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The Global Polio Eradication Initiative, launched in 1988 with anticipated completion by 2000, has yet to reach its ultimate goal. The recent surge of polio cases urgently calls for a reassessment of the programme's current strategy and a new design for the way forward. We propose that the sustainable protection of the world population against paralytic polio cannot be achieved simply by stopping the circulation of poliovirus but must also include maintaining high rates of population immunity indefinitely, which can be created and maintained by implementing global immunisation programmes with improved poliovirus vaccines that create comprehensive immunity without spawning new virulent viruses. The proposed new strategic goal of eradicating the disease rather than the virus would lead to a sustainable eradication of poliomyelitis while simultaneously promoting immunisation against other vaccine-preventable diseases.

This study sought to determine if there were significant trends in lower extremity movement quality, as assessed by the Landing Error Scoring System (LESS) scores and plane-specific LESS subscales, across in 12 recent cohorts of incoming USMA cadets.prospective cohort study.United States Military Academy.7,591.Landing Error Scoring System (LESS) scores, adjusted for sex and ACL injury history.Statistically significant inverse trends were found between total LESS score and year (p 0.01) and sagittal plane subscale and year (p 0.01). A statistically significant direct trend was found for the frontal/transverse plane subscale and year (p 0.01). However, each of these trends had a small associated effect size, and none were considered clinically meaningful.There were no meaningful changes in lower extremity movement quality in incoming US Military Academy cadets between 2005 and 2017.

A fast and reliable method for the direct determination of the herbicide glyphosate, its major degradation product aminomethylphosphonic acid (AMPA) and glufosinate is presented for a variety of food matrices. The Quick Polar Pesticides in food of Plant Origin method (QuPPe-PO-Method) was used for extraction without further preconcentration or clean-up steps involving e.g. solid phase extraction (SPE). The method makes use of a commercially available high performance liquid chromatograph coupled to a tandem mass spectrometer with electrospray ionization (LC-ESI-MS/MS) - as present in many laboratories - equipped with an ion chromatography (IC)-column using an MS-compatible eluent made of 0.8% formic acid in water. Due to the absence of time-consuming clean-up procedures, strong matrix effects (ME) of up to 91% for AMPA in grapefruit can be observed, when comparing its sensitivity to that obtained for solvent-based standards. The limits of detection (LODs) were determined for the sample matrices apple, mushrooms, grapefruit, linseed, red lentils and wheat and they were found to be in the range of 0.09 to 0.8, 0.04 to 1 and 0.2 to 2 µg/kg for glyphosate, AMPA and glufosinate, respectively. For the same matrices the validation was carried out according to SANTE guidelines for different commodity groups by spiking them up prior to extraction to concentrations ranging from 10 to 400 µg/kg for matrices with high water content and from 10 to 800 µg/kg for matrices with low water content. When using solvent-based calibration under the use of isotopically labelled internal standards (ILIS) the recoveries were found to range from 84% to 120% and the relative standard deviations (RSD) range between 1% and 19% for glyphosate, AMPA and glufosinate at all fortification levels for all matrices investigated. Accordingly, the method was successfully introduced in our laboratory with limits of quantification (LOQs) of 10 µg/kg for glyphosate, AMPA and glufosinate in samples from SANTE commodity groups 1, 2, 4a and 5. The reliability and robustness of the method are demonstrated by showing a recovery control chart obtained for glyphosate in randomly selected samples from different commodity groups. Therefore, the samples were spiked up with 10 µg/kg of glyphosate during routine analysis, whereby all recoveries were found to be in the range between 70 and 120%.

International audience; Background: Rasagiline, a monoamine oxidase B inhibitor with neuroprotective potential in Parkinson's disease, has shown a disease-modifying effect in the SOD1-Gly93Ala low-expressing mouse model of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, both alone and in combination with riluzole. We sought to test whether or not rasagiline 1 mg/day can prolong survival in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis also receiving riluzole.Methods: Patients with possible, probable, or definite amyotrophic lateral sclerosis were enrolled to our randomised, placebo-controlled, parallel-group, double-blind, phase 2 trial from 15 German network for motor neuron diseases (MND-NET) centres (university hospitals or clinics). Eligible patients were aged at least 18 years, had onset of progressive weakness within the 36 months before the study, had disease duration of more than 6 months and less than 3 years, and had a best-sitting slow vital capacity of at least 50%. After a 4-week screening period, eligible patients were randomly assigned (1:1) to receive either rasagiline (1 mg/day) or placebo in addition to riluzole (100 mg/day), after stratification for site of onset (bulbar or spinal) and study centre. Patients and all personnel assessing outcome parameters were masked to treatment allocation. Patients were followed up 2, 6, 12, and 18 months after randomisation. The primary endpoint was survival time, defined as the time to death or time to study cutoff date (ie, the last patient's last visit plus 14 days). Analyses of primary outcome and safety measures were done in all patients who received at least one dose of trial treatment (intention-to-treat population). The trial is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, number NCT01879241.Findings: Between July 2, 2013, and Nov 11, 2014, 273 patients were screened for eligibility, and 252 patients were randomly assigned to receive rasagiline (n=127) or placebo (n=125). 126 patients taking rasagiline and 125 taking placebo were included in the intention-to-treat analysis. For the primary outcome, the survival probability at the end of the study was 0·43 (95% CI 0·25-0·59) in the rasagiline group (n=126) and 0·53 (0·43-0·62) in the placebo group (n=125). The estimated effect size (hazard ratio) was 0·91 (one-sided 97·5% CI -infinity to 1·34; p=0·31). Rasagiline was well tolerated, and most adverse events were due to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis disease progression rather than treatment; the most frequent of these were dysphagia (32 [25%] taking rasagiline vs 24 [19%] taking placebo) and respiratory failure (25 [20%] vs 31 [25%]). Frequency of adverse events were comparable between both groups.Interpretation: Rasagiline was safe in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. There was no difference between groups in the primary outcome of survival, although post-hoc analysis suggested that rasagiline might modify disease progression in patients with an initial slope of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Functional Rating Scale Revised greater than 0·5 points per month at baseline. This should be confirmed in another clinical trial.Funding: Teva Pharmaceutical Industries.

Addition of fats to the diets of ruminants has long been known to result in a reduction in enteric methane emissions. Tannins have also been used to reduce methane emissions but with mixed success. However, the effect of feeding fat in combination with tannin is unknown. Eight ruminally cannulated Holstein-Friesian cows were fed four diets in a double Latin-square, full crossover sequence. The treatments were 800 ml/day of water (CON), 800 g/day of cottonseed oil, 400 g/day of tannin, and 800 g/day of cottonseed oil and 400 g/day of tannin in combination (fat- and tannin-supplemented diet). Methane emissions were measured using open-circuit respiration chambers. Intake of basal diets was not different between treatments. Cows fed cottonseed oil had greater milk yield (34.9 kg/day) than those fed CON (32.3 kg/day), but the reduced concentration of milk fat meant there was no difference in energy-corrected milk between treatments. Methane yield was reduced when either cottonseed oil (14%) or tannin (11%) was added directly to the rumen, and their effect was additive when given in combination (20% reduction). The mechanism of the anti-methanogenic effect remains unclear but both fat and tannin appear to cause a reduction in fermentation in general rather than cause a change in the type of fermentation.

Meat and milk from ruminants provide an important source of protein and other nutrients for human consumption. Although ruminants have a unique advantage of being able to consume forages and graze lands not suitable for arable cropping, 2% to 12% of the gross energy consumed is converted to enteric CH4 during ruminal digestion, which contributes approximately 6% of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. Thus, ruminant producers need to find cost-effective ways to reduce emissions while meeting consumer demand for food. This paper provides a critical review of the substantial amount of ruminant CH4-related research published in past decades, highlighting hydrogen flow in the rumen, the microbiome associated with methanogenesis, current and future prospects for CH4 mitigation and insights into future challenges for science, governments, farmers and associated industries. Methane emission intensity, measured as emissions per unit of meat and milk, has continuously declined over the past decades due to improvements in production efficiency and animal performance, and this trend is expected to continue. However, continued decline in emission intensity will likely be insufficient to offset the rising emissions from increasing demand for animal protein. Thus, decreases in both emission intensity (g CH4/animal product) and absolute emissions (g CH4/day) are needed if the ruminant industries continue to grow. Providing producers with cost-effective options for decreasing CH4 emissions is therefore imperative, yet few cost-effective approaches are currently available. Future abatement may be achieved through animal genetics, vaccine development, early life programming, diet formulation, use of alternative hydrogen sinks, chemical inhibitors and fermentation modifiers. Individually, these strategies are expected to have moderate effects (

Define the $n$-th fibotomic polynomial to be the product of the monic irredicible factors of the $n$-th Fibonacci polynomial which are not factors of any Fibonacci polynomial of smaller degree. In this paper, we prove a number of properties of the fibotomic polynomials. This includes determining the discriminant of the fibotomic polynomials and the resultant of pairs of fibotomic polynomials. Furthermore, we completely determine the factorization form of the fibotomic polynomials in prime fields. Results are also generalized for the bivariate homogenous fibotomic polynomials.

A comprehensive overview is provided evaluating direct real-world CO2 emissions of both diesel and petrol cars newly registered in Europe between 1995 and 2015. Before 2011, European diesel cars emitted less CO2 per kilometre than petrol cars, but since then there is no appreciable difference in per-km CO2 emissions between diesel and petrol cars. Real-world CO2 emissions of diesel cars have not declined appreciably since 2001, while the CO2 emissions of petrol cars have been stagnant since 2012. When adding black carbon related CO2-equivalents, such as from diesel cars without particulate filters, diesel cars were discovered to have had much higher climate relevant emissions until the year 2001 when compared to petrol cars. From 2001 to 2015 CO2-equivalent emissions from new diesel cars and petrol cars were hardly distinguishable. Lifetime use phase CO2-equivalent emissions of all European passenger vehicles were modelled for 1995–2015 based on three scenarios: the historic case, another scenario freezing percentages of diesel cars at the low levels from the early 1990s (thus avoiding the observed “boom” in new diesel registrations), and an advanced mitigation scenario based on high proportions of petrol hybrid cars and cars burning gaseous fuels. The difference in CO2-equivalent emissions between the historical case and the scenario avoiding the diesel car boom is only 0.4%. The advanced mitigation scenario would have been able to achieve a 3.4% reduction in total CO2-equivalent emissions over the same time frame. The European diesel car boom appears to have been ineffective at reducing climate-warming emissions from the European transport sector.

Agricultural industries are faced with the challenge to reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG) such as nitrous oxide (N2O), carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4). Approximately 27% of the GHG emissions generated by agriculture and 80% of the GHG emissions generated by livestock are in the form of CH4 from enteric fermentation and manure management. Two feed additives that have been shown to decrease enteric CH4 emissions are 3-nitrooxypropanol (3-NOP) and nitrate. However, data are lacking on the net impact of these CH4 mitigating additives on whole farm GHG emissions across different production systems. The objectives of this partial life cycle assessment (LCA) were: 1) to analyse the effect of 3-NOP and nitrate on whole farm GHG emissions of Australian and Canadian beef and dairy farms, and 2) to analyse the effect of different strategies of 3-NOP and nitrate feeding on whole farm GHG emissions. Two Australian dairy farms (ADF), one Australian beef farm (ABF), one Canadian dairy farm (CDF) and one Canadian beef farm (CBF) were modelled over the productive lifespans of dairy and beef herds. Australian farm GHG emissions were estimated based on the Australian National Greenhouse Gas Inventory method using the Greenhouse Accounting Framework calculators for beef and dairy. For the Canadian farms, total GHG emissions were estimated using Holos 3.0.3, a whole-farm software model. For all farms, the system boundary of the partial LCA was defined as the farm gate, including emissions associated with on-farm activities and emissions associated with production and transport of major production inputs. Both additives decreased whole farm GHG emissions; however, 3-NOP had a greater effect than nitrate. Feeding 3-NOP but not nitrate could be economical for both beef and dairy farms, depending on the cost of 3-NOP. It is concluded that 3-NOP can make an important contribution to reducing whole farm GHG emissions; however, a carbon offset method would have to be in place to incentivize its use in the livestock industries.

Recently, multiple compounds have been synthesized that target the allosteric binding site(s) of CB(1). These CB(1) positive allosteric modulators, may capture the benefits of cannabinoid receptor activation without unwanted psychoactive effects, such as sedation. For example, ZCZ011 blocks neuropathic pain, absent the catalepsy, sedation, and hypothermia caused by CB(1) orthosteric modulators, including Δ(9)-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). The primary goal of the present study was to evaluate the potential of ZCZ011 to attenuate somatic signs of cannabinoid withdrawal in mice. Mice were repeatedly administered THC (10 mg/kg, s.c.) or vehicle, and withdrawal was either precipitated using the CB(1) antagonist rimonabant (3 mg/kg, ip) or elicited spontaneously via THC abstinence. ZCZ011 (≥10 mg/kg, i.p.) significantly attenuated somatic signs of withdrawal, including head twitches and paw tremors, but had no effect on locomotor activity or conditioned place preference. We next tested the antiulcerogenic properties of CB(1) positive allosteric modulation. Mice were fasted for 22 h, administered ZCZ011, and gastric hemorrhages were induced with the nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug diclofenac sodium (100 mg/kg, p.o.). ZCZ011 alone had no effect on gastric ulceration, but ZCZ011 (≥10 mg/kg) blocked ulcer formation when combined with a subthreshold MAGL inhibitor (JZL184; 1 mg/kg, i.p.). Thus, CB(1) positive allosteric modulation is a novel approach to treat cannabinoid dependence and gastric inflammation.

In transposing Directive 2013/59/Euratom (European Basic Safety Standards or EU BSS) into national law, it was necessary to identify industrial sectors which involve naturally occurring radioactive materials (NORM) which may lead to public exposure that cannot be disregarded from a radiation protection point of view. A research project was implemented that resulted in a comprehensive survey of all potentially relevant industrial sectors operating in Germany. Major efforts were made to determine source terms of airborne discharges, atmospheric dispersion models, and dose calculations.The study arrived at the conclusion that the discharge and the settlement of dust in agricultural and horticultural areas is the most relevant dispersion and exposure pathway, while discharges of radon are of minor importance.The original study used a number of rather complex models that may distract from the fact that very few key parameters and assumptions determine the effective dose of members of the public. This paper revisits the study and identifies those parameters and assumptions and provides a simplified, generic, yet sufficiently reliable and robust assessment methodology to determine the radiological relevance of dust discharges from NORM industries under the typical geographical and meteorological conditions of Germany.This paper provides examples of dose estimates for members of the public for selected industries operating in Germany. Due to its simplicity and robustness, the methodology can also be used to assess effective doses resulting from discharges in other industries in Germany, and it can be adapted to conditions in other countries in a straightforward way. Keywords: NORM, Dust discharge, Public exposure, High temperature processes, Atmospheric dispersion model

Increasing soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks is an often-mentioned option to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. However, increasing carbon stocks in agricultural soils is difficult and the ability of soils to store carbon as the climate changes is uncertain. This is due to many interacting factors, including those that vary spatially, contributing to organic matter inputs and decomposition rates. We used two models, the Sustainable Grazing Systems whole-farm system model (SGS) and the RothC soil carbon model, to investigate the potential impacts of climate change on SOC stocks in pastures in a temperate, winter-dominant rainfall region of south eastern Australia. A wide range of possible future climates were simulated from 2017 to 2090 at two sites, each with two soil types. Results demonstrate that projected rainfall, the factor with the most variability between climate scenarios, was the primary source of uncertainty in SOC response. Dry climate projections resulted in lower SOC content than other scenarios. The two models were similar in their projected trends, but the RothC model generally gave larger percent changes in soil carbon over the simulation period and a larger range of responses due to changes in site characteristics, particularly clay content. Sustainable stocking rates were determined by the whole-farm system model based on climate, pasture production, and maintaining minimum dry matter coverage. Wet future climates lead to increased production that supported increases in stocking and increases in SOC stocks. While soil carbon accumulated at slower rates or remained steady under dry projections, lower production meant this was accompanied by decreased average 2070–2090 stocking rates, which approached zero by 2090 on the low-rainfall site. This highlights an important interaction between SOC and grazing management. The results demonstrate the extent of the uncertainty associated with soil carbon trading for farmers and the need for adaptation options that allow farms to remain sustainable and productive as the climate changes.

Many nitrogen (N) fertilizer recommendations for grazing livestock enterprises are based on cutting experiments, excluding the influence of recycled N in excreta. Grazing experiments are expensive to conduct, and so compromise on variables such as number of N fertilizer rates, replication and number of years of investigation. Biophysical modelling provides an efficient and effective approach to address many of the complexities of field studies. Our study, using the biophysical whole-farm systems model DairyMod, examined the effect of a range of N fertilizer rates on pasture production for five dairy sites through south-eastern Australia over 18 years under both cutting and grazing regimes. The study aims were to highlight the variation in pasture N responses between cutting and grazing experiments and compare results to current best management practice (BMP) guidelines for N fertilizer management. Annual and seasonal maximum and optimum pasture production, defined as 90% of maximum production, N fertilizer rate to achieve optimum pasture production and the slope of the response rate curve between two fertilizer application rates were estimated. For all five sites, at the lower N rates, there was a divergence in annual pasture production between the grazing and cutting management regimes. However, once N was no longer limiting pasture production for the cutting regime, annual pasture production under cutting and grazing converged. For most sites and seasons, current BMPs of applying between 20 and 50 kg N ha−1 post grazing will ensure efficient use of N applied, assuming soil moisture is not first limiting growth. However, this study has refined these recommendations across all sites and seasons. For some seasons and sites, there was high variability in pasture N response rate between years that need to be taken into consideration. At Elliott in Tasmania, an irrigated site, there was merit in increasing N fertilizer rates above the current recommendation above 50 kg N ha−1 post grazing during spring and summer. In contrast, at the rainfed sites of Ellinbank and Terang in Victoria, the recommendation would be to not apply N fertilizer during autumn and only in selected wetter summers.

Evidence from farm level studies indicates that there is potential to improve nitrogen (N) use efficiency of the predominately pasture-based dairy farms in Australia. This is possible via several ways which includes modifying the timing and rates of N fertiliser applied to pasture. Traditionally fertiliser strategies have been based on a “recipe” approach where N fertiliser, primarily urea, is applied a set rate following grazing. The aim of this study was to compare the pasture dry matter response, N loss and response rate of fertiliser strategies which used increasing knowledge of plant and soil conditions in different ways. The study was conducted under grazing conditions using the biophysical model, DairyMod and repeated at several locations and farming systems in the dairy regions of Australia. In comparison to set rates this study showed that strategic approaches to N fertiliser have the potential to be more efficient in N use and lower both N inputs and N losses with little impact of pasture production. This was evident across all seasons and locations studied. Strategies that used the plant N status to trigger fertiliser timing and rates were more efficient and had lower environmental N losses than those that used fixed rates or soil N information. Fertilising per plant N requirements was the most efficient – and therefore should be the priority for development – particularly in view of the greater expense of fertilisers that are slow release. Precision fertiliser management strategies have the value in terms of reducing fertiliser use and loss during autumn and to a lesser extent in summer, with the least value in winter. However, for the strategies to be properly evaluated for pasture based dairy farms with grazing, a whole farm analysis needs to be conducted that incorporates other sources of feed. This is a necessary inclusion in any subsequent studies.

Introduction Over 5% of infants worldwide receive breathing support immediately after birth. Our goal was to define references ranges for exhaled carbon dioxide (ECO2), exhaled tidal volume (VTe), and respiratory rate (RR) immediately after birth in spontaneously breathing, healthy infants born at 36 weeks’ gestational age or older. Methods This was a single-centre, observational study at the Royal Women’s Hospital in Melbourne, Australia, a busy perinatal referral centre. Immediately after the infant’s head was delivered, we used a face mask to measure ECO2, VTe, and RR through the first ten minutes after birth. Respiratory measurements were repeated at one hour. Results We analysed 14,731 breaths in 101 spontaneously breathing infants, 51 born via planned caesarean section and 50 born vaginally with a median (IQR) gestational age of 391/7 weeks (383/7–395/7). It took a median of 7 (4–10) breaths until ECO2 was detected. ECO2 quickly increased to peak value of 48 mmHg (43–53) at 143 s (76–258) after birth, and decreased to post-transitional values, 31 mmHg (28–24), by 7 min. VTe increased after birth, reaching a plateau of 5.3 ml/kg (2.5–8.4) by 130 s for the remainder of the study period. Maximum VTe was 19 ml/kg (16–22) at 257 s (82–360). RR values increased slightly over time, being higher from minute five to ten as compared to the first two minutes after birth. Conclusions This study provides reference ranges of exhaled carbon dioxide, exhaled tidal volumes, and respiratory rate for the first ten minutes after birth in term infants who transition without resuscitation.

Underestimating the impacts of climate change on agricultural production could lead to complacency about the potential adaptation challenges. This study used a Representative Climate Futures (RCF) approach to model projected wheat yields under climate change in Australia. It simulated the range of impacts, resulting from a subset of individual Global Climate Models (GCMs), on wheat production in the major wheat regions of Australia. The study used RCFs that represented ‘most-likely’ ‘best’ and ‘worst’ cases across multiple Representative Concentration pathways (RCPs). Median wheat yields modelled for the South West Australia projected declines between 26% and 38%, under a ‘most-likely’ case for RCP 4.5 by 2090, and between 41% and 49%, under a ‘most-likely’ case for RCP 8.5. Median wheat yields declined under RCP 8.5 for the ‘most-likely’ case across the majority of wheat producing regions, with a range of 1% to 49%. Greater declines were projected under the ‘worst’ cases of hottest and driest climates. However, the ‘best’ cases of least warm and wetter climates projected an increase in median wheat yield, a range of 2% to 87%. Variability also changed from the baseline under all projected RCFs and across all regions, with a standard deviation of up to 2.46 t/ha under the ‘most likely’ case at a site in south-eastern Australia. These likely shifts in the size and reliability of yields, combined with concurrent climate change impacts on other factors, mean that agriculture faces significant adaptation challenges, particularly under some of the ‘most-likely’ scenarios and all of the ‘worst’ case scenarios. Further work is required to explore how scenarios in one region relate to those in other regions and thus the overall outcome at the continental scale.

A new mass spectrometric method for evaluating metabolite formation of the pesticides thiacloprid, azoxystrobin, and difenoconazole was developed for the Brassica species pak choi and broccoli. Both, distribution and transformation kinetics of the active compounds and their metabolites were analyzed by UPLC-TWIMS-QTOF-MS. Additionally, HR-MS analysis and structure elucidation tools such as diagnostic ions, isotopic matches, and collision cross sections were applied for metabolites identification. Following the application of two plant protection products (containing the above-mentioned active compounds) in a greenhouse study plant material was cryo-milled and extracted with water/methanol. The residual levels of active compounds were identified at certain timepoints during pre-harvest intervals and in the final products. Different phase I and phase II metabolites of the pesticides were identified in different plant organs such as leaves, stems, (broccoli) heads, and roots. Three individual degradation pathways and distribution profiles are suggested including eight thiacloprid, eleven azoxystrobin and three difenoconazole metabolites.

Vitamin D (vitD) is involved in immune regulation, and its receptor has been identified in several tissues including lung, adipose tissue, brain, and skin. Based on these observations, it has been suggested that vitD has an essential role not only in bone metabolism but also in other diseases such as atopic dermatitis (AD), bronchial asthma (BA), attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and obesity because the affected tissues express vitD receptors. Furthermore, obesity, AD, and BA are regarded as inflammatory diseases. Therefore, we hypothesized that vitD concentrations are lower in children with AD, BA, ADHD, and obesity compared to healthy children. We measured 25-hydroxyvitamin D concentrations in 235 children (60% boys, age 9.3±1.7years) with obesity, BA, AD, or ADHD and compared them to those of 3352 children from a healthy population. Additionally, parathyroid hormone was measured in the children with obesity, ADHD, BA, and AD. VitD concentrations were not lower in children with obesity, ADHD, BA, and AD compared to healthy children. In multiple regression analyses adjusted to migration background, time period of blood sample, age, and sex, VitD levels correlated significantly with the severity of AD measured by SCORing Atopic Dermatitis index and attention deficit measured by Conners questionnaire in ADHD. VitD levels were not linked to hyperactivity in ADHD, the severity of BA measured as forced expiration volume in the first second, or body mass index standard deviation score. Parathyroid hormone was not associated with the activity of any analyzed disease. In conclusion, most of our findings do not support the hypothesis that vitD is involved in the pathogenesis of these entities.

A new sensitive, fast, and robust analytical method based on a QuPPe (Quick Polar Pesticides) extraction procedure coupled to ion chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (IC-MS/MS) was developed. The study aimed at the determination of the highly polar pesticides chlorate, perchlorate, ethephon, and 2-hydroxyethylphosphonic acid (HEPA) in different plant food commodities. For achieving an acceptable dynamic range for chlorate and perchlorate and to compensate for matrix effects, the isotopically-labelled internal standards 18O3-chlorate and 18O4-perchlorate and ethephon D4 were applied for calibration. The optimized method was fully validated at levels of 0.010 and 0.100 mg kg−1 for all compounds in the matrices tomato, apple, lemon, sultana, avocado, and wheat according to the actual EU guidance document SANTE/11945/2015. For HEPA and the commodity sultana levels for validation were chosen at 0.050 mg kg−1 and 0.100 mg kg−1. The precision and accuracy of the validation results were determined at hand of five replicates with recovery rates between 93 and 119% and RSDs between 1 and 14%. The use of internal standards for chlorate, perchlorate and ethephon allows the determination in a wide working range between 0.01 and 1 mg kg−1 without interference by matrix effects. The developed analytical methodology is able to meet the strict requirements for the analysis of baby food.