Food frequency consumption and lipoproteins serum levels in the population of an urban area, Brazil

OBJECTIVE: To identify the association between food group consumption frequency and serum lipoprotein levels among adults. METHODS: The observations were made during a cross-sectional survey of a representative sample of men and women over 20 years old living in Cotia county, S. Paulo, Brazil. Data on food frequency consumption, serum lipids, and other covariates were available for 1,045 adults. Multivariate analyses adjusted by age, gender, body mass index, waist-to-hip ratio, educational level, family income, physical activity, smoking, and alcohol consumption were performed. RESULTS: Consumption of processed meat, chicken, red meat, eggs and dairy foods were each positively and significantly correlated with LDL-C, whereas the intake of vegetables and fruits showed an inverse correlation. Daily consumption of processed meat, chicken, red meat, eggs, and dairy foods were associated with 16.6 mg/dl, 14.5 mg/dl, 11.1 mg/dl, 5.8 mg/dl, and 4.6 mg/dl increase in blood LDL-C, respectively. Increases of daily consumption of fruit and vegetables were associated with 5.2 mg/dl and 5.5 mg/dl decreases in LDL-C, respectively. Alcohol beverage consumption showed a significant positive correlation with HDL-C. CONCLUSIONS: Dietary habits in the study population seem to contribute substantially to the variation in blood LDL and HDL concentrations. Substantially CHD risk reduction could be achieved with dietary changes.

Schistosomiasis mansoni in urban Northeast Brazil: influence of rainfall regime on the population dynamics of Biomphalaria sp.

Introduction Our objective was to evaluate the influence of rainfall regime on the population dynamics of Biomphalaria in a potential urban focus of schistosomiasis in Aracaju, Brazil, during 2009-2010. Methods Snails were collected monthly and were counted, measured and identified; the level of infection and fecal contamination at the sampling sites was determined; rainfall data were obtained. Results High levels of fecal contamination were observed, and the abundance of Biomphalaria glabrata increased during the rainy and post-rainy seasons. The snails' size was variable, and infected snails were identified independently of rainfall. Conclusions These results provide evidence of anthropogenic and climate interference in an urban focus of schistosomiasis in the Aracaju metropolitan area.

Nutritional transition of school children from low income families of a northeastern urban area, Brazil

Background: Evaluating child growth is, in practice, performed by measuring the development of a child's weight, height, and body composition in comparison to averages observed among a reference population. Objective: To describe the nutritional status of children of low income families who live in urban region in northeastern Brazil. Methods: This study is a population case series with a transversal and observational design. The study population consisted of 257 children, aged 5 to 10 years, who were enrolled in a public school to children of low income families. We used the cutoff point for short stature of -2 Z scores for age, and underweight, overweight, and obese were classified as the 5th, 85th, and 95th percentiles, respectively, of the body mass index (BMI) for age, with both classifications in accordance with the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC 2000). Comparisons by gender were performed for the measures of the central tendency and the frequency of diagnoses, in addition to the tendency of the evolution of BMI by age. Results: The prevalence of short stature was 3.5% (95% CI: 1.9-6.5). In the evaluation of BMI for age, the prevalences found for underweight, overweight, and obese were 5.8% (95% CI: 3.6-9.4), 4.7% (95% CI: 2.7-8.0), and 2.3% (95% CI: 1.1-5.0), respectively. We found a significant trend in the reduction of BMI with the increase in age. Conclusions: According to CDC references, the prevalences of underweight and short stature were higher than expected and for the overweight and obesity were lower than expected, indicating that the nutritional transition had still not reached, as commonly is described, these low income children from the urban outskirts of the Northeast region.

Dar es Salaam; a study in urban geography.

Bibliographical footnotes.

Minsk and Budapest, the two capital cities. Selected studies of post-socialist urban geography and ecological problems of urban areas

The official cooperation between the Hungarian and the Belarusian geography began to be outlined in a sunny afternoon of June 2010 in the Minsk building of the Geographic Faculty of the Belarusian State University, four years ago. Then we reviewed the potential frames of cooperation with Professor Ekaterina Antipova. It was supported by the academican Károly Kocsis, member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, director of the Geographical Research Institute, and we could also win the support of the dean Ivan Pirozhnik and the academician Vladimir Loginov from the Belarusian State University and the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus, respectively. This informal cooperation became official in the autumn of 2010 in the frame of the Academic Mobility Agreement Project between the Hungarian and the Belarusian academies of sciences. Since then several publications have appeared about Hungary and Belarus in the geographic journals of both countries, however, this is the first, long awaited, significant common publication. Besides the project-based co-operations like e. g. the EastMig (www.eastmig.mtafki.hu) and the ReSEP-CEE (www.mtafki.hu/ReSEP_CEE_Be.html) supported by the Visegrad Fund, a vivid student exchange program was also launched from the autumn of 2010 between the Geographic Research Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, and the Geographic Faculty of the Belarusian State University with the scholarship program of the Visegrad Fund. Later the Department of Economic Geography of the Corvinus University of Budapest, headed by István Tózsa became also an active partner of the cooperation. The publishing expenses of this book are also fully financed by the Department of Economic Geography.

Modelagem dinâmica espacial de mudanças no uso do solo urbano: contribuição metodológica

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

A produção do espaço na cidade de Fortaleza-CE: uma análise das ações, políticas, projetos e planos diretores

Pós-graduação em Geografia - IGCE

As cidades pequenas na região metropolitana de Campinas-SP: dinâmica demográfica, papéis urbanos e (re) produção do espaço

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Percepção e educação ambiental: contribuições metodológicas para o estudo das relações entre áreas naturais protegidas e instituições de ensino

Pós-graduação em Geografia - IGCE

The use of shallow seismic reflection technique in near surface exploration of urban sites: An evaluation in the city of SãO Paulo, Brazil

In order to evaluate the use of shallow seismic technique to delineate geological and geotechnical features up to 40 meters depth in noisy urban areas covered with asphalt pavement, five survey lines were conducted in the metropolitan area of São Paulo City. The data were acquired using a 24-bit, 24-channel seismograph, 30 and 100 Hz geophones and a sledgehammer-plate system as seismic source. Seismic reflection data were recorded using a CMP (common mid point) acquisition method. The processing routine consisted of: prestack band-pass filtering (90-250 Hz); automatic gain control (AGC); muting (digital zeroin) of dead/noisy traces, ground roll, air-wave and refracted-wave; CMP sorting; velocity analyses; normal move-out corrections; residual static corrections; f-k filtering; CMP stacking. The near surface is geologically characterized by unconsolidated fill materials and Quaternary sediments with organic material overlying Tertiary sediments with the water table 2 to 5 m below the surface. The basement is composed of granite and gneiss. Reflections were observed from 40 milliseconds to 65 ms two-way traveltime and were related to the silt clay layer and fine sand layer contact of the Tertiary sediments and to the weathered basement. The CMP seismic-reflection technique has been shown to be useful for mapping the sedimentary layers and the bedrock of the São Paulo sedimentary basin for the purposes of shallow investigations related to engineering problems. In spite of the strong cultural noise observed in these urban areas and problems with planting geophones we verified that, with the proper equipment, field parameters and particularly great care in data collection and processing, we can overcome the adverse field conditions and to image reflections from layers as shallow as 20 meters.

Foraging activity and demographic patterns of two termite species (Isoptera: Rhinotermitidae) living in urban landscapes in southeastern Brazil

Coptotermes gestroi and Heterotermes tenuis (Isoptera: Rbinotermitidae) are important pests in southeastern Brazil causing serious economic damage. In this study we determined the demographic patterns and foraging activity of these species using mark-release-recapture and the consumption of wooden stakes. Using both the weighted mean and Lincoln index methods, population estimates ranged from ≈ 0.57 to 1.99 million individuals for C. gestroi and from ≈ 0.20 to 1.37 million for H. tenuis. Territory size of the colonies ranged from 172.5 to 5235 m 2 for C. gestroi and from 16 to 40 m 2 for H. tenuis. Our results also indicate that foraging activity was dependent on the minimum temperature; however, the existence of a compensation strategy in the foraging activities may permit foragers to exploit food sources under different environmental conditions.

Sprawling and Urban transportation system: Impacts in the city of Londrina, Parana, Brazil

After nearly 80 years since the construction of its core, represented today by the city's central area, Londrina, located in the state of Parana, has the appearance of a new city but its features and trends of planning policies depict the bad examples of Brazilian cities. With a booming urban growth, from north to south of the county, the urban interstices represented by big voids in the middle of the city created speculation and the concept of an ideal city slowly disappeared. With a metropolitan appearance and, at the same time, with small town aspects, Londrina stands out as an automobile-oriented city, a fact that has impacted the livelihood of the population, generating environmental impacts for all social classes. This paper discusses how the form of occupation in Londrina, characterized by the sprawl phenomenon and its relation to car preference as a mode of transportation has generated urban environmental impacts. It was concluded that the choice of using cars in Londrina, as well in other medium-sized Brazilian cities studied by the comparative method, has increased and has generated bottlenecks in traffic. As a consequence, there is a constant expropriation of properties for widening roads and at the same time, the presence of various densities and urban voids that form an uneven urban space and an obstacle to efficient urban planning. © 2012 WIT Press.