and lean body mass in those adolescents who had already menstruated. Body changes might be expressed by calculating muscle and arm fat areas using triceps skinfold and arm circumference.

Central leptin replacement enhances chemorespiratory responses in leptin-deficient mice independent of changes in body weight

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Morphomettic changes on honeybee Apis mellifera L. workers fat body cells after juvenile hormone topic application at emergence

The effect of topical application of juvenile hormone (JH) over the lifetime of worker bees was evaluated in Apis mellifera, by measuring the area of the two cell types, trophocytes and oenocytes, found in the fat body. Topical application of 1 mu l of a 1 mu g/mu l solution of JH in acetone to the abdomens of newly emerged workers produced an increase in cell size, in both types of cell of 5-day-old treated workers in relation to the untreated control. The treatment was more effective on the oenocytes, since there were significant differences compared to the averages of the treatments and the interaction of the treatments with the age of the workers. The developmental pattern seemed to differ from the treated group. However, subsequent effects were probably dependent on different, natural variations in hormonal levels. (c) 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Tribute to R.G. Boutilier: Skin colour and body temperature changes in basking Bokermannohyla alvarengai (Bokermann 1956)

In amphibians solar basking far from water sources is relatively uncommon since the highly permeable amphibian skin does not represent a significant barrier to the accompanying risk of losing water by evaporation. A South American frog, Bokermannohyla alvarengai (Bokermann 1956), however, spends a significant amount of the day exposed to full sun and relatively high temperatures. The means by which this frog copes with potentially high rates of evaporative water loss and high body temperatures are unknown. Thus, in this study, skin colour changes, body surface temperature, and evaporative water loss rates were examined under a mixture of field and laboratory conditions to ascertain whether changes in skin reflectivity play an important role in this animal's thermal and hydric balance. Field data demonstrated a tight correlation between the lightness of skin colour and frog temperature, with lighter frogs being captured possessing higher body temperatures. Laboratory experiments supported this relationship, revealing that frogs kept in the dark or at lower temperatures (20 degrees C) had darker skin colours, whereas frogs kept in the light or higher temperatures (30 degrees C) had skin colours of a lighter hue. Light exhibited a stronger influence on skin colour than temperature alone, suggesting that colour change is triggered by the increase in incident solar energy and in anticipation of changes in body temperature. This conclusion is corroborated by the observation that cold, darkly coloured frogs placed in the sun rapidly became lighter in colour during the initial warming up period (over the first 5 min), after which they warmed up more slowly and underwent a further, albeit slower, lightening of skin colour. Surprisingly, despite its natural disposition to bask in the sun, this species does not possess a 'waterproof' skin, since its rates of evaporative water loss were not dissimilar from many hylid species that live in arboreal or semi-aquatic environments. The natural history of B. alvarengai is largely unknown and, therefore, it is likely that the herein reported colour change and basking behaviour represent a complex interaction between thermoregulation and water balance with other ecologically relevant functions, such as crypsis.

Short-term changes in handgrip strength, body composition, and lymphedema induced by breast cancer surgery

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Morphological changes of mammalian nucleoli during spermatogenesis and their possible role in the chromatoid body assembling

Chromatoid body (CB) is a typical cytoplasmic organelle of germ cells, and it seems to be involved in RNA/protein accumulation for later germ-cell differentiation. Despite most of the events in mammals spermatogenesis had been widely described in the past decades and the increase in the studies related to the CB molecular composition and physiology, the origins and functions of this important structure of male germ cells are still unclear. The aims of this study were to describe the nucleolar cycle and also to find some relationship between the nucleolar organization and the CB assembling during the spermatogenesis in mammals. Cytochemical and cytogenetics analysis showed nucleolar fragmentation in post-pachytene spermatocytes and nucleolar reorganization in post-meiotic spermatids. Significant difference in the number and in the size of nucleoli between spermatogonia and round spermatids, as well as differences in the nucleolar position within the nucleus were also observed. Ultrastructural analysis showed the CB assembling in the cytoplasm of primary spermatocytes and the nucleolar fragmentation occurring at the same time. In conclusion our results suggest that the CB may play important roles during the spermatogenesis process in mammals and that its origin may be related to the nucleolar cycle during the meiotic cell cycle.

Changes in maternal body composition and metabolism of dairy goats during pregnancy

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Histopathological changes in the perivisceral fat body of Rhinocricus padbergi (Diplopoda, Spirobolida) triggered by biosolids

Human activities generate a great amount of sewage daily, which is dumped into the sewer system. After sewage-treatment processes, sewage sludge is generated. Such byproduct can be treated by different methods; the result of treatment is a stabilized compost of reduced pathogenicity that has a similar inorganic chemical composition to the raw sewage sludge. After such pretreatment, sewage sludge is called a biosolids, and it can be used in agriculture. In this contest, the present study evaluated the effects of a sample of biosolids on the perivisceral fat body of a diplopod. These invertebrates are soil organisms that play an important role in the dynamics of terrestrial ecosystems, and as a consequence, they are in contact with xenobiotics present in this environmental compartment. Special emphasis is given on the interpretation of the effects of complex mixtures in target organs of diplopods. A semiquantitative analysis for the evaluation of histopathological changes in the perivisceral fat body was proposed. The sample-induced histopathological and ultrastructural changes in individuals exposed to it, and the severity of the effects was positively related to the exposure time, resulting in the deaths of exposed individuals after 90 days. Thus, the results indicate the need for caution in the use of biosolids as well as the need for improving waste management techniques, so they will produce environmentally innocuous final products.