Birth weight and related outcomes have profound influences on life cycle health, but the effect of maternal hemoglobin concentration during pregnancy on birth weight is still unclear. This study aims to reveal the associations between maternal hemoglobin concentrations in different trimesters of pregnancy and neonatal birth weight, LBW, and SGA. This was a prospective study based on a cluster-randomized controlled trial conducted from July 2015 to December 2019 in rural areas of Northwest China. Information on maternal socio-demographic status, health-related factors, antenatal visits, and neonatal birth outcomes were collected. A total of 3748 women and their babies were included in the final analysis. A total of 65.1% and 46.3% of the participants had anemia or hemoglobin ≥ 130 g/L during pregnancy. In the third trimester, maternal hemoglobin concentration was associated with birth weight in an inverted U-shaped curve and with the risks of LBW and SGA in extended U-shaped curves. The relatively higher birth weight and lower risks for LBW and SGA were observed when hemoglobin concentration was 100–110 g/L. When maternal hemoglobin was 130 g/L, the neonatal birth weight was more than 100 g lower than that when the maternal hemoglobin was 100 g/L. In conclusion, both low and high hemoglobin concentrations in the third trimester could be adverse to fetal weight growth and increase the risks of LBW and SGA, respectively. In addition to severe anemia, maternal hemoglobin >130 g/L in the third trimester should be paid great attention to in the practice of maternal and child health care.

The study explored the protective effect of sesamin against lipid-induced renal injury and hyperlipidemia in a rat model. An animal model of hyperlipidemia was established in Sprague-Dawley rats. Fifty-five adult Sprague-Dawley rats were divided into five groups. The control group was fed a standard diet, while the other four groups were fed a high-fat diet for 5 weeks to induce hyperlipidemia. Three groups received oral sesamin in doses of 40, 80, or 160 mg/(kg·day). Seven weeks later, the blood lipids, renal function, antioxidant enzyme activities, and hyperoxide levels in kidney tissues were measured. The renal pathological changes and expression levels of collagen type IV (Col-IV) and α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA) were analyzed. The administration of sesamin improved the serum total cholesterol, triglyceride, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, apolipoprotein-B, oxidized-low-density lipoprotein, and serum creatinine levels in hyperlipidemic rats, while it increased the high-density lipoprotein cholesterol and apolipoprotein-A levels. Sesamin reduced the excretion of 24-h urinary protein and urinary albumin and downregulated α-SMA and Col-IV expression. Moreover, sesamin ameliorated the superoxide dismutase activity and reduced malondialdehyde levels in kidney tissue. Sesamin could mediate lipid metabolism and ameliorate renal injury caused by lipid metabolism disorders in a rat model of hyperlipidemia.

To evaluate the probiotic characteristics and safety of Enterococcus durans isolate A8-1 from a fecal sample of a healthy Chinese infant, we determined the tolerance to low pH, survival in bile salts and NaCl, adhesion ability, biofilm formation, antimicrobial activity, toxin gene distribution, hemolysis, gelatinase activity, antibiotic resistance, and virulence to Galleria mellonella and interpreted the characters by genome resequencing. Phenotypically, E. durans A8-1 survived at pH 5.0 in 7.0% NaCl and 3% bile salt under aerobic and anaerobic condition. The bacterium had higher adhesion ability toward mucin, collagen, and Bovine Serum Albumin (BSA) in vitro and showed high hydrophobicity (79.2% in chloroform, 49.2% in xylene), auto-aggregation activity (51.7%), and could co-aggregate (66.2%) with Salmonella typhimurium. It had adhesion capability to intestinal epithelial Caco-2 cells (38.74%) with moderate biofilm production and antimicrobial activity against several Gram-positive pathogenic bacteria. A8-1 can antagonize the adhesion of S. typhimurium ATCC14028 on Caco-2 cells to protect the integrity of the cell membrane by detection of lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) and AKP activities. A8-1 also helps the cell relieve the inflammation induced by lipopolysaccharide by reducing the expression of cytokine IL-8 (P = 0.002) and TNF-α (P > 0.05), and increasing the IL-10 (P < 0.001). For the safety evaluation, A8-1 showed no hemolytic activity, no gelatinase activity, and had only asa1 positive in the seven detected virulence genes in polymerase chain reaction (PCR), whereas it was not predicted in the genome sequence. It was susceptible to benzylpenicillin, ampicillin, ciprofloxacin, levofloxacin, moxifloxacin, tigecycline, nitrofurantoin, linezolid, vancomycin, erythromycin, and quinupristin/dalofopine except clindamycin, which was verified by the predicted lasA, lmrB, lmrC, and lmrD genes contributing to the clindamycin resistance. The virulence test of G. mellonella showed that it had toxicity lower than 10% at 1 × 10⁷ CFU. According to the results of these evaluated attributes, E. durans strain A8-1 could be a promising probiotic candidate for applications.

Limited studies investigating the relationships between dietary patterns and congenital heart defects (CHDs) are available. This study aimed to explore the associations between dietary patterns and CHDs risk in Shaanxi, China. We conducted a hospital-based case-control study and included a total of 474 cases and 948 controls. Pregnant women waiting for delivery in the hospital were interviewed to report their diets during pregnancy using a validated food frequency questionnaire. Dietary patterns were derived using principal component factor analysis. Mixed logistic regression models were used to assess the associations between dietary patterns and CHDs. Pregnant women in the highest tertile of the prudent pattern had a lower risk of CHDs compared to those in the lowest tertile (OR = 0.65, 95%CI: 0.48–0.89). Pregnant women with high scores on the vegetarian pattern were at an increased risk of CHDs (medium vs. lowest tertile: OR = 1.50, 95%CI = 1.03–2.17; highest vs. lowest tertile: OR = 1.56, 95%CI = 1.13–2.15; p_trend = 0.015). Pregnant women with high scores on the dairy and egg pattern were at a reduced risk of CHDs (medium vs. lowest tertile: OR = 0.66, 95%CI = 0.49–0.90; highest vs. lowest tertile: OR = 0.60, 95%CI = 0.43–0.82; p_trend = 0.001). Maternal diet during pregnancy is an important target for intervention, and it may influence the likelihood of developing CHDs.

To explore the extent and nature of television food advertising especially unhealthy food advertising to primary school children in Xi’an, China. Television data were recorded for 2 weekdays and 2 weekend days between 6:00 and 22:00 during May and June in 2012 from a total of five television channels most popular with children in Xi’an. Pearson χ2 tests and logistic regression were applied to determine differences in the proportion of healthy food, unhealthy food and miscellaneous food advertisements for different channels, programs, dates, viewing periods and the use of persuasive marketing tactics. Of the 5527 advertisements transcribed, 25.5 % were for food, among which 48.1 % were considered to be unhealthy. The frequency of food advertisements was 6 per hour per channel, including 3 unhealthy food advertisements. Compared with healthy and miscellaneous food advertisements, more unhealthy food advertisements were shown during afternoon, weekends and children’s non-peak viewing times as well as on children’s television channels, central television channels and non-children’s programmes. Unhealthy foods contributed the highest proportion of all food advertisements containing promotional characters (51.7 %) and premium offers (59.1 %). Both promotional characters and premium offers appeared more on non-children’s television channels. The majority of food advertisements were for unhealthy food. More unhealthy food ads were shown in children’s non-peak time and afternoon as well as non-children’s channels. More children-oriented persuasive marketing tactics were used in unhealthy food ads especially in non-children’s channels. Therefore, intervening in the entrance of unhealthy foods into the market and establishing regulations related to food advertising especially unhealthy food advertisements are important strategies to prevent children’s exposure to unhealthy food and childhood obesity.