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Vernez, David Koechlin, Alice Milon, Antoine Boniol, Magali Valentini, Faustine Chignol, Marie-Christine Dore, Jean-Francois Bulliard, Jean-Luc Boniol, Mathieu eng 2015/11/06 06:00 J Occup Environ Med. 2015 Nov;57(11):1192-6. doi: 10.1097/JOM.0000000000000537.; International audience; BACKGROUND: Solar ultraviolet has been recognized as the main causative factor for skin cancer and is currently classified as a carcinogenic agent by International Agency for Research on Cancer. METHOD: Results from a previous phone survey conducted in 2012 in France were used to assess exposure conditions to sun among outdoor workers. Satellite data were used in combination with an exposure model to assess anatomical exposure. RESULT: The yearly median exposure of the outdoor worker population is 77 kJ/m to 116 kJ/m. Road workers, building workers, and gardeners are the more exposed. About 70% of the yearly dose estimate is due to the cumulative summer and spring exposures. CONCLUSIONS: This study highlights the role of individual factors in anatomical exposure and ranks the most exposed body parts and outdoor occupations. Prevention messages should put emphasis on spring exposure, which is an important contributor to the yearly dose.

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Boniol, Mathieu Koechlin, Alice Boniol, Magali Valentini, Faustine Chignol, Marie-Christine Dore, Jean-Francois Bulliard, Jean-Luc Milon, Antoine Vernez, David eng Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't 2015/03/06 06:00 J Occup Environ Med. 2015 Mar;57(3):315-20. doi: 10.1097/JOM.0000000000000354.; International audience; OBJECTIVES: Occupational ultraviolet (UV) exposure was evaluated in a population-based sample in France. METHODS: A random survey was conducted in 2012 in individuals aged 25 to 69 years. The median daily standard erythemal UV dose (SED) was estimated from exposure time and place and matched to satellite UV records. RESULTS: A total of 889 individuals were exposed to solar UV with highest doses observed among gardeners (1.19 SED), construction workers (1.13 SED), agricultural workers (0.95 SED), and culture/art/social science workers (0.92 SED). Information and communication technology, industry, and transport workers were highly exposed (>0.70 SED). Significant factors associated with high occupational UV exposure were sex (P < 0.0001), phototype (P = 0.0003), and taking lunch outdoors (P < 0.0001). CONCLUSIONS: This study identified not only expected occupations with high UV exposure but also unexpected occupations with high exposures. This could serve as a basis for future prevention.

Excessive exposure to solar ultraviolet (UV) is the main cause of skin cancer. Specific prevention should be further developed to target overexposed or highly vulnerable populations. A better characterisation of anatomical UV exposure patterns is however needed for specific prevention. To develop a regression model for predicting the UV exposure ratio (ER, ratio between the anatomical dose and the corresponding ground level dose) for each body site without requiring individual measurements. A 3D numeric model (SimUVEx) was used to compute ER for various body sites and postures. A multiple fractional polynomial regression analysis was performed to identify predictors of ER. The regression model used simulation data and its performance was tested on an independent data set. Two input variables were sufficient to explain ER: the cosine of the maximal daily solar zenith angle and the fraction of the sky visible from the body site. The regression model was in good agreement with the simulated data ER (R(2)=0.988). Relative errors up to +20% and -10% were found in daily doses predictions, whereas an average relative error of only 2.4% (-0.03% to 5.4%) was found in yearly dose predictions. The regression model predicts accurately ER and UV doses on the basis of readily available data such as global UV erythemal irradiance measured at ground surface stations or inferred from satellite information. It renders the development of exposure data on a wide temporal and geographical scale possible and opens broad perspectives for epidemiological studies and skin cancer prevention.

International audience; Mesothelioma is a rare disease less than 0.3% of cancers in France, very aggressive and resistant to the majority of conventional therapies. Asbestos exposure is nearly the only recognized cause of mesothelioma in men observed in 80% of case. In 1990, the projections based on mortality predicted a raise of incidence in mesothelioma for the next three decades. Nowadays, the diagnosis of this cancer is based on pathology, but the histological presentation frequently heterogeneous, is responsible for numerous pitfalls and major problems of early detection toward effective therapy. Facing such a diagnostic, epidemiological and medico-legal context, a national and international multidisciplinary network has been progressively set up in order to answer to epidemiological survey, translational or academic research questions. Moreover, in response to the action of the French Cancer Program (action 23.1) a network of pathologists was organized for expert pathological second opinion using a standardized procedure of certification for mesothelioma diagnosis. We describe the network organization and show the results during this last 15years period of time from 1998-2013. These results show the major impact on patient's management, and confirm the interest of this second opinion to provide accuracy of epidemiological data, quality of medico-legal acknowledgement and accuracy of clinical diagnostic for the benefit of patients. We also show the impact of these collaborative efforts for creating a high quality clinicobiological, epidemiological and therapeutic data collection for improvement of the knowledge of this dramatic disease.

We introduce a novel method to extract the vessels in eye fun-dus images which is adaptive to lighting variations. In the Logarithmic Image Processing framework, a 3-segment probe detects the vessels by probing the topographic surface of an image from below. A map of contrasts between the probe and the image allows to detect the vessels by a threshold. In a lowly contrasted image, results show that our method better extract the vessels than another state-of the-art method. In a highly contrasted image database (DRIVE) with a reference , ours has an accuracy of 0.9454 which is similar or better than three state-of-the-art methods and below three others. The three best methods have a higher accuracy than a manual segmentation by another expert. Importantly, our method automatically adapts to the lighting conditions of the image acquisition., Comment: Proceedings of 2020 IEEE 17th International Symposium on Biomedical Imaging (ISBI).To appear in https://ieeexplore.ieee.org

Under voluntary vaccination, a critical role in shaping the level and trends of vaccine uptake is played by the type and structure of information that is received and used by parents of children eligible for vaccination. In this article we investigate the feedbacks of spatial mobility and the spatial structure of information on vaccination dynamics, by extending to a continuous spatially structured setting existing behavioral epidemiology models for the impact of vaccine adverse events (VAEs) on vaccination choices. We considered the simplest spatial setting, namely classical 'Fickian' diffusion, and focused on the noteworthy case where the infection is absent. This scenario mimics the important case of a population where a previously endemic vaccine preventable infection was successfully eliminated, but the re-emergence of the disease must be prevented. This is, for example, the case of poliomyelitis in most countries worldwide. In such a situation, the dynamics of VAEs and of the related information arguably become the key determinant of vaccination decision and of collective coverage. In relation to this 'information issue', we compared the effects of three main cases: (ⅰ) purely local information, where agents react only to locally occurred events; (ⅱ) a mix of purely local and global, country-wide, information due e.g., to country-wide media and the internet; (ⅲ) a mix of local and non-local information. By representing these different information options through a range of different spatial information kernels, we investigated: the presence and stability of space-homogeneous, nontrivial, behavior-induced equilibria; the existence of bifurcations; the existence of classical and generalized traveling waves; and the effects of awareness campaigns enacted by the Public Health System to sustain vaccine uptake. Finally, we analyzed some analogies and differences between our models and those of the Theory of Innovation Diffusion.

Summary Background Critical care patients are at increased risk of infection. Near-patient surfaces act as reservoirs of microbial soil, which may contain pathogens. Aim To correlate soil levels with hand-touch frequency of near-patient sites in an intensive care unit (ICU). Methods Five sites around each bed in a 10-bed ICU were screened for total microbial soil (cfu/cm 2 ) and Staphylococcus aureus every month for 10 months. Selected sites were infusion pump and cardiac monitor, left and right bedrails, and bed table. Ten 1 h covert audits of hand-touch frequency of these sites were performed in order to provide an average hand-touch count, which was modelled against soil levels obtained from microbiological screening. Findings Seven of 10 staphylococci were found in conjunction with gross contamination of a specific site ( P =0.005) and the same proportion from three most frequently touched sites (bedrails and bed table). There was a linear association between four sites demonstrating gross microbial contamination (>12 cfu/cm 2 ) and mean number of hand-touch counts ( P =0.08). The bed table was handled most but was not the most contaminated site. We suspected that customary placement of alcohol gel containers on bed tables may have reduced microbiological yield. Removing the gel container from one table confirmed its inhibitory effect on microbial contamination after rescreening (19% vs 50% >12 cfu/cm 2 : P =0.007). Conclusion Surface bioburden at near-patient sites in ICU is associated with hand-contact frequencies by staff and visitors. This supports the need for targeted hygienic cleaning in a high-risk healthcare environment.

International audience; Functional Asplund's metrics were recently introduced to perform pattern matching robust to lighting changes thanks to double-sided probing in the Logarithmic Image Processing (LIP) framework. Two metrics were defined, namely the LIP-multiplicative Asplund's metric which is robust to variations of object thickness (or opacity) and the LIP-additive Asplund's metric which is robust to variations of camera exposure-time (or light intensity). Maps of distances-i.e. maps of these metric values-were also computed between a reference template and an image. Recently, it was proven that the map of LIP-multiplicative As-plund's distances corresponds to mathematical morphology operations. In this paper, the link between both metrics and between their corresponding distance maps will be demonstrated. It will be shown that the map of LIP-additive Asplund's distances of an image can be computed from the map of the LIP-multiplicative Asplund's distance of a transform of this image and vice-versa. Both maps will be related by the LIP isomorphism which will allow to pass from the image space of the LIP-additive distance map to the positive real function space of the LIP-multiplicative distance map. Experiments will illustrate this relation and the robustness of the LIP-additive Asplund's metric to lighting changes.

Bees are exposed to a wide range of multiple chemicals “chemical mixtures” from anthropogenic (e.g. plant protection products or veterinary products) or natural origin (e.g. mycotoxins, plant toxins). Quantifying the relative impact of multiple chemicals on bee health compared with other environmental stressors (e.g. varroa, viruses, and nutrition) has been identified as a priority to support the development of holistic risk assessment methods. Here, extensive literature searches and data collection of available laboratory studies on combined toxicity data for binary mixtures of pesticides and non-chemical stressors has been performed for honey bees (Apis mellifera), wild bees (Bombus spp.) and solitary bee species (Osmia spp.). From 957 screened publications, 14 publications provided 218 binary mixture toxicity data mostly for acute mortality (lethal dose: LD50) after contact exposure (61%), with fewer studies reporting chronic oral toxicity (20%) and acute oral LC50 values (19%). From the data collection, available dose response data for 92 binary mixtures were modelled using a Toxic Unit (TU) approach and the MIXTOX modelling tool to test assumptions of combined toxicity i.e. concentration addition (CA), and interactions (i.e. synergism, antagonism). The magnitude of interactions was quantified as the Model Deviation Ratio (MDR). The CA model applied to 17% of cases while synergism and antagonism were observed for 72% (MDR > 1.25) and 11% (MDR

In order to create an image segmentation method robust to lighting changes, two novel homogeneity criteria of an image region were studied. Both were defined using the Logarithmic Image Processing (LIP) framework whose laws model lighting changes. The first criterion estimates the LIP-additive homogeneity and is based on the LIP-additive law. It is theoretically insensitive to lighting changes caused by variations of the camera exposure-time or source intensity. The second, the LIP-multiplicative homogeneity criterion, is based on the LIP-multiplicative law and is insensitive to changes due to variations of the object thickness or opacity. Each criterion is then applied in Revol and Jourlin's (1997) region growing method which is based on the homogeneity of an image region. The region growing method becomes therefore robust to the lighting changes specific to each criterion. Experiments on simulated and on real images presenting lighting variations prove the robustness of the criteria to those variations. Compared to a state-of the art method based on the image component-tree, ours is more robust. These results open the way to numerous applications where the lighting is uncontrolled or partially controlled., The original publication is available at www.ias-iss.org

International audience; The three central phenomena of cuprate (copper oxide) superconductors are linked by a common doping level p*—at which the enigmatic pseudogap phase ends and the resistivity exhibits an anomalous linear dependence on temperature, and around which the superconducting phase forms a dome-shaped area in the phase diagram1. However, the fundamental nature of p* remains unclear, in particular regarding whether it marks a true quantum phase transition. Here we measure the specific heat C of the cuprates Eu-LSCO and Nd-LSCO at low temperature in magnetic fields large enough to suppress superconductivity, over a wide doping range2 that includes p*. As a function of doping, we find that Cel/T is strongly peaked at p* (where Cel is the electronic contribution to C) and exhibits a log(1/T) dependence as temperature T tends to zero. These are the classic thermodynamic signatures of a quantum critical point3,4,5, as observed in heavy-fermion6 and iron-based7 superconductors at the point where their antiferromagnetic phase comes to an end. We conclude that the pseudogap phase of cuprates ends at a quantum critical point, the associated fluctuations of which are probably involved in d-wave pairing and the anomalous scattering of charge carriers.

International audience; In order to estimate a registration model of eye fundus images made of an affinity and two radial distortions, we introduce an estimation criterion based on an error between the vessels. In [1], we estimated this model by minimising the error between characteristics points. In this paper, the detected vessels are selected using the circle and ellipse equations of the overlap area boundaries deduced from our model. Our method successfully registers 96 % of the 271 pairs in a Public Health dataset acquired mostly with different cameras. This is better than our previous method [1] and better than three other state-of-the-art methods. On a publicly available dataset, ours still better register the images than the reference method.

Objective: To investigate the associations between head and neck cancer\ud (HNC) risk and occupations. Methods: We harmonized data on occupations\ud in a pooled analysis of 8839 HNC cases and 13,730 controls in International\ud Head and Neck Cancer Epidemiology (INHANCE) consortium. Logistic\ud regression was used to estimate odds ratios (ORs) for associations of\ud occupations and HNC risk. Population attributable fraction (PAF)\ud for occupations was calculated using the formula PEC (OR 1)/OR.1\ud Results: Trend of increasing HNC risk was found with increasing duration\ud of employment for many occupations, including cooks (OR ¼ 1.36; 95%\ud confidence interval [CI] 1.09 to 1.68), cleaners (OR ¼ 1.38; 95% CI 1.13 to\ud 1.69), painters (OR ¼ 1.82; 95% CI 1.42 to 2.35). The PAF for a priori\ud occupations was 14.5% (95% CI 7.1% to 21.9%) for HNC. Conclusions: We\ud found associations between certain occupations and HNC risks, including for\ud subsites, with a duration– response relationship.

International audience

Introduction: Lung cancer is the leading cause of years of life lost because of cancer and is associated with the highest economic burden relative to other tumor types. Research remains at the cornerstone of achieving improved outcomes of lung cancer. We present the results of a comprehensive analysis of global lung cancer research between 2004 and 2013 (10 years). Methods: The study used bibliometrics to undertake a quantitative analysis of research output in the 24 leading countries in cancer research internationally on the basis of articles and reviews in the Web of Science (WoS) database. Results: A total of 32,161 lung cancer research articles from 2085 different journals were analyzed. Lung cancer research represented only 5.6% of overall cancer research in 2013, a 1.2% increase since 2004. The commitment to lung cancer research has fallen in most countries apart from China and shows no correlation with lung cancer burden. A review of key research types demonstrated that diagnostics, screening, and quality of life research represent 4.3%, 1.8%, and 0.3% of total lung cancer research, respectively. The leading research types were genetics (20%), systemic therapies (17%), and prognostic biomarkers (16%). Research output is increasingly basic science, with a decrease in clinical translational research output during this period. Conclusions: Our findings have established that relative to the huge health, social, and economic burden associated with lung cancer, the level of world research output lags significantly behind that of research on other malignancies. Commitment to diagnostics, screening, and quality of life research is much lower than to basic science and medical research. The study findings are expected to provide the requisite knowledge to guide future cancer research programs in lung cancer.

Background: To measure the uptake of first invitation to cervical screening by vaccine status in a population-based cohort offered HPV immunisation in a national catch-up campaign. Methods: A retrospective observational study of routinely collected data from the Scottish Cervical Screening Programme. Data were extracted and linked from the Scottish Cervical Call Recall System, the Scottish Population Register and the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation. Records from 201 023 women born between 1 January 1988 and 30 September 1993 were assessed. Women born in or after 1990 were eligible for the national catch-up programme of HPV immunisation. Attendance for screening was within 12 months of the first invitation at age 20 years. Results: There was a significant decline in overall attendance from the 1988 cohort to the 1993 cohort with the adjusted attendance ratio of the 1988 cohort being 1.49 times (95% CI 1.46–1.52) that of the 1993 cohort. Immunisation compensated for this decrease in uptake with unvaccinated individuals having a reduced ratio of attendance compared with those fully vaccinated (RR=0.65, 95% CI 0.64–0.65). Not taking up the opportunity for HPV immunisation was associated with an attendance for screening below the trend line for all women before the availability of HPV immunisation. Conclusions: HPV immunisation is not associated with the reduced attendance for screening that had been feared. Immunised women in the catch-up cohorts appear to be more motivated to attend than unimmunised women, but this may be a result of a greater awareness of health issues. These results, while reassuring, may not be reproduced in routinely immunised women. Continued monitoring of attendance for the first smear and subsequent routine smears is needed.

International audience; The current paper deals with the role played by Logarithmic Image Processing (LIP) operators for evaluating the homogeneity of a region. Two new criteria of heterogeneity are introduced, one based on the LIP addition and the other based on the LIP scalar multiplication. Such tools are able to manage Region Growing algorithms following the Revol's technique: starting from an initial seed, they consist of applying specific dilations to the growing region while its inhomogeneity level does not exceed a certain level. The new approaches we introduce are significantly improving Revol's existing technique by making it robust to contrast variations in images. Such a property strongly reduces the chaining effect arising in region growing processes.

A new set of mathematical morphology (MM) operators robust to illumination changes in images is defined thanks to the Logarithmic Image Processing (LIP) model which is based on physical laws of acquisition and which is consistent with human vision. The fundamental operators of logarithmic-MM, the logarithmic-dilation and the logarithmic-erosion, are defined with the LIP-addition of a structuring function. The combination of these two adjunct operators gives morphological filters, namely the logarithmic-opening and closing, useful for pattern recognition. The mathematical relation existing between " classical " dilation and erosion-with an additive structuring function-and their logarithmic-versions is established facilitating their implementation. Results on simulated and real images show that logarithmic-MM is more efficient on low-contrasted information than " classical " MM.

Comparisons are presented between a hybrid Vlasov-Maxwell (HVM ) simulation of turbulence in a collisionless plasma and fluid reductions. These includ e Hall- magnetohydrodynamics (HMHD) and Landau fluid (LF) or FLR-Land au fluid (FLR- LF) models that retain pressure anisotropy and low-frequency kin etic effects such as Landau damping and, for the last model, finite Larmor radius (FLR) c orrections. The problem is considered in two space dimensions, when initial conditio ns involve moderate-amplitude perturbations of a homogeneous equilibrium pla sma subject to an out-of-plane magnetic field. LF turns out to provide an accurat e description of the velocity field up to the ion Larmor radius scale, and even to smaller scales for the magnetic field. Compressibility nevertheless appears significant ly larger at the sub-ion scales in the fluid models than in the HVM simulation. High freque ncy ki- netic effects, such as cyclotron resonances, not retained by fluid descriptions, could be at the origin of this discrepancy. A significant temperature anisotr opy is generated, with a bias towards the perpendicular component, the more intense fluctuations being rather spread out and located in a broad vicinity of current sheets . Non-gyrotropic pressure tensor components are measured and their fluctuation s are shown to reach a significant fraction of the total pressure fluctuation, with inten se regions closely correlated with current sheets.

International audience; Asplünd’s metric, which is useful for pattern matching, consists in a double-sided probing, i.e. the over-graph and the sub-graph of a function are probed jointly. It has previously been defined for grey-scale images using the Logarithmic Image Processing (LIP) framework. LIP is a non-linear model to perform operations between images while being consistent with the human visual system. Our contribution consists in extending the Asplünd’s metric to colour and multivariate images using the LIP framework. Asplünd’s metric is insensitive to lighting variations and we propose a colour variant which is robust to noise.

Coste, Astrid Goujon, Stephanie Boniol, Mathieu Marquant, Fabienne Faure, Laure Dore, Jean-Francois Hemon, Denis Clavel, Jacqueline eng Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't Netherlands 2015/07/15 06:00 Cancer Causes Control. 2015 Sep;26(9):1339-49. doi: 10.1007/s10552-015-0629-x. Epub 2015 Jul 14.; International audience; PURPOSE: Few studies have investigated the relationship between solar ultraviolet radiation (UV) and childhood hematological malignancies (CHM). This study addresses the associations between residential UV exposure at diagnosis and the incidence of types and subtypes of CHM, by age and gender, in France, over a long period, on the fine scale of the 36,326 Communes that constitute mainland France. METHODS: The 9,082 cases of acute leukemia and 3,563 cases of lymphoma diagnosed before the age of 15 years from 1990 to 2009 were provided by the French National Registry of Childhood Hematological Malignancies. The incidence of CHM was calculated by Commune, year, age and gender and expressed as the standardized incidence ratio (SIR). UV data from 1988 to 2007 were extracted from the EUROSUN database. RESULTS: The annual daily average UV exposure of the children ranged from 85.5 to 137.8 J/cm(2). For each additional 25 J/cm(2), there was a significant increase in precursor B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (PBC-ALL) in children aged less than 5 years (SIR 1.18; 95% CI 1.10-1.27). Further analysis of PBC-ALL in the young children suggested a better fit of models with a threshold, with the risk increasing above 100 J/cm(2), for which the SIR was 1.24 (95% CI 1.14-1.36) for a 25 J/cm(2) increase. The results remained stable in analyses stratifying by deprivation index or degree of urbanization of the Communes. CONCLUSION: The study suggests that higher residential UV exposure may be positively associated with a higher incidence of PBC-ALL in early childhood.

International audience; Background and aim. Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the most common primary liver cancer diagnosed worldwide. Deregulation of Wnt/β-catenin pathway has been associated with the development of HCC in a substantial number of cases in Europe and far less in Asia. Nothing is known about this pathway in HCC cases from South America. This study aimed to investigate the frequency of mutations in β-catenin gene (CTNNB1) and the subcellular localization of β-catenin in HCC cases from Colombia. Material and methods. We determine by direct sequencing the frequency of mutations in exon 3 of CTNNB1 gene and by immu-nohistochemistry the subcellular localization of β-catenin in 54 samples of HCC obtained from three pathology units in Bogota and Medellin cities. Results. Only three HCC cases (5.6%) were found mutated at residues (G34E, S45P, P44S, T41I) important for phosphorylation and ubiquitination of β-catenin protein. Strikingly, nuclear or cytoplasmic accumulation of β-catenin, hallmark of Wnt pathway activation, was found in 42.6% HCC cases (23/54). Interestingly, β-catenin accumulation was significantly more frequent in young patients and hepatitis B virus-related HCC. Conclusions. Although, CTNNB1 exon 3 mutations are not frequent in HCC from Colombian patients, our findings indicate that Wnt/β-catenin signaling is activated in 42.6% of HCC samples. Furthermore, Wnt signaling was demonstrated in HCC cases associated of HBV infection, one of the most important HCC risk factors in Colombia.

Dickinson, N Rankin, J Pollard, M Maleta, K Robertson, C Hursthouse, A eng NE/E008313/1/Medical Research Council/United Kingdom Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't Netherlands 2014/09/15 06:00 Sci Total Environ. 2014 Dec 1;500-501:199-210. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2014.08.087. Epub 2014 Sep 15.; International audience; Micronutrient deficiency affects over 4.5 billion people worldwide, the majority in developing countries. Deficiencies of iron (and associated anaemia) and zinc in pregnancy are associated with complications, maternal and neonatal mortality, and developmental disorders in the foetus and growing child. We report the results of pilot study which used an interdisciplinary approach to explore environmental and sociocultural factors influencing the micronutrient status in the soil-plant-human transfer for pregnant subsistence farmers in two geographically contrasting regions of Southern Malawi. It evaluated micronutrient status in soil and the staple crop and explored the context for their transfer to pregnant women. Scientific and social science methods were used to collect data, following full sensitisation of the communities. A total of 99 participants were recruited from Chiradzulu (plateau) and Chikwawa (floodplain). Soil, maize and blood samples were collected, along with food frequency and health behaviour questionnaires and anthropological observation. Statistical analysis revealed that soil iron was significantly higher in Chiradzulu than in Chikwawa; total iron concentration is not deemed to be deficient in either area. Soil zinc was not significantly different between areas. Maize concentrations of iron and zinc were not significantly different between areas, and were not deficient relative to improved cultivars. Blood iron deficiency and associated anaemia were problematic in both areas, but more so in Chikwawa than in Chiradzulu, and zinc deficiency was similar in both areas. The study has identified a significant difference in the blood iron status of the participants of the two communities, and has shown that this difference is not accounted for by the staple crop maize. Socio-geographical factors appear to play a significant role in the micronutrient health of the populations. The findings lend support to multifaceted community intervention studies which educate communities on strategies to tackle micronutrient deficiencies.

In a previous nationwide ecological study based on 20 years of registration and 7,443 cases of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), we reported a positive association between residential solar ultraviolet (UV) light at diagnosis and childhood precursor B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (PBC-ALL). The present study investigated the influence of suspected individual risk factors for ALL on the association between UV and PBC-ALL, and evaluated this association at the residence at birth. Individual data collected by interviews in the ESCALE (2003–2004) and ESTELLE (2010–2011) nationwide case–control studies, which included 1,511 cases of leukemia aged less than 15 years and 3,102 population controls, were analyzed. Municipalities of residences at birth and at diagnosis/interview were extracted and assigned UV radiation exposure from the EUROSUN database. The potential confounders or effect modifiers considered were strongly suspected risk factors for ALL that were available in the ESCALE and ESTELLE studies. UV exposure at diagnosis was associated with PBC-ALL (OR = 1.27 [1.08–1.48]) for UV > 105.5 J/cm2 compared to UV ≤ 105.5 J/cm2. Considering exposure to UV at birth rather than at diagnosis/inclusion yielded almost identical results as both variables were strongly correlated. Taking into account the suspected ALL risk factors did not affect this association in the pooled study. Our findings suggest that our previous observation of an ecological association between residential UV radiation exposure at diagnosis and PBC-ALL was not confounded or modified by individual risk factors, and that the critical exposure time window may be prenatal.

K{\"o}hler's method is a useful multi-thresholding technique based on boundary contrast. However, the direct algorithm has a too high complexity-O(N 2) i.e. quadratic with the pixel numbers N-to process images at a sufficient speed for practical applications. In this paper, a new algorithm to speed up K{\"o}hler's method is introduced with a complexity in O(N M), M is the number of grey levels. The proposed algorithm is designed for parallelisation and vector processing , which are available in current processors, using OpenMP (Open Multi-Processing) and SIMD instructions (Single Instruction on Multiple Data). A fast implementation allows a gain factor of 405 in an image of 18 million pixels and a video processing in real time (gain factor of 96)., Comment: IEEE CopyrightProceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Image Processing ICIP 2017

We introduce a simple expression for the map of Asplund's distances with the multiplicative Logarithmic Image Processing (LIP) law. It is a difference between a morphological dilation and a morphological erosion with an additive structuring function which corresponds to a morphological gradient., Accepted to the 12th European Congress for Stereology and Image Analysis 2017, Kaiserslautern, Germany, September 11-14, 2017

Background In prospective studies, sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) have been associated with weight increase. However, most prospective studies examine changes in body weight over time according to amounts of SSB intake at baseline, generally without considering changes over time in SSB, energy intake and physical activity. The objective of the present study was to examine how SSB intakes influence changes in weight, according to the way SSB intakes are analysed. Methods For a prospective cohort study with two nutritional assessments in time, 46 Flemish municipalities were selected by clustered random sampling. Within these municipalities, a random sample of men and women between 18 and 75 years of age was selected and invited to participate. In total, 562 middle-aged Belgian adults were tested in 2002 and 2012 for the same anthropometric, lifestyle, nutrition and physical activity parameters. The main outcome measured were weight changes from 2002 to 2012 were analysed according to various ways to parametrise SSB intakes in 2002 and changes in SSB, energy intake, and physical activity from 2002 to 2012. Results In a multivariable model including age, sex, the best predictors of weight changes were the weight at baseline (P

In this paper, we consider a SEIR epidemiological model with information--related changes in contact patterns. One of the main features of the model is that it includes an information variable, a negative feedback on the behavior of susceptible subjects, and a function that describes the role played by the infectious size in the information dynamics. Here we focus in the case of delayed information. By using suitable assumptions, we analyze the global stability of the endemic equilibrium point and disease--free equilibrium point. Our approach is applicable to global stability of the endemic equilibrium of the previously defined SIR and SIS models with feedback on behavior of susceptible subjects.

In a comment on several articles on the vegan dietary pattern, Antoniazzi & Acosta-Navarro (2017) mentioned the paradox of the presence of dietary cholesterol as a nutritional component in the analysis of the vegan dietary pattern [1]. [...]

International audience; Many eye fundus images present strong variations of contrast which can be a limitation to the diagnosis of the retinopathy. Either some lesions are not taken into account or only a limited part of the domain of the image can be read. Graders have to manually adjust the contrast, which is tedious and not easily reproducible. We have developed an automatic system, which standardises the colour contrast across the whole domain of the image. The method is consistent with the physical principles or image formation and ensures that the colour aspect of lesions such as micro-aneurysms or anatomical structures such as veins are similar. It is more powerful than the existing grey level methods. We have tested our approach on several thousand images acquired in good or in harsher conditions. Some were bright while others were dark. Expert graders have checked the enhanced images. Diagnosis becomes more obvious and the grading more comfortable. Another limitation for the diagnosis is that images of the same patient acquired for different examinations cannot be directly superimposed. Indeed, the eye of the patient is never in the exact same position, the image is a projection of a 3D scene into the plane of the sensor, the optics of the camera creates a radial deformation and the colour of the image may have changed. We have developed an automatic method to superimpose eye fundus images acquired in the same position (nasal or macular). It is based on contrast standardisation, matching of salient points and a deformation model taking into account two radial distortions. We have performed tests for 69 patients with pairs of retinal examinations acquired in good conditions at an interval of one year with and without the same camera. A similar test has been performed on 5 patients with 20 pairs acquired in harsher conditions. A minimum of 96% of pairs were correctly superimposed. This is an important step towards the longitudinal analysis of large public health databases.

RESUMO: Objetivo: Analisar as taxas de mortalidade por neoplasia maligna no Brasil e nas Unidades da Federação (UF) nos anos de 1990 e 2015, segundo o sexo e principais tipos de câncer. Métodos: Com as estimativas de carga global de doença para o Brasil, foram calculadas taxas de mortalidade por câncer, ajustadas por idade e respectivos intervalos de incerteza de 95%, para o Brasil e UF, em 1990 e 2015, bem como a variação percentual dessas no período. Foram analisadas as principais causas de mortalidade por câncer segundo sexo, considerando as cinco taxas mais elevadas no país e para cada estado. Resultados: A taxa de mortalidade por câncer para homens e mulheres manteve-se estável entre os dois anos no país. O mesmo padrão de comportamento foi observado em praticamente todas as UF, sendo que a maioria dos estados da região Nordeste e metade da região Norte exibiram aumento não significativo das taxas de mortalidade. Em relação aos tipos, houve queda nas taxas de mortalidade para os cânceres de estômago em ambos os sexos (mulheres: -38,9%; homens: -37,3%), colo do útero em mulheres (-33,9%), e pulmão e esôfago em homens (-12,0% e -14,1%, respectivamente); em contrapartida, houve aumento para os cânceres de pulmão em mulheres (+20,7%) e de cólon e reto em homens (+29,5%). Conclusão: As diferenças de comportamento dos principais tipos de câncer, com queda principalmente nas regiões mais desenvolvidas e aumento nas regiões menos desenvolvidas do país, parecem refletir as desigualdades tanto socioeconômicas quanto de acesso aos serviços de saúde pela população brasileira. ABSTRACT: Objective: To analyze the mortality rates from malignant neoplasia in Brazil and Federal Units (FU) in the years 1990 and 2015, according to sex and main types of cancer. Methods: Using estimates of global disease burden for Brazil made by the GBD 2015 study, age-adjusted cancer mortality rates and respective 95% uncertainty intervals were calculated for Brazil and FU in 1990 and 2015, as well as their percentage variation in the period. The main causes of cancer mortality by sex were analyzed, considering the five highest rates in the country and for each state. Results: The cancer mortality rate for male and female population remained stable between the two years in the country. The same behavior pattern was observed in almost all the FU, and the majority of states in the northeast region and half of the north region showed a non-significant increase in mortality rates. Regarding the types of cancer, there was a drop in mortality rates for stomach cancers in both sexes (women: -38.9%, men: -37.3%), cervical cancer in women (-33.9%), and lung and esophagus cancer in men (-12.0% and -14.1%, respectively); in contrast, there was an increase in lung cancers in women (+20.7%) and colon and rectum cancers in men (+29.5%). Conclusion: Differences in the behavior of major cancers, with a decrease mainly in the more developed regions and an increase in the less developed regions of the country, seem to reflect the socioeconomic inequalities as well as difficulties in access to health services by the Brazilian population.

Accurate assessment of TP53 gene status in sporadic tumors and in the germline of individuals at high risk of cancer due to Li–Fraumeni Syndrome (LFS) has important clinical implications for diagnosis, surveillance, and therapy. Genomic data from more than 20,000 cancer genomes provide a wealth of information on cancer gene alterations and have confirmed TP53 as the most commonly mutated gene in human cancer. Analysis of a database of 70,000 TP53 variants reveals that the two newly discovered exons of the gene, exons 9β and 9γ, generated by alternative splicing, are the targets of inactivating mutation events in breast, liver, and head and neck tumors. Furthermore, germline rearrange-ments in intron 1 of TP53 are associated with LFS and are frequently observed in sporadic osteosarcoma. In this context of constantly growing genomic data, we discuss how screening strategies must be improved when assessing TP53 status in clinical samples. Finally, we discuss how TP53 alterations should be described by using accurate nomenclature to avoid confusion in scientific and clinical reports. Cancer Res; 77(6); 1250–60. ©2017 AACR.

We establish the link between Mathematical Morphology and the map of Asplund's distances between a probe and a grey scale function, using the Logarithmic Image Processing scalar multiplication. We demonstrate that the map is the logarithm of the ratio between a dilation and an erosion of the function by a structuring function: the probe. The dilations and erosions are mappings from the lattice of the images into the lattice of the positive functions. Using a flat structuring element, the expression of the map of Asplund's distances can be simplified with a dilation and an erosion of the image; these mappings stays in the lattice of the images. We illustrate our approach by an example of pattern matching with a non-flat structuring function., Comment: The final publication is available at link.springer.com

Caini, Saverio Boniol, Mathieu Tosti, Giulio Magi, Serena Medri, Matelda Stanganelli, Ignazio Palli, Domenico Assedi, Melania Marmol, Veronique Del Gandini, Sara eng Meta-Analysis Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't Review England 2014/08/05 06:00 Eur J Cancer. 2014 Oct;50(15):2649-58. doi: 10.1016/j.ejca.2014.06.024. Epub 2014 Jul 30.; International audience; Vitamin D is formed mainly in the skin upon exposure to sunlight and can as well be taken orally with food or through supplements. While sun exposure is a known risk factor for skin cancer development, vitamin D exerts anti-proliferative and pro-apoptotic effects on melanocytes and keratinocytes in vitro. To clarify the role of vitamin D in skin carcinogenesis, we performed a review of the literature and meta-analysis to evaluate the association of vitamin D serum levels and dietary intake with cutaneous melanoma (CM) and non-melanoma skin cancer (NMSC) risk and melanoma prognostic factors. Twenty papers were included for an overall 1420 CM and 2317 NMSC. The summary relative risks (SRRs) from random effects models for the association of highest versus lowest vitamin D serum levels was 1.46 (95% confidence interval (CI) 0.60-3.53) and 1.64 (95% CI 1.02-2.65) for CM and NMSC, respectively. The SRR for the highest versus lowest quintile of vitamin D intake was 0.86 (95% CI 0.63-1.13) for CM and 1.03 (95% CI 0.95-1.13) for NMSC. Data were suggestive of an inverse association between vitamin D blood levels and CM thickness at diagnosis. Further research is needed to investigate the effect of vitamin D on skin cancer risk in populations with different exposure to sunlight and dietary habits, and to evaluate whether vitamin D supplementation is effective in improving CM survival.

Lamb, Karen E Flasche, Stefan Diggle, Mathew Inverarity, Donald Greenhalgh, David Jefferies, Johanna M Smith, Andrew Edwards, Giles F S Denham, Barbara McMenamin, Jim McDonald, Eisin Mitchell, Tim J Clarke, Stuart C Robertson, Chris eng Netherlands 2013/06/29 06:00 Vaccine. 2014 Jul 23;32(34):4356-63. doi: 10.1016/j.vaccine.2013.05.079. Epub 2013 Jun 24.; International audience; INTRODUCTION: The 7-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (Prevenar((R)), Wyeth; PCV7) was introduced to the UK paediatric immunisation schedule in 2006. This study investigates trends in serotypes and multi locus sequence types (STs) among cases of invasive pneumococcal disease (IPD) in Scotland prior to, and following, the introduction of PCV7. METHODS: Scottish Invasive Pneumococcal Disease Enhanced Surveillance has records of all cases of IPD in Scotland since 1999. Cases diagnosed from blood or cerebrospinal fluid isolates until 2010 were analysed. Logistic and poisson regression modelling was used to assess trends prior to and following the introduction of PCV7. RESULTS: Prior to PCV7 use, on average 650 cases of IPD were reported each year; 12% occurred in those aged

1532-1827 Kavanagh, K Pollock, K G J Potts, A Love, J Cuschieri, K Cubie, H Robertson, C Donaghy, M Journal article Br J Cancer. 2014 Apr 15. doi: 10.1038/bjc.2014.198.; International audience; Background:In 2008, a national human papillomavirus (HPV) immunisation programme began in Scotland for 12-13 year old females with a three-year catch-up campaign for those under the age of 18. Since 2008, three-dose uptake of bivalent vaccine in the routine cohort aged 12-13 has exceeded 90% annually, while in the catch-up cohort overall uptake is 66%.Methods:To monitor the impact of HPV immunisation, a programme of national surveillance was established (pre and post introduction) which included yearly sampling and HPV genotyping of women attending for cervical screening at age 20. By linking individual vaccination, screening and HPV testing records, we aim to determine the impact of the immunisation programme on circulating type-specific HPV infection particularly for four outcomes: (i) the vaccine types HPV 16 or 18 (ii) types considered to be associated with cross-protection: HPV 31, 33 or 45; (iii) all other high-risk types and (iv) any HPV.Results:From a total of 4679 samples tested, we demonstrate that three doses (n=1100) of bivalent vaccine are associated with a significant reduction in prevalence of HPV 16 and 18 from 29.8% (95% confidence interval 28.3, 31.3%) to 13.6% (95% confidence interval 11.7, 15.8%). The data also suggest cross-protection against HPV 31, 33 and 45. HPV 51 and 56 emerged as the most prevalent (10.5% and 9.6%, respectively) non-vaccine high-risk types in those vaccinated, but at lower rates than HPV 16 (25.9%) in those unvaccinated.Conclusions:This data demonstrate the positive impact of bivalent vaccination on the prevalence of HPV 16, 18, 31, 33 and 45 in the target population and is encouraging for countries which have achieved high-vaccine uptake.British Journal of Cancer advance online publication, 15 April 2014; doi:10.1038/bjc.2014.198 www.bjcancer.com.

Amadou, Amina Torres Mejia, Gabriela Fagherazzi, Guy Ortega, Caro Angeles-Llerenas, Anjelica Chajes, Veronique Biessy, Carine Sighoko, Dominique Hainaut, Pierre Romieu, Isabelle eng Multicenter Study Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't Netherlands 2014/02/12 06:00 Am J Prev Med. 2014 Mar;46(3 Suppl 1):S52-64. doi: 10.1016/j.amepre.2013.10.024.; International audience; BACKGROUND: Obesity has been associated with breast cancer risk in the Caucasian population but the association remains unclear in the Hispanics. Previous studies conducted among Hispanics in the U.S. have shown inconsistent results. PURPOSE: The association between anthropometry, body shape evolution across lifetime, and the risk of breast cancer was assessed using a multi-center population-based case-control study conducted in Mexico. METHODS: One thousand incident cases and 1074 matched control women aged 35-69 years were recruited between 2004 and 2007, and analyzed in 2011-2012. Conditional logistic regression models were used. RESULTS: Height was related to an increased risk of breast cancer in both premenopausal (p trend=0.03) and postmenopausal women (p trend=0.002). In premenopausal women, increase in BMI; waist circumference (WC); hip circumference (HC); and waist-hip ratio (WHR) were inversely associated with breast cancer risk (p trends

Chaturvedi, Anil K Anderson, William F Lortet-Tieulent, Joannie Curado, Maria Paula Ferlay, Jacques Franceschi, Silvia Rosenberg, Philip S Bray, Freddie Gillison, Maura L eng Research Support, N.I.H., Intramural Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't 2013/11/20 06:00 J Clin Oncol. 2013 Dec 20;31(36):4550-9. doi: 10.1200/JCO.2013.50.3870. Epub 2013 Nov 18.; International audience; PURPOSE: Human papillomavirus (HPV) has been identified as the cause of the increasing oropharyngeal cancer (OPC) incidence in some countries. To investigate whether this represents a global phenomenon, we evaluated incidence trends for OPCs and oral cavity cancers (OCCs) in 23 countries across four continents. METHODS: We used data from the Cancer Incidence in Five Continents database Volumes VI to IX (years 1983 to 2002). Using age-period-cohort modeling, incidence trends for OPCs were compared with those of OCCs and lung cancers to delineate the potential role of HPV vis-a-vis smoking on incidence trends. Analyses were country specific and sex specific. RESULTS: OPC incidence significantly increased during 1983 to 2002 predominantly in economically developed countries. Among men, OPC incidence significantly increased in the United States, Australia, Canada, Japan, and Slovakia, despite nonsignificant or significantly decreasing incidence of OCCs. In contrast, among women, in all countries with increasing OPC incidence (Denmark, Estonia, France, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovakia, Switzerland, and United Kingdom), there was a concomitant increase in incidence of OCCs. Although increasing OPC incidence among men was accompanied by decreasing lung cancer incidence, increasing incidence among women was generally accompanied by increasing lung cancer incidence. The magnitude of increase in OPC incidence among men was significantly higher at younger ages (< 60 years) than older ages in the United States, Australia, Canada, Slovakia, Denmark, and United Kingdom. CONCLUSION: OPC incidence significantly increased during 1983 to 2002 predominantly in developed countries and at younger ages. These results underscore a potential role for HPV infection on increasing OPC incidence, particularly among men.

Kamper-Jorgensen, M Rostgaard, K Glaser, S L Zahm, S H Cozen, W Smedby, K E Sanjose, S Chang, E T Zheng, T La Vecchia, C Serraino, D Monnereau, A Kane, E V Miligi, L Vineis, P Spinelli, J J McLaughlin, J R Pahwa, P Dosman, J A Vornanen, M Foretova, L Maynadie, M Staines, A Becker, N Nieters, A Brennan, P Boffetta, P Cocco, P Hjalgrim, H eng 5 ROI CA69269/CA/NCI NIH HHS/ Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't England 2013/06/22 06:00 Ann Oncol. 2013 Sep;24(9):2245-55. doi: 10.1093/annonc/mdt218. Epub 2013 Jun 19.; International audience; BACKGROUND: The etiology of Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) remains incompletely characterized. Studies of the association between smoking and HL have yielded ambiguous results, possibly due to differences between HL subtypes. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Through the InterLymph Consortium, 12 case-control studies regarding cigarette smoking and HL were identified. Pooled analyses on the association between smoking and HL stratified by tumor histology and Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) status were conducted using random effects models adjusted for confounders. Analyses included 3335 HL cases and 14 278 controls. RESULTS: Overall, 54.5% of cases and 57.4% of controls were ever cigarette smokers. Compared with never smokers, ever smokers had an odds ratio (OR) of HL of 1.10 [95% confidence interval (CI) 1.01-1.21]. This increased risk reflected associations with mixed cellularity cHL (OR = 1.60, 95% CI 1.29-1.99) and EBV-positive cHL (OR = 1.81, 95% CI 1.27-2.56) among current smokers, whereas risk of nodular sclerosis (OR = 1.09, 95% CI 0.90-1.32) and EBV-negative HL (OR = 1.02, 95% CI 0.72-1.44) was not increased. CONCLUSION: These results support the notion of etiologic heterogeneity between HL subtypes, highlighting the need for HL stratification in future studies. Even if not relevant to all subtypes, our study emphasizes that cigarette smoking should be added to the few modifiable HL risk factors identified.

Dancer, S J Kirkpatrick, P Corcoran, D S Christison, F Farmer, D Robertson, C eng Netherlands 2013/01/02 06:00 Int J Antimicrob Agents. 2013 Feb;41(2):137-42. doi: 10.1016/j.ijantimicag.2012.10.013. Epub 2012 Dec 28.; International audience; A restrictive antibiotic policy banning routine use of ceftriaxone and ciprofloxacin was implemented in a 450-bed district general hospital following an educational campaign. Monthly consumption of nine antibiotics was monitored in defined daily doses (DDDs) per 1000 patient-occupied bed-days (1000 pt-bds) 9 months before until 16 months after policy introduction. Hospital-acquired Clostridium difficile, meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and extended-spectrum beta-lactamase (ESBL)-producing coliform cases per month/1000 pt-bds were identified and reviewed throughout the hospital. Between the first and final 6 months of the study, average monthly consumption of ceftriaxone reduced by 95% (from 46.213 to 2.129 DDDs/1000 pt-bds) and that for ciprofloxacin by 72.5% (109.804 to 30.205 DDDs/1000 pt-bds). Over the same periods, hospital-acquisition rates for C. difficile reduced by 77% (2.398 to 0.549 cases/1000 pt-bds), for MRSA by 25% (1.187 to 0.894 cases/1000 pt-bds) and for ESBL-producing coliforms by 17% (1.480 to 1.224 cases/1000 pt-bds). Time-lag modelling confirmed significant associations between ceftriaxone and C. difficile cases at 1 month (correlation 0.83; P

The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-52277-7_5; International audience; Asplünd 's metric, which is useful for pattern matching, consists in a double-sided probing, i.e. the over-graph and the sub-graph of a function are probed jointly. This paper extends the Asplünd 's metric we previously defined for colour and multivariate images using a marginal approach (i.e. component by component) to the first spatio-colour Asplünd 's metric based on the vectorial colour LIP model (LIPC). LIPC is a non-linear model with operations between colour images which are consistent with the human visual system. The defined colour metric is insensitive to lighting variations and a variant which is robust to noise is used for colour pattern matching.

Micronutrient dilution following sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) consumption can lead to a qualitative impoverishment of a dietary pattern. The aim of this prospective study was to investigate the relation between SSB consumption and micronutrients. A total 562 adults were tested in 2002 and 2012 for the same anthropometric, lifestyle and nutritional intake activity parameters. Calcium, iron and magnesium intake decreased with increasing baseline SSB intake, and with increasing SSB consumption during the 10 years. A 100 ml increase in SSB consumption was associated with a 22 mg lower intake of calcium, 0.4 mg of iron and 9 mg of magnesium. There was no relation between vitamins and SSB consumption. In conclusion, there was limited evidence in our study, which suggests SSB have minimal dilutional effect on dietary micronutrient consumption. A major limitation of the present study is that of the original 1569 participants in 2002, 36% returned for participation in 2012. ispartof: European Journal of Clinical Nutrition vol:72 issue:1 pages:170-173 ispartof: location:England status: published

BACKGROUND: The nature of the association between occupational social prestige, social mobility, and risk of lung cancer remains uncertain. Using data from the international pooled SYNERGY case–control study, we studied the association between lung cancer and the level of time-weighted average occupational social prestige as well as its lifetime trajectory. METHODS: We included 11,433 male cases and 14,147 male control subjects. Each job was translated into an occupational social prestige score by applying Treiman’s Standard International Occupational Prestige Scale (SIOPS). SIOPS scores were categorized as low, medium, and high prestige (reference). We calculated odds ratios (OR) with 95 % confidence intervals (CI), adjusting for study center, age, smoking, ever employment in a job with known lung carcinogen exposure, and education. Trajectories in SIOPS categories from first to last and first to longest job were defined as consistent, downward, or upward. We conducted several subgroup and sensitivity analyses to assess the robustness of our results. RESULTS: We observed increased lung cancer risk estimates for men with medium (OR = 1.23; 95 % CI 1.13–1.33) and low occupational prestige (OR = 1.44; 95 % CI 1.32–1.57). Although adjustment for smoking and education reduced the associations between occupational prestige and lung cancer, they did not explain the association entirely. Traditional occupational exposures reduced the associations only slightly. We observed small associations with downward prestige trajectories, with ORs of 1.13, 95 % CI 0.88–1.46 for high to low, and 1.24; 95 % CI 1.08–1.41 for medium to low trajectories. CONCLUSIONS: Our results indicate that occupational prestige is independently associated with lung cancer among men. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12885-016-2432-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

In this paper, a method is presented for superimposition (i.e. registration) of eye fundus images from persons with diabetes screened over many years for diabetic retinopathy. The method is fully automatic and robust to camera changes and colour variations across the images both in space and time. All the stages of the process are designed for longitudinal analysis of cohort public health databases where retinal examinations are made at approximately yearly intervals. The method relies on a model correcting two radial distortions and an affine transformation between pairs of images which is robustly fitted on salient points. Each stage involves linear estimators followed by non-linear optimisation. The model of image warping is also invertible for fast computation. The method has been validated (1) on a simulated montage and (2) on public health databases with 69 patients with high quality images (271 pairs acquired mostly with different types of camera and 268 pairs acquired mostly with the same type of camera) with success rates of 92% and 98%, and five patients (20 pairs) with low quality images with a success rate of 100%. Compared to two state-of-the-art methods, ours gives better results., This is an author-created, un-copyedited version of an article published in Biomedical Physics \& Engineering Express. IOP Publishing Ltd is not responsible for any errors or omissions in this version of the manuscript or any version derived from it. The Version of Record is available online at https://doi.org/10.1088/2057-1976/aa7d16

Introduction Tumor protein p53 gene ( TP53 ) mutations are common in stage I through III non–small cell lung cancer, but clinical trials have shown inconsistent results regarding their relationship to the effects of adjuvant therapy. The objective is to clarify their putative prognostic and predictive effects. Methods A pooled analysis of TP53 mutations (exons 5–8) was conducted in four randomized trials (the International Adjuvant Lung Cancer Trial, J BRonchus 10, Cancer and Leukemia Group B-9633, and Adjuvant Navelbine International Trialist Association trial) of platinum-based adjuvant chemotherapy (ACT) versus observation (OBS). Hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) of mutant versus wild-type (WT) TP53 for overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) were estimated using a multivariable Cox model stratified on trial and adjusted on sex, age, and clinicopathological variables. Predictive value was evaluated with an interaction between treatment and TP53 . Results A total of 1209 patients (median follow-up 5.5 years) were included. There were 573 deaths (47%) and 653 DFS events (54%). Mutations (434 [36%]) had no prognostic effect (OBS HR OS = 0.99, 95% CI: 0.77–1.28, p = 0.95; HR DFS = 0.99, 95% CI: 0.78–1.25, p = 0.92) but were marginally predictive of benefit from ACT for OS (test for interaction: OS, p = 0.06; DFS, p = 0.11). Patients with WT TP53 had a tendency toward better outcomes with ACT than did those in the OBS group (HR OS = 0.77, 95% CI: 0.62–0.95, p = 0.02; HR DFS = 0.75, 95% CI: 0.62–0.92, p = 0.005). In the ACT arm, a deleterious effect of mutant versus WT TP53 was observed (HR OS = 1.40, 95% CI: 1.10–1.78, p = 0.006; HR DFS = 1.31, 95% CI: 1.04–1.64, p = 0.02). Conclusions TP53 mutation had no prognostic effect but was marginally predictive for survival from ACT. In patients who received ACT, TP53 mutation tended to be associated with shorter survival than wild-type TP53 .

Refers To Noriaki Ohuchi, Akihiko Suzuki, Tomotaka Sobue, Masaaki Kawai, Seiichiro Yamamoto, Ying-Fang Zheng, Yoko Narikawa Shiono, Hiroshi Saito, Shinichi Kuriyama, Eriko Tohno, Tokiko Endo, Akira Fukao, Ichiro Tsuji, Takuhiro Yamaguchi, Yasuo Ohashi, Mamoru Fukuda, Takanori Ishida, J-START investigator groups Sensitivity and specificity of mammography and adjunctive ultrasonography to screen for breast cancer in the Japan Strategic Anti-cancer Randomized Trial (J-START): a randomised controlled trial The Lancet, Volume 387, Issue 10016, 23–29 January 2016, Pages 341-348 PDF (234 K) Supplementary content Referred to by Noriaki Ohuchi, Akihiko Suzuki, Seiichiro Yamamoto, Shinichi Kuriyama, Takanori Ishida Adjunctive ultrasonography for breast cancer screening – Authors' reply The Lancet, Volume 387, Issue 10036, 11–17 June 2016, Pages 2381-2382 PDF (93 K) The primary goal of cancer screening is to decrease cancer mortality through detecting cancer at an earlier curable stage. Thus effective screening implies a decrease in the rate of advanced cancers. The randomised trial of Noriaki Ohuchi and colleagues suggests that the systematic addition of an ultrasonography examination to mammography and clinical breast examination increases the sensitivity of breast screening. Two screening rounds were done, but reported results concerned the first round only. The search for interval cancers was restricted to the period extending between the first and the second round and their stage distribution was not reported. Because of the absence of data about screen-detected cancers found at further rounds and interval cancers diagnosed during longer follow-up, the results of this single-round trial cannot be interpreted correctly. For example, how many of the extra 65 stage 0–1 cancers (36% of all stage 0 and 1 cancers) found with additional ultrasonography would represent overdiagnosis (ie, the detection of cancer that would not become clinical in the absence of screening)? If a sizeable portion of these 65 extra cancers represented overdiagnosis, then the gain in sensitivity is overestimated because earlier detection is of no relevance for overdiagnosed cancers. Another question is raised by the similar number of advanced (stage 2–4) cancers found in both groups. Do these similar numbers mean that the addition of ultrasonography does not improve the capacity of screening to detect cancers at an earlier stage? In our view, this Article adds confusion to investigations into the value of ultrasonography for breast screening. We declare no competing interests.

Influenza vaccines are currently the best method available to prevent seasonal influenza infection. In most European countries one dose (or two doses for children) of seasonal vaccine is given from September to December to the elderly and other target groups for vaccination. In Europe, influenza seasons can last until mid-May (1), and it is expected that vaccination conveys protection on the individual for the duration of the season. In 13/15 reviewed studies on the length of vaccine-induced protection among the elderly, using anti-haemagglutination antibody titres as a proxy for seroprotection levels, seroprotection rates lasted at least >4 months after vaccination (2). However in the 2011-12 influenza season various studies in Europe reported a decrease in influenza vaccine effectiveness (VE) against A(H3N2) over time within the season (3–5). In the United States, a decrease in VE against A(H3N2) with time since vaccination was suggested in the 2007-8 influenza season (6). The observed decrease of VE over time can be explained by viral change (notably antigenic drift) occurring in the season. Drift in B viruses may be slower than in A viruses (7), and A(H3N2) viruses undergo antigenic drift more frequently than A(H1N1)pdm09 viruses (8). The decrease of VE over time can also be explained by a waning of the immunity conferred by the vaccine independently from viral changes. If vaccine-induced protection wanes more rapidly during the season, then depending on the start and duration of the influenza season, the decline of VE may cause increases in overall incidence, hospitalisations and deaths. Changes to vaccination strategies (timing and boosters) may be needed. As anti-haemagglutination antibody titres are not well defined as a correlate of protection (9,10), vaccine efficacy (as measured in trials) or vaccine effectiveness observational studies may be one way to measure vaccine-induced protection. These studies require a large sample size to model VE by time since vaccination and currently, most of the seasonal observational studies lack the precision required to provide evidence for waning immunity. In this study we pooled data across five post-pandemic seasons (2010/11-2014/15) from the I-MOVE (Influenza - Monitoring Vaccine Effectiveness) multicentre case control studies (1,3,11,12), to obtain a greater sample size to study the effects of time since vaccination on influenza type/subtype-specific VE. We measure influenza type/subtype-specific VE by time since vaccination for the overall season, but also in the early influenza phase; under the hypothesis that virological changes are fewer in the early season, but waning of the vaccine effect should be present regardless of time within the influenza phase.

Background: Increased cancer risk has been reported among workers in the rubber manufacturing industry employed before the 1960s. It is unclear whether risk remains increased among workers hired subsequently. The present study focused on risk of cancer mortality for rubber workers first employed since 1975 in 64 factories. Patients and methods: Anonymized data from cohorts of rubber workers employed for at least 1 year from Germany, Italy, Poland, Sweden, and the UK were pooled. Standardized mortality ratios (SMRs), based on country-specific death rates, were reported for bladder and lung cancer (primary outcomes of interest), for other selected cancer sites, and for cancer sites with a minimum of 10 deaths in men or women. Analyses stratified by type of industry, period, and duration of employment were carried out. Results: A total of 38 457 individuals (29 768 men; 8689 women) contributed to 949 370 person-years. No increased risk of bladder cancer was observed [SMR = 0.80, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.46; 1.38]. The risk of lung cancer death was reduced (SMR = 0.81, 95% CI 0.70; 0.94). No statistically significant increased risk was observed for any other cause of death. A reduced risk was evident for total cancer mortality (SMR = 0.81, 95% CI 0.76; 0.87). Risks were lower for workers in the tyre industry compared with workers in the general rubber goods sector. Analysis by employment duration showed a negative trend with SMRs decreasing with increasing duration of employment. In an analysis of secondary end points, when stratified by type of industry and period of first employment, excess risks of myeloma and gastric cancer were observed each due, essentially, to results from one centre. Conclusion: No consistent increased risk of cancer death was observed among rubber workers first employed since 1975, no overall analysis of the pooled cohort produced significantly increased risk. Continued surveillance of the present cohorts is required to confirm the absence of long-term risk. © The Author 2016.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to assess the associations of biomechanical properties of the cornea with metabolic and environmental factors in an elderly population. METHODS: The ALIENOR (Antioxydants, Lipides Essentiels, Nutrition, and Maladies OculaiRes) study is a population-based study. In 2009-2010, 624 subjects, aged 74 years or more, underwent an eye examination, including intraocular pressure (IOP), central corneal thickness (CCT), and biomechanical properties of the cornea measurements using the Ocular Response Analyzer. Socio-demographic, lifestyle, and medical history data were collected using standardized questionnaires. Mean lifetime ambient ultraviolet (UV) exposure was estimated using residential history and statistics of UV radiation at each location using the Eurosun UV database. RESULTS: Mean age was 82.2 ± 4.3 years. Mean corneal hysteresis (CH), corneal resistance factor (CRF), and CCT were 9.4 ± 1.9, 9.8 ± 1.9 mm Hg, and 551.6 ± 36.8 μm, respectively. In the multivariate analysis, CH and CRF values were significantly lower in subjects older than 80 years (-0.56; 95% confidence interval [CI]: -0.89;-0.24); P < 0.001 and -0.48; 95% CI: -0.75;-0.20; P < 0.001, respectively), in subjects having higher ambient UV exposure (-0.50; 95% CI: -0.88;-0.12; P < 0.01; and -0.46; 95% CI: -0.78;-0.13); P < 0.05, respectively), and in subjects with high plasma LDL cholesterol (CH: -0.46; 95% CI: -0.86;-0.03; P < 0.05; and CRF: -0.37; 95% CI: -0.72;-0.008; P < 0.05). Central corneal thickness was significantly higher in former smokers than in never smokers (+11.01; 95% CI: 0.48;21.55; P < 0.05) and was not significantly associated with age, ambient UV exposure, diabetes, or LDL cholesterol. CONCLUSIONS: Biomechanical properties of the cornea are modified by metabolic and lifetime environmental factors, especially UV exposure. The manner these factors may influence onset and progression of ocular diseases or IOP measurements need further investigation.