The importance of a consistent and comprehensive milking routine as a critical component of any mastitis control program is well documented. However, as pressure on time increases, farmers are faced with 3 options: (1) adjust the milking routine to suit the time available, (2) undertake the task less thoroughly, or ...

This study analysed meat consumption patterns among Finnish consumers, considering both stated past changes and intended future changes. Consumer segments with different patterns of and reasons for change were identified. Latent class analysis revealed six consumer clusters that formed three major cluster blocks. The first block, comprising 48% of the ...

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Many people lack access to food stores that provide healthful food. Neighborhoods with poor supermarket access have been characterized as "food deserts" (as contrast with "food oases"). This study explored factors influencing food buying practices among residents of food deserts versus food oases in the city of Boston, ...

Taste neophobia is manifested behaviorally as lower intake of a novel, potentially dangerous tastant relative to the same tastant when it is perceived as safe and familiar. To further characterize this phenomenon, microstructural analysis of lick patterns was used to track the transition from novel to familiar for three tastants: ...

In preparation for a proposed large-scale food fortification program in Cameroon, we completed a nationally representative, cross-sectional, cluster survey to assess the consumption patterns of four potentially fortifiable foods (refined vegetable oil, wheat flour, sugar, and bouillon cube) by women and children. Thirty clusters were randomly chosen in each of ...

BACKGROUND: Focus groups, rapid assessment procedures, key informant interviews and institutional reviews of local health services provide valuable insights on health service resources and performance. A long-standing challenge of health planning is to combine this sort of qualitative evidence in a unified analysis with quantitative evidence from household surveys. A ...

INTRODUCTION: Information on chemical composition of the new oral "spitless" smokeless tobacco products is scarce, and it is not clear whether there is some variability as a function of purchase place or time due to either unintended or intended manufacturing variations or other conditions. METHODS: We analyzed tobacco-specific N-nitrosamines (TSNA) ...

Since cloning of the dopamine receptor D4 (DRD4), its role in the brain has remained unclear. It has been reported that polymorphism of the DRD4 gene in humans is associated with reactivity to cues related to tobacco smoking. However, the role of DRD4 in animal models of nicotine addiction has ...

Caries is the most common oral infectious disease in the world. Its development is influenced also by diet components that interfere with pathogen mutans group Streptococci (MGS) activity. A very active research to identify functional foods and their components that are generally recognised as safe has been ongoing, with the ...

Effects of varenicline (Champix), a nicotinic partial agonist, were evaluated on subjective effects of nicotine (drug discrimination), motivation for nicotine taking (progressive-ratio schedule of intravenous nicotine self-administration) and reinstatement (cue-induced reinstatement of previously extinguished nicotine-seeking behaviour). Effects on motor performance were assessed in rats trained to discriminate nicotine (0.4 mg/kg) ...

This review is aimed at understanding some of the common neurochemical, behavioral and physiological determinants of drug and food overconsumption. Much current work has been devoted to determining the similarities between the brain circuits controlling excessive use of addictive drugs and the overconsumption of palatable foods. The brain systems involved ...

Systemic administration of the mGlu5 receptor antagonist 2-methyl-6-(phenylethynyl)-pyridine (MPEP) was previously shown to selectively attenuate nicotine self-administration without affecting food-maintained responding in rats. Glutamatergic neurotransmission in the ventral tegmental area (VTA) and nucleus accumbens (NAcc) shell plays an important role in the reinforcing effects of nicotine. To determine the brain ...

Interference with cholinergic functions in hippocampus and prefrontal cortex impairs learning and memory for social transmission of food preference, suggesting that acetylcholine (ACh) release in the two brain regions may be important for acquiring the food preference. This experiment examined release of ACh in the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex of ...

Smoking decreases appetite, and smokers often report that they smoke to control their weight. Understanding the neurobiological mechanisms underlying the anorexic effects of smoking would facilitate the development of novel treatments to help with smoking cessation and to prevent or treat obesity. By using a combination of pharmacological, molecular genetic, ...

ABSTRACT: Non-inferiority trials test whether a new product is not unacceptably worse than a product already in use. This paper introduces some concepts related to non-inferiority and discusses regulatory views of both the European Medicines Agency and the United States Food and Drug Administration.

Allergy describes a constellation of clinical diseases that affect up to 30% of the world's population. It is characterized by production of allergen-specific IgE, which binds to mast cells and initiates a cascade of molecular and cellular events that affect the respiratory tract (rhinitis and asthma), skin (dermatitis, urticaria), and ...

Dry pet food is a potential source of exposure to house dust and storage mite allergens in canine atopic dermatitis. This study evaluated contamination of house dust and dry dog food stored in paper bags, sealable plastic bags and sealable plastic boxes in 10 households for 90 days using Acarex(®) tests ...

No effective treatment is available for food allergy and its primary management still consists of avoiding relevant allergens. Probiotics are claimed to beneficially affect the immune system. We sought to investigate the therapeutic potential of VSL#3 probiotic mixture on specific immune responses and anaphylactic reaction induced in mice by the ...

In recent years, there has been a steadily growing number of published data on pyrrolizidine alkaloids (PAs) in honey and pollen. This raises the question whether honey and/or pollen used as ingredients in food processing might provoke a downstream contamination in the food chain. Here we addressed two different facets ...

Objective To examine whether the season of birth or season of the early phase of gestation is associated with sensitisation to food allergens in children, with special reference to mothers' pollen exposure in spring. Design A population-based cohort study linking information from a questionnaire survey to allergy tests performed on ...

Food allergy is a growing health concern, which currently affects approximately 4% of adults and 8% of infants. For consumer protection purposes, food producers are required by law to disclose on the product label whether a major allergen is used during the production process. The commonly employed monitoring methods are ...

As part of the safety assessment of genetically modified (GM) soybean, 2-dimensional gel electrophoresis analyses were performed with the isoxaflutole and glyphosate tolerant soybean FG72, its non-GM near-isogenic counterpart (Jack) and three commercial non-GM soybean lines. The objective was to compare the known endogenous human food allergens in seeds in ...

Cow's milk is one of the most common causes of food allergy affecting approximately 2.5% of infants in the first years of their life. However, only limited information regarding the allergenic activity of individual cow's milk allergens is available. To analyse the frequency of IgE reactivity and to determine the ...

Identification of allergenic foods of public health importance should be based on well-defined criteria. Björkstén et al. (2008) proposed that the criteria should assess the evidence for an IgE mechanism, the reaction, the potency and the severity of the effect of the food and its prevalence. This study evaluated the ...

Food allergy is an IgE-mediated hypersensitive reaction estimated to affect up to 4% of infants and adults in developed countries. Proteins termed allergens are mostly responsible for food allergic reactions, consisting of mild to severe systemic reactions. Proteomics include multi-dimensional separation and protein identification by mass spectrometry, followed by data ...

Nonspecific lipid transfer proteins (LTPs) are important allergens in fruits, vegetables, nuts, pollen, and latex. Despite their wide distribution throughout the plant kingdom, their clinical relevance is largely confined to the Mediterranean area. As they can sensitize via the gastrointestinal tract, LPTs are considered true food allergens, and IgE reactivity ...

Food-allergic individuals have to strictly avoid the offending food because no causative immunotherapies are available. Thus, reliable labelling of allergenic ingredients or precautionary labelling of cross-contacts with potential allergens is of major importance. Verification of compliance with labelling requirements and identification of cross-contacts demand test methods that enable the specific ...

China is the largest producer and consumer of aquatic products in the world; however, many people in China suffer from allergies upon consuming crab. Stability in simulated gastric fluid is regarded as an important parameter for the estimation of food allergenicity. The digestive stability of allergenic protein tropomyosin (TM) and ...

This paper presents a sandwich enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) that allows the determination of traces of sesame in food. Chicken anti-sesame antibodies, used as coating antibodies, and rabbit anti-sesame antibodies, used as secondary antibodies, were prepared by immunization with a protein extract of white, peeled sesame. The ELISA did not ...

This review addresses the problem of lupin sensitization in the home environment. We summarize the data currently available on allergy to lupin, which has become, in recent years, a hidden killer in our homes. Since 2006, when lupin was included in European regulations as a food whose presence must be ...

Food or environmental allergens play a significant pathogenic role in a subgroup of patients with atopic dermatitis (AD) and can trigger eczema flares. This review focuses on when and which diagnostic and allergen-avoidance measures are beneficial. Diagnosis of allergic triggers may be aided by skin-prick tests measuring serum-specific IgE and/or ...

It is widely accepted that, under normal conditions, the contact between allergens and the immune system via the gut results in immune tolerance. Thus, it is rather surprising that normal adults may become sensitized to foods that they have consumed a number of times without any consequence. However, the medical ...

Food allergy is recognized as one of the major health concerns. It is estimated that ca. 4% of the population is affected by food allergenic disorders. Food allergies are defined as IgE-mediated hypersensitivity reactions. Foods such as peanuts, tree nuts, wheat, soy, cow's milk, egg, fish and shellfish are regarded ...

Purified allergens are required to detect cross-contamination with other allergenic foods and to understand allergen interaction with other components of the food matrix. Pure allergens are also used for the diagnosis and treatment of food allergies. For example, serological methods are being developed to improve the quality of diagnosis, and ...

Tree nut allergy is one of the common potentially life-threatening food allergies in children and adults. Recombinant food allergens offer new perspectives to solve problems of clinical and molecular allergology in diagnosis, research, and therapy of food allergies. So far, superoxide dismutase (s) has been identified as a panallergen and ...

An innovative enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) format based on antibody-coated magnetic micro-particles (MPs) for the sensitive detection of Ara h3/4 allergen in food is described. The immunosupport is suspended in the incubation solutions and the MPs with the captured allergen can be easily harvested on a magnet, separated from the ...

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: This paper reviews current concepts in our understanding of oral allergy or pollen-food syndrome. As technology has improved, much more accurate profiling of food allergic individuals is now possible, resulting in more precise diagnosis, elucidation of cross reactivity patterns and more helpful prediction of risk of anaphylaxis. ...

The present article summarizes the 2008-2009 literature on allergen standardization and immunotherapy for inhalant and food sensitivities, with emphasis on delineation of the underlying immunologic changes and on evidence-based conclusions from such and clinical data. The efficacy of subcutaneous immunotherapy for inhalant allergies has been established but that for sublingual ...

Coffee is one of the leading commodities in tropical America. Although plantations are usually established under a canopy of trees in most producing countries in the region, Brazilian coffee is mostly produced under full sun conditions. Such simple, single-crop agroecosystems with intensive agrochemical inputs often suffer with pests like mites. ...

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: To discuss whether strict allergen avoidance is the most appropriate strategy for managing or preventing food allergy. RECENT FINDINGS: The standard of care for the management of food allergy has been strict allergen avoidance. This advice is based upon the suppositions that exposure could result in allergic ...

Bee pollen has been proposed as a food supplement, but it can be a dangerous food for people with allergy. We study an allergic reaction after ingestion of bee pollen in a 4-year-old boy who had developed rhinitis in the last spring and autumn. We performed a prick-by-prick test with ...

Food allergy and intolerance became very important problems in food safety and healthcare during the last few decades. Beside the pharmaceutical treatment of the symptoms, effective cure of these illnesses is the avoidance of the problematic food proteins. According to this reason, proper legislation is crucial for protecting sensitive people. ...

Allergy to fig fruit (Ficus carica) has been described in patients allergic to Ficus benjamina or rubber latex but may occur also in pollen-allergic patients. To study the potential cross-reactivity between fig and taxonomically related fruits with the major birch pollen allergen Bet v 1. One hundred and eighty-eight patients ...

To explore the prevalence of common food and aeroallergens sensitization in early childhood skin diseases. and to compare the pattern of common food and aeroallergens sensitization before and after 6 months among infants with atopic dermatitis (AD). All skin prick tests (SPTs) performed on children pound18 months of age managed ...

The consumption of shrimp is a common cause of food hypersensitivity reactions. Shrimp allergy is diagnosed using a skin prick test (SPT) as well as by food challenges. Due to the lack of a wide variety of commercial shrimp extracts for SPTs, we selected various shrimp species for the preparation ...

Celery is acknowledged as a major food allergen in Europe, and mandatory labeling for preprocessed foods has been implemented. However, no methods for the specific detection of celery protein in foods have been published. In the present study, a sandwich celery ELISA using polyclonal anticelery antibodies for capture and detection ...

This document provides supplemental guidance on specifications for the development and implementation of studies to validate the performance characteristics of quantitative ELISA methods for the determination of food allergens. It is intended as a companion document to other existing publications on method validation. The guidance is divided into two sections: ...

Peanut allergy is a major cause of food-induced severe anaphylactic reactions. To date, no medical care is available to prevent and treat peanut allergy and therefore hypoallergenic peanut varieties are of considerable health political and economic interest. Major allergens that induce IgE-responses in peanut-sensitive patients are Ara h 1, Ara ...

Food allergen labeling regulations have been implemented in several countries since 2006. Currently, experts are still discussing the introduction of thresholds or action levels, which should lead to the reduction of the widespread use of advisory statements (e.g., "may contain") for the benefit of the allergic consumer. However, the establishment ...

Genetically modified (GM) foods must be tested for safety, including by allergenicity tests to ensure that they do not contain new allergens or higher concentrations of known allergens than the same non-GM foods. In this study experimentally developed EGFP-transgenic chickens were used and evaluated the allergenicity of meat from the ...