Dietary Intake, Body Composition, and Nutrition Knowledge of Irish Dancers.

Irish dance requires lengthy, intensive training to perform at a high level in competitions and professionally. Irish dancers have been known to have high injury rates. Appropriate nutrient and fluid intakes have been shown to minimize the risk of fatigue and injury during training and performance in sport, but there is a lack of evidence as to whether and how this might apply in Irish dance. Forty adult Irish dancers, 35 females (age 21 ± 3 years) and five males (aged 27 ± 8 years), professionals or in full time training, were recruited for this study to investigate nutrition knowledge, dietary intake, and body composition. Participants were asked to complete "The Sport Nutrition Questionnaire," a sport- and dance-specific nutrition knowledge questionnaire, 4 day estimated food diaries, and under-take a dual x-ray absorptiometry (DXA) scan to assess body composition. Food diaries were analyzed using Dietplan 7. Reported energy, fiber, iron (females), magnesium (females), selenium, iodine (females), and folate (females) intakes were below United Kingdom dietary reference values. Fruit and vegetable intakes were low: 2.7 ± 1.4 portions per day. Sixteen percent of days reported contained no fruits or vegetables. Mean body mass index (BMI) for 35 female participants was 23.2 ± 3.3 kg/m², mean BMI for five male participants was 22.2 ± 1.6 kg/m². Mean body fat measured by DXA in 18 female participants was 33.4% ± 6.9%, which was higher than seen in other dance populations. Mean lean mass was 40.8 ± 5.6 kg. Mean score for the nutrition knowledge questionnaire in which the maximum score is 65, was 30.5 ± 7.6 (47% ± 11.7%), range: 9 to 44 (14% to 68%). The ability of the Irish dancers to correctly identify foods as being high or low in carbohydrate, protein, and fat varied widely. Body composition did not correlate with intake of any nutrient but did correlate with nutrition knowledge questionnaire score (r = -.663, p < 0.001). Given the dietary intakes and nutrition knowledge exhibited by the dancers in this study, further work is needed to inform and improve diets and support the demands of Irish dance.

Nutrition and culture in professional football. A mixed method approach.

An adequate diet is essential for the optimal performance of professional football (soccer) players. Existing studies have shown that players fail to consume such a diet, without interrogating the reasons for this. The aim of this study was to explore the difficulties professional football players experience in consuming a diet for optimal performance. It utilized a mixed method approach, combining nutritional intake assessment with qualitative interviews, to ascertain both what was consumed and the wider cultural factors that affect consumption. The study found a high variability in individual intake which ranged widely from 2648 to 4606 kcal/day. In addition, the intake of carbohydrate was significantly lower than that recommended. The study revealed that the main food choices for carbohydrate and protein intake were pasta and chicken respectively. Interview results showed the importance of tradition within the world of professional football in structuring the players' approach to nutrition. In addition, the players' personal eating habits that derived from their class and national habitus restricted their food choice by conflicting with the dietary choices promoted within the professional football clubs.

Nutrition and elite young athletes.

Nutrition can play an essential role in the health of elite young athletes as well as exercise performance. Children and adolescents need adequate energy intake to ensure proper growth, development, and maturation. In addition, the requirements may further increase with increasing exercise training. There are, however, several metabolic differences that result in slightly different advice for young versus adult athletes. For example, younger athletes generally rely more on fat as a fuel, have smaller glycogen stores and have a limited glycolytic capacity. This would imply reduced carbohydrate requirements but a greater capacity to oxidize fat. There are also differences in thermoregulation, although the exact impact on fluid requirements is not clear. The limited evidence suggests that acute energy and fluid imbalances can be detrimental to performance and there may be benefits of ingesting carbohydrate and fluid during exercise, especially during more prolonged exercise. Exogenous carbohydrate oxidation rates have been reported to contribute more to energy expenditure in children. This may, however, simply be a reflection of the fact that the oxidation of this carbohydrate is not limited by body size, but by absorption. Absorption rates are likely to be similar in children and adults and therefore exogenous carbohydrate oxidation rates should be comparable. The relative contribution will therefore be higher because of the lower absolute intensities in children. There are a large number of questions still unanswered and sports nutrition advice to the elite young athlete is largely extrapolated from the adult population. Therefore, more research is needed in the years to come to give better advice to these young athletes.

The synthesis of cyclic imidates from amides of glucuronic acid and investigation of glycosidation reactions.

The synthesis of novel cyclic glycosyl imidates and an investigation of their potential as donors in glycosidation reactions is described. The results show that 1,2-cis glycosides obtained from the reactions of glycosyl acetates or cyclic imidates, each derived from amides of glucuronic acid, result from the anomerisation of initially formed 1,2-trans glycosides.

Novel synthesis of castanospermine and 1-epicastanospermine.

[reaction: see text] Polyhydroxylated indolizidines have potential for treatment of HIV, hepatitis C and HSV infection, multiple sclerosis, angiogenesis, cancer, and diabetes. A new synthetic approach to the title compounds from a 5-C-methoxypyranosyl azide has been developed. The route incorporates the aldol reaction and a novel catalytic reductive amination cascade to generate the indolizidine ring.

A general synthesis of iminosugars.

1-Deoxynojirimycin, 1-deoxymannojirimycin, and 1-deoxygalactostatin have been synthesized by epoxidation of tri-O-acetyl-6-deoxyhex-5-enopyranosyl azides followed by methanolysis, deacetylation, and catalytic hydrogenation. 1,6-Dideoxygalactostatin was obtained by the reaction of 2,3,4-tri-O-acetyl-6-deoxy-beta-L-arabino-hex-5-enopyranosyl azide with NIS in methanol followed by deacetylation and catalytic hydrogenation. The overall yields were 4.4-23.5% over seven to nine steps.

A study of the epoxidation of 6-deoxyhex-5-enopyranosides. 1,5-Dicarbonyl derivatives and novel synthetic routes to D-xylo-hexos-5-ulose and D-lyxo-hexos-5-ulose.

The work described deals with the isolation and characterization of epoxides from 6-deoxyhex-5-enopyranosides and preliminary exploration of their synthetic potential. Prolonged epoxidation reaction times led to their hydrolysis in situ and gave novel protected D-hexos-5-ulose derivatives (sugar 1,5-dicarbonyls). Some reactions of the hexos-5-uloses were studied, and in some cases septanoside (seven-membered-ring saccharide) derivatives were isolated. Novel routes to D-xylo-hexos-5-ulose and D-lyxo-hexos-5-ulose, of interest as intermediates in the synthesis and biosynthesis of inositols and aza sugars, are also described. The structures of the epoxides and novel hexos-5-uloses were established by NMR and X-ray crystallographic methods.