The athlete gut microbiota: state of the art and practical guidance.

The gut microbiota has been proposed to grant the athlete a metabolic advantage that might be key when optimising performance. While a taxonomic core set of microorganisms characterising the athlete's gut microbiota has not been delineated, some compositional features might be associated with improved metabolic efficiency, which appears to be driven by the production of bacterial metabolites, such as short-chain fatty acids. Not only long-term exercise but also dietary patterns associated with high-level sports practice contribute to this microbial environment, yet isolating the impact of individual dietary components is challenging. The present review synthetises the available evidence on the compositional aspects of the athlete's gut microbiota, discusses mechanisms involved in the bidirectional association between exercise and the gut environment, and evaluates the role of athletes' diet in this interplay. Additionally, a practical approach to indicators commonly reported in metagenomic and metabolomic analyses is provided to explore how these insights can translate to support dietary protocols.

Oral and general health conditions involved in periodontal status during pregnancy: a prospective cohort study.

PURPOSE: Pregnancy is a period in a woman's life that has important consequences on oral health, particularly for gingival health. Present study aims to identify women at higher risk of developing periodontal disease (gingivitis and periodontitis) during late pregnancy and evaluate how this condition evolves during this period. METHODS: Prospective cohort study was designed with pregnant women who were assessed during the first and third trimesters of gestation in a southern Spanish public hospital. Data regarding gingival and periodontal health, oral hygiene, and overall health status (obesity and diabetes mellitus) were collected. Reporting followed STROBE checklist. RESULTS: Significantly higher number of women had the periodontal and gingival disease in the third trimester of gestation compared with in early pregnancy. In the third trimester of gestation, 42 (28.6%) and 63 (42.9%) of women presented symptoms of periodontal disease and gingival disease, respectively. Obesity (OR 2.834; 95%CI 0.919-8.741), worse oral hygiene during the first trimester of gestation (OR: 4.031; 95%CI 2.12-7.65), and periodontal disease during early pregnancy (OR: 15.104; 95%CI 3.60-63.36) most effectively predicted periodontal disease during late pregnancy. CONCLUSIONS: Pregnancy is associated with exacerbated periodontal and gingival disease symptoms throughout the different trimesters of gestation. Obesity and oral hygiene during early pregnancy were the risk factors that most contributed to the aforementioned changes in periodontal disease.

Factors associated with oral health-related quality of life during pregnancy: a prospective observational study.

PURPOSE: To evaluate the evolution of perceived quality of life in relation to oral health during pregnancy and to determine the risk factors involved in this process. METHODS: A follow-up study was carried out with pregnant Spanish women. Two oral examinations and an oral health-related quality of life (OHRQoL) assessment, using the OHIP-14 questionnaire, were performed in the first and third trimester of pregnancy. Data on sociodemographic characteristics, medical history, O'Sullivan Test measures, oral hygiene habits, history of caries, and periodontal status of participants were collected through structured medical-dental questionnaires. RESULTS: A complete dataset comprising 246 pregnant women was available for analysis. Overall scores for negative impacts on the OHIP questionnaire were significantly higher during late pregnancy (74%). This indicated a deterioration in oral health-related quality of life amongst participants. Items describing "painful aching", "self-consciousness", "unsatisfactory diet", and "interrupted meals" showed the greatest increase between the first and third trimester of gestation. Multivariate analysis showed that pre-gestational/gestational diabetes mellitus and poor oral hygiene habits during the first trimester of gestation were directly associated with worse oral health-related quality of life during the third trimester of gestation (hyperglycemia: OR 2.86; 95% CI 1.019-8.050: p = 0.043 / oral hygiene: OR 1.33; 95% CI 0.970-1.836; p = 0.076). CONCLUSIONS: In the present research, hyperglycemia during pregnancy and poor oral hygiene habits during the first trimester of gestation led to a higher risk of poor oral quality of life during late pregnancy.

Vitamin D, preeclampsia and prematurity: A systematic review and meta-analysis of observational and interventional studies.

BACKGROUND: Vitamin D has important functions outside of bone metabolism. Deficiency has been associated with several adverse outcomes during pregnancy such as preeclampsia and prematurity. There is an increasing body of literature on this topic with studies performed to date having produced contradictory results. OBJECTIVE: To synthesize the literature about vitamin D deficiency and its association with preeclampsia and prematurity in order to determine if maternal vitamin D insufficiency and/or deficiency during pregnancy is associated with the prevalence of preeclampsia and prematurity. DESIGN: A systematic review and meta-analysis of observational and interventional studies. METHODS: Two independent researchers reviewed the included studies according to PRISMA reporting guidelines. A protocol for this review was registered in PROSPERO with the registration number: "CRD42019136318". Three electronic databases (PubMed, ScienceDirect and Web of Science); were searched in order to identify eligible studies. Observational and interventional studies were selected which had been published in the last 6 years, and analysed the association between maternal vitamin D concentrations during pregnancy and the development of preeclampsia and/or preterm birth. Data were extracted and presented in tables and figures. Fixed and random-effects meta-analyses were performed on the studies which provided enough sample data to calculate odds ratios. Results from both statistical methods were compared. Meta-analysis cut-off points for vitamin D insufficiency and deficiency were defined as <75nmol/L and <50nmol/L, respectively. RESULTS: Fifty-five studies met the inclusion criteria. Fixed-effects meta-analysis of the interventional studies indicated that vitamin D supplementation acts as a prevention factor for preeclampsia and prematurity. Fixed-effects meta-analysis of observational studies concluded that vitamin D insufficiency and deficiency are associated with a higher risk of developing preeclampsia. However, prematurity and vitamin D were only associated when maternal vitamin D concentrations was <75 nmol/L. Random-effects meta-analysis found no significant association between vitamin D, preeclampsia and prematurity in either observational or interventional studies. CONCLUSION: Higher vitamin D concentrations during pregnancy could be associated with a decreased risk of preeclampsia and prematurity but statistical significance of associations depends on the study design used. Well-designed clinical trials with vitamin D supplementation are needed in order to better define associations.

Criticality on networks with topology-dependent interactions.

Weighted scale-free networks with topology-dependent interactions are studied. It is shown that the possible universality classes of critical behavior, which are known to depend on topology, can also be explored by tuning the form of the interactions at fixed topology. For a model of opinion formation, simple mean field and scaling arguments show that a mapping gamma'=(gamma-mu)(1-mu) describes how a shift of the standard exponent gamma of the degree distribution can absorb the effect of degree-dependent pair interactions J(ij) proportional to (k(i)k(j))(-mu), where k(i) stands for the degree of vertex i. This prediction is verified by extensive numerical investigations using the cavity method and Monte Carlo simulations. The critical temperature of the model is obtained through the Bethe-Peierls approximation and with the replica technique. The mapping can be extended to nonequilibrium models such as those describing the spreading of a disease on a network.

Dynamical replica analysis of disordered Ising spin systems on finitely connected random graphs.

We study the dynamics of macroscopic observables such as the magnetization and the energy per degree of freedom in Ising spin models on random graphs of finite connectivity, with random bonds and/or heterogeneous degree distributions. To do so, we generalize existing versions of dynamical replica theory and cavity field techniques to systems with strongly disordered and locally treelike interactions. We illustrate our results via application to, e.g., +/-J spin glasses on random graphs and of the overlap in finite connectivity Sourlas codes. All results are tested against Monte Carlo simulations.

Trading interactions for topology in scale-free networks.

Scale-free networks with topology-dependent interactions are studied. It is shown that the universality classes of critical behavior, which conventionally depend only on topology, can also be explored by tuning the interactions. A mapping, gamma'=(gamma-mu)/(1-mu), describes how a shift of the standard exponent gamma of the degree distribution P(q) can absorb the effect of degree-dependent pair interactions J(ij)proportional to(q(i)q(j))(-mu). The replica technique, cavity method, and Monte Carlo simulation support the physical picture suggested by Landau theory for the critical exponents and by the Bethe-Peierls approximation for the critical temperature. The equivalence of topology and interaction holds for equilibrium and nonequilibrium systems, and is illustrated with interdisciplinary applications.

Optimal capacity of the Blume-Emery-Griffiths perceptron.

A Blume-Emery-Griffiths perceptron model is introduced and its optimal capacity is calculated within the replica-symmetric Gardner approach, as a function of the pattern activity and the embedding stability parameter. The stability of the replica-symmetric approximation is studied via the analog of the de Almeida-Thouless line. A comparison is made with other three-state perceptrons.