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To invest in energetically demanding life history stages, individuals require a substantial amount of resources. Physiological traits, particularly those related to energetics, can be useful for examining variation in life history decisions and trade‐offs because they result from individual responses to environmental variation. Leptin is a protein hormone found in mammals that is proportional to the amount of endogenous fat stores within an individual. Recently, researchers have confirmed that a mammalian leptin analogue (MLA), based on the mammalian sequence of leptin, is present with associated receptors and proteins in avian species, with an inhibitory effect on foraging and body mass gain at high circulating levels. While MLA has been both quantified and manipulated in avian species, little is currently known regarding whether plasma MLA in wild‐living species and individuals is associated with key reproductive decisions. We quantified plasma MLA in wild, Arctic‐nesting female common eiders (Somateria mollissima) at arrival on the breeding grounds and followed them to determine subsequent breeding propensity, and reproductive phenology, investment, and success. Common eiders are capital‐income breeding birds that require the accumulation of substantial fat stores to initiate laying and successfully complete incubation. We found that females with lower plasma MLA initiated breeding earlier and in a shorter period of time. However, we found no links between plasma MLA levels and breeding propensity, clutch size, or reproductive success. Although little is still known about plasma MLA, based on these results and its role in influencing foraging behaviors and condition gain, plasma MLA appears to be closely linked to reproductive timing and is therefore likely to underlie trade‐offs surrounding life history decisions. We measured a plasma mammalian leptin analogue (MLA), a trait shown to influence foraging behaviour and mass gain, in wild‐living, pre‐laying female common eiders. We found that females with higher plasma MLA could reproduce at an earlier date and in a shorter period of time compared to females with lower plasma MLA, but other reproductive traits were not influenced. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Processing necessary to remove immunogenic components of nerve allograft renders it acellular. Seeding with supportive cells may improve axon regeneration. We aim to identify the method associated with implantation of the greatest volume and most even distribution of cells. Methods: Hypodermic needle injection was compared to soaking in solution under both normal and pressurized conditions after micropuncture of the allograft. Distribution within the allograft was measured using an in vitro model of fluorescent beads, as well as cultured Schwann cells. Results: Injection treatment resulted in larger volumes and a more uniform cross-sectional distribution of implanted cells. Beads and cells behaved similarly relative to the measured outcomes. Conclusions: Injection instills more cells in a more uniform distribution. In vivo testing may evaluate whether these techniques vary relative to cell survival, cell migration, and clinical outcomes. Size- and concentration-matched fluorescent beads may represent a viable model for analyzing cell implantation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

γ-Crystallins, abundant proteins of vertebrate lenses, were thought to be absent from birds. However, bird genomes contain well-conserved genes for γS- and γN-crystallins. Although expressed sequence tag analysis of chicken eye found no transcripts for these genes, RT- PCR detected spliced transcripts for both genes in chicken lens, with lower levels in cornea and retina/retinal pigment epithelium. The level of mRNA for γS in chicken lens was relatively very low even though the chicken crygs gene promoter had lens-preferred activity similar to that of mouse. Chicken γS was detected by a peptide antibody in lens, but not in other ocular tissues. Low levels of γS and γN proteins were detected in chicken lens by shotgun mass spectroscopy. Water-soluble and water-insoluble lens fractions were analyzed and 1934 proteins (< 1% false discovery rate) were detected, increasing the known chicken lens proteome 30-fold. Although chicken γS is well conserved in protein sequence, it has one notable difference in leucine 16, replacing a surface glutamine conserved in other γ-crystallins, possibly affecting solubility. However, L16 and engineered Q16 versions were both highly soluble and had indistinguishable circular dichroism, tryptophan fluorescence and heat stability (melting temperature Tm ~ 65 °C) profiles. L16 has been present in birds for over 100 million years and may have been adopted for a specific protein interaction in the bird lens. However, evolution has clearly reduced or eliminated expression of ancestral γ-crystallins in bird lenses. The conservation of genes for γS- and γN-crystallins suggests they may have been preserved for reasons unrelated to the bulk properties of the lens. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the system-deciding principle of economic rationality for its logical soundness and effects in global practice. Analysis demonstrates the fallacious structure of the underlying assumptions of homo economicus across theories and institutions, and explains how cumulative destruction of global economic, social, and ecological life systems follows from its life-blind mechanism. Higher-order concepts of life-capital, life-value efficiency, and life-good supply and demand are then defined to bring economic rationality into coherence with terrestrial and human life requirements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ross 708 broiler chickens were fed one of three levels of crude protein (12, 21 or 30%) from 7 to 28 days of age. Birds were then switched to either a higher (30%) or lower level of crude protein (12% and sampled three days following the switch. The purpose of these treatments was to test effects of changes in protein level at a representative time during the finisher phase (days 28 to 31) of broiler growth and to relate changes to metabolic plasma hormone levels (IGF-I, IGF-II, insulin, leptin, T3, T4, glucagons, Ghrelin) and regulatory enzymes [malic enzyme (ME), aspartate aminotransferase (AAT), and NADP-isocitrate dehydrogenase (ICD)] and their respective mRNAs The data from this experiment show that a priority of hormones can be established with respect to correlations between circulating values and representative metabolic enzymes and their mRNAs. It is suggested from these data that both IGF-I and T4 are equal in a metabolic priority scheme and are superior to glucagon and Ghrelin which are still significantly related to certain enzymes and their mRNAs. It is entirely possible that mRNA levels do not correlate or totally regulate enzyme protein (as evidenced by activities of regulatory enzymes) although the relationships for ME (R=0.69; P<0.001), ICD (R=0.64; P<0.001) and AAT (R=0.47, P<0.001) does lend some credence that transcriptional events regulate these two enzymes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To understand how the proghrelin system functions in regulating growth hormone release and food intake as well as defining its pleiotropic roles in such diverse physiological processes as energy homeostasis, gastrointestinal tract function and reproduction requires detailed knowledge of the structure and function of the components that comprise this system. These include the preproghrelin gene that encodes the proghrelin precursor protein from which two peptide hormones, ghrelin and obestatin, are derived and the cognate receptors that bind proghrelin-derived peptides to mediate their physiological actions in different tissues. Also key to the functioning of this system is the post-translational processing of the proghrelin precursor protein and the individual peptides derived from it. While this system has been intensively studied in a variety of animal species and humans over the last decade, there has been considerably less investigation of the avian proghrelin system which exhibits some unique differences compared to mammals. This review summarizes what is currently known about the proghrelin system in birds and offers new insights into the nature and function of this important endocrine system. Such information facilitates cross-species comparisons and contributes to our understanding of the evolution of the proghrelin system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explains what has long been missing across domains and levels of analysis: (a) the life-blind inner logic regulating contemporary paradigms of rationality and scientific method; (b) the reasons why these regulators of thought select for unforeseen consequences of ecological, social, and economic collapse; and (c) the principle of life-ground consistency which corrects this systemic incoherence of thought regime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This analysis explains why the currently instituted value-sets of “rationality” and “scientific method” select for unforeseen consequences of economic, social and ecological system collapse. Laying bare the era's unifying paradigm of “rational choice” across theory (e.g., game theory, contractarianism, prisoner's dilemma) and practice (global business, geostrategic analysis, armed war and mass-media sport), the analysis exposes the systematic disconnection of rationality and its lead vector of scientific method from the needs and capacities of life-systems. Only if rational and scientific standards are grounded in life-enabling purpose and means consistent with it, the argument shows, can they be made coherent with life support systems through generational time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper achieves two general objectives. It first analyses Bernard Hodgson's Economic As Moral Science as a path-breaking internal critique of neo-classical economic theory, and it then demonstrates that the underlying neo-classical paradigm he presupposes suffers from a deeper-structural myopia than his standpoint recognizes. EMS mainly exposes the a priori moral prescriptions underlying orthodox consumer choice theory -- namely, its classical utilitarian ground and four or, as argued here, five hidden universal categorical-ought prescriptions which the theory presupposes as instrumental imperatives: (1) comparability evaluations by all consumer judgements; (2) non-satiety of consumer desire; (3) consistency and transitivity of consumer preferences; (4) diminishing rate of marginal substitution by consumer choice; and (5) an unlimited aggregate growth of commodity production, or "the liberal growth ethic". The article argues that Hodgson's refutation of the neo-classical claims of "value neutral scientific method" is sound, that his bridging of the Humean reason-desire divide by the "rational review" of wants is resonantly demonstrated, and that his argument for conversion of an "a priori-cum-normative-cum-idealized" neo-classical theory into scientific status is logically plausible but morally abhorrent. The principal objection to Hodgson's magisterial exposé of neo-classical doctrine's moral a priorism is that the latter's normative presuppositions are profoundly deranged at a level that he himself assumes as given. In consequence, there is theoretical closure at three levels: (1) to the underlying "life economy" of non-priced and non-profit production and distribution of goods otherwise in short supply; (2) to the "civil commons" infrastructure sustaining these non-commodity systems of social and ecological production and distribution; and (3) to the systemic despoiling of both by monetized market mechanisms which are falsely assumed as the defining limits of "the economy". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Broiler breeder pullets were divided into two groups at 21 wk of age. One group was given free access to feed (ad libitum) and the other fed a limited amount of feed (restricted). At 22 wk, all birds were photostimulated and maintained throughout an egg-laying cycle ending at 36 wk. Samples of liver and abdominal fat pad were collected just before photostimulation (prelight), after photostimulation at first egg and at peak egg production (plateau). Hepatic expression of sterol regulatory element binding protein-1, ATP-citrate lyase, fatty acid synthase, malic enzyme, acetyl-CoA carboxylase and stearoyl-CoA (Delta9) desaturase 1 genes in ad libitum birds declined from their highest levels just before photostimulation as the birds came into and maintained egg production. In contrast, the restricted birds had significant (P < 0.05) increases in the expression of these genes after photostimulation at first egg with a subsequent decline as they reached peak egg production. Hepatic expression of fatty acid binding protein, VLDL apolipoprotein (apoVLDL-II) and apoB genes increased significantly (P < 0.05) in both ad libitum and restricted breeders after photostimulation, whereas apoA1 gene expression declined during this time. Abdominal fat pad weights were significantly (P < 0.05) higher in the ad libitum compared with restricted birds after photostimulation. Lipoprotein lipase in this tissue showed a pattern of expression similar to that observed for the hepatic lipogenic enzyme genes. In conclusion, feed restriction during the pullet-to-breeder transition period significantly (P < 0.05) altered hepatic lipogenic gene expression in broiler breeders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is generally believed by governing political parties, economists, business people and other believers in global market doctrine that those who oppose "free trade agreements" are misled, uninformed and "do not really know what they are protesting against". At the same time, the opponents of these transnational trade-and-investment restructurings have diverse concerns ranging from loss of democratic sovereignty, labour rights and environmental protection of majority-world oppression, the growth of poverty and inequality, and global cultural homogenization. The following analysis integrates the growing multitude of critical attacks on these extra-parliamentary agreements into a systematic anatomy of the latter's underlying structure whose regulating principles are not yet recognised or debated in business, political or economic circles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focuses on the significance of the trade campaign Free Trade Area of the Americas for global corporate system. Meta-principles for global corporate system; Features of global market system implemented by World Trade Organization.

This article presents a response to an article by Geoffrey Hodgson on life-value economics and the neo-classical paradigm of economics in the context of business ethics. The author begins by discussing five central concepts from Hodgson's paper. The "life code of value," "civil commons," "the money to more money sequence," civil commons, and definitions used by Hodgson are all investigated by the author. The author believes that in his paper, Hodgson does not actually focus on what he has discussed, rather, Hodgson states his own feelings on the subject. The author believes that the neo-classical method is not able to fit real-life situations and different paradigms should be used.

Tests the hypothesis that exposure to mild heat stress evokes an immediate response in satellite cell activity. Growth factors that have been implicated in the recruitment of satellite cells for skeletal muscle growth and regeneration; Muscle growth at an early age; Regulatory proteins of muscles.

A newly devised radioimmunoassay for the measurement of myocardial myoglobin has been modified by us to measure circulating myoglobin levels in rats subjected to isoproterenol-induced myocardial infarction of various degrees of severity. The method has been found to be very effective. Myoglobinemia proved to be a sensitive index of early myocardial damage in rats, perhaps superseding the enzyme CPK in detecting early myocardial damage. Both myoglobin and CPK were equally effective in providing an index of the extent of histopathologic myocardial infarction. The changes in myoglobin and CPK did not correlate well with the changes in plasma SGOT, SGPT, and LDH, which are more diagnostic of the later stages of acute myocardial infarction. Myoglobinemia offers excellent promise as a diagnostic aid in detecting early myocardial infarction in rats, and perhaps ultimately in humans, since there are only small differences between the immunologic specificity of human versus rat myoglobin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article begins with an overview of the historic moment of ‘the end of the Cold War’, and of the paradoxically deepening moral, social, and environmental problems posed by the military system. It demonstrates that historical and contemporary analyses of defence and war have dogmatically presupposed the military paradigm, and have therefore failed to recognize the self‐reproducing structure of covert premisses and inferences upon which it rests. In laying bare this underlying system of unreason, the analysis demonstrates that the military paradigm's ultimately self‐contradictory concepts of ‘security’ and ‘defence’ repose on unstated interests of social and political rule. Proposing new distinctions between pathological and life‐enabling forms of war, and between guilty and innocent combatants, the argument develops alternative, non‐military principles of war to guide rational and moral agency [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article considers six standard arguments in favour of an unfettered free market: (1) the freedom to consume; (2) the freedom of the seller; (3) the freedom of the producer; (4) freedom from government interference; (5) lower costs; (6) promotion of democracy. It demonstrates that each of these arguments turns out to be incoherent on closer examination. The ground of this incoherence it is shown, is the market doctrine's systematic omission of non-business costs and benefits from its analysis, a methodological blindness which can only be overcome by a wider-lensed comprehension of economic value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Male and female, massively obese and nonobese, spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR) which are hypersensitive to stress were kept under quiescent conditions; they were autopsied at 15 months of age. The blood pressure of the Obese/SHR plateaued at 166 mmHg versus 198 mmHg for the nonobese/SHR. The once massive thymi vanished in the Obese/SHR accompanied by greatly enlarged adrenal glands, pituitary basophilia, greatly elevated levels of adrenocorticotrophin, corticosterone, deoxycorticosterone, aldosterone, fatty liver, hyperlipidemia, and hyperglycemia. The Obese/SHR were hyperadrenocorticoid compared with their nonobese siblings and manifested a cushingoid spectrum of degenerative changes (e.g., thin skin, hypertension, diabetes, kidney stones, and accelerated aging). The provision of a nonstressful environment is believed to have dampened the usual chronic hyperadrenocorticism and prolonged the lifespan of the Obese/SHR. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR) were autopsied at timed intervals from weaning to 28 months. Blood pressure reached 180 to 240 mm hg after 4 months and was maintained. After 20 months, male shr began to die of myocardial infarction. A survey was made of the histopathologic changes associated with increasing blood pressure and age. Histopathologic changes appeared in males when they became 8 months old; degenerative changes did not appear in female shr until 12 to 15 months. Degenerative changes consisted of pituitary basophilia, fatty liver, islet hyperplasia and beta cell degranulation which preceded and became exacerbated with worsening hypertension. Intimal fibrino hyalin lesions of the gonads, polyarteritis nodosa, myocardial infarction, and cerebral edema were more severe in males vs females. Female shr live significantly longer than males (e.g., 28 to 34 months). Hypertension and longevity may be under separate genetic control in shr. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The differential use of metabolic substrates by birds is not well understood. Therefore, to clarify which substrates are preferentially utilized, studies were conducted on birds with divergent dietary habits and on close non-avian relatives of birds, alligators. Fasting plasma substrate and hormone levels were compared for Mourning doves (omnivorous), Bald Eagles, Great Homed Owls, Red-tailed Hawks, and American alligators (all carnivorous). The plasma of carnivorous birds and alligators had the highest concentrations of ketone bodies (10 to 21 mg/dl) concomitant with low levels of triglycerides (62 to 79 mg/dl) indicative of free fatty acid (FFA) utilization. Elevated FFAs have been correlated with decreased utilization of glucose and insulin resistance in mammals. This may also occur in birds as doves, eagles, and hawks were less sensitive to insulin as indicated by high glucose (325 to 350 mg/dl) levels in all three species, as well as increased insulin levels in eagles and hawks (1.1 to 1.2 ng/ml). In contrast, owls had high glucose (361 mg/dl) but low insulin (0.2 ng/ml) levels. More studies are required to determine if owls release insulin in response to a glucose load. Interestingly, previous studies have demonstrated that pancreatectomy of Great Homed Owls results in hyperglycemia and death suggesting they, like alligators and mammals, rely on insulin more than the other birds examined in this study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ross 708 broiler chickens were fed one of three levels of crude protein (12, 21 or 30%) from 7 to 28 days of age. Birds were then switched to either higher (12 to 30%, 21 to 30%) or lower levels of crude protein (30-12%, 21-12%). Birds were sampled three days following switches to their respective finisher diets. The purpose of these treatments was to test effects of changes in protein level during the finisher phase (days 28 to 35) of broiler growth and to relate changes to metabolic hormone levels and regulatory enzymes [malic enzyme, ME; aspartate aminotransferase, AAT; isocitrate dehydrogenase (NADP), ICD activities and mRNA]. Glucagon, IGF-I, T4 and Ghrelin were inversely correlated (P<0.01) to ME activities but, positively correlated to both ICD and AAT activities. The data from this experiment also shows that a priority of hormones can be established as far as correlations between circulating value and representative metabolic enzymes and their mRNA's. It is suggested from these data that both IGF-I and T4 are equal in a metabolic priority scheme and are superior to glucagon and Ghrelin which are still significantly related to certain enzymes and their mRNA. It is entirely possible that mRNA levels may not correlate or totally regulate enzyme protein (as evidenced by activities of ME, ICD and AAT activities) although the relationships for ME (R = 0.69; P<0.01) and ICD (R=0.64; P<0.01 were significant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]