Effect of alendronate on growth

Oyhanart and coinvestigators evaluated the effect of alendronate on growing animals. Healthy male Wistar rats, aged 1 month, received alendronate or vehicle for 8 weeks, and morphometric and histomorphometric parameters were assessed. Alendronate caused significant alterations in growth, decreasing femur and tibia length, tibial cartilage thickness, and longitudinal growth of hemimandibles.

See Effect of alendronate on the mandible and long bones: An experimental study in vivo

Gene expression after ventilation

Dénervaud et al. analyzed gene expression profiles in a newborn rat model 48 h after mechanical ventilation. In treated animals versus controls, 271 genes changed expression significantly. These experiments identified mainly tissue modeling/wound repair and immune response pathways as being modified after respiratory support.

See Gene expression profile in newborn rat lungs after two days of recovery of mechanical ventilation

Automated oxygen control in lambs

Automated closed-loop control of the fraction of inspired oxygen (FiO2) has been shown to facilitate oxygen supplementation in the neonatal intensive-care unit but has not yet been tested during preterm resuscitation. Hütten and coauthors intubated 22 preterm lambs and randomized them to receive standardized resuscitation with either automated or manual FiO2 control. In this model, fully automated FiO2 control was feasible and prevented hyperoxia under rapidly changing physiologic conditions during postnatal resuscitation.

See Fully automated predictive intelligent control of oxygenation (PRICO) in resuscitation and ventilation of preterm lambs

Effects of human milk oligosaccharides

Human milk oligosaccharides (HMOs) shape the intestinal microbiota in term infants. Using mass spectrometry, Underwood and colleagues investigated milk, urine, and stool specimens from 14 mother–premature infant dyads for HMO composition. They found that certain HMOs might decrease pathogens associated with sepsis and necrotizing enterocolitis and other HMOs may increase dysbiosis.

See Human milk oligosaccharides in premature infants: absorption, excretion, and influence on the intestinal microbiota

Neonatal neuroimaging and development

Rose and coinvestigators hypothesized that near-term macrostructural brain abnormalities identified using conventional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and white matter microstructure detected using diffusion tensor imaging would be associated with lower cognitive and motor development at 18–22 months of age. A total of 102 very-low-birth-weight preterm infants were recruited prior to routine near-term brain MRI and assessed. Among other results, the investigators found that cerebellar macrostructure abnormalities do indeed correlate with early neurodevelopment and gait.

See Neonatal brain microstructure correlates of neurodevelopment and gait in preterm children 18–22 mo of age: an MRI and DTI study

Z-scores for central adiposity

To provide anthropometric measures of central adiposity for North American children, Sharma et al. created smoothed centile charts and tables for waist-to-height ratio and waist circumference based on data from the US National Health and Nutrition Survey. Z-scores for both measures of central adiposity were significantly more strongly associated with cardiometabolic comorbidities than BMI-Z scores.

See LMS tables for waist-circumference and waist-height ratio Z-scores in children aged 5-19y in NHANES III: Association with cardio-metabolic risks