90 results on '"Detlef Groth"'
Search Results
2. Improving ramification detection of St. Nicolas House Analysis
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Seve Chen, Cédric Moris, and Detlef Groth
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St. Nicolas Analysis ,snha ,network reconstruction ,R-squared gaining ,linear model check ,graph estimation ,Medicine ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
The St. Nicolas House Analysis (SNHA) is a new graph estimation method for detection of extensive interactions among variables. It operates by ranking absolute bivariate correlation coefficients in descending order thereby creating hierarchic association chains. The latter characterizes dependence structures of interacting variables which can be visualized in a corresponding network graph as a chain of end-to-end connected edges representing direct relationships between the connected nodes. The important advantage of this relatively new approach is that it produces less false positive edges resulting from indirect or transitive associations than expected with standard correlation or linear model-based approaches. Here we aim to improve the detection of ramifications in graphs by addition of different data processing layers to SNHA. They include the combinations of the extensions R-squared gaining(RSG) and linear model check(LMC). SNHA together with these so-called extensions were benchmarked against default SNHA and other reference methods available for the programming language R. In the end combinations of RSG, LMC and Bootstrapping improve SNHA performance across different network types, albeit at the cost of longer computation time.
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- 2024
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3. Networks in Auxology – proceedings of the 31st Aschauer Soiree, held at Aschau, Germany, June 17th 2023
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Michael Hermanussen, Christiane Scheffler, Melanie Dammhahn, Detlef Groth, Cédric Moris, Tim Hake, Barry Bogin, Piotr Fedurek, Jesper Boldsen, Takashi Satake, Stef van Buuren, Jani Söderhäll, Chris Jefferies, Yehuda Limony, Jovanna Dahlgren, Julia Quitmann, Ingo Scheffler, Nino Nazirishvili, Ekaterine Kvaratskhelia, Annamaria Zsakai, Martin Musalek, Basak Koca Özer, Cansev Meşe Yavuz, Janina Tutkuviene, Laura Kasperiunaite, Simona Gervickaite, Sylvia Kirchengast, Slawomir Koziel, Aleksandra Gomula, Zbyszek Czapla, Antonia Rösler, Leslie Lieberman, Stephen Lieberman, and Martin Brüne
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Social hierarchies ,strategic growth adjustment ,Monte Carlo analysis ,life history strategy ,adherence and quality of life ,Medicine ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
Twenty-seven scientists met for the annual Auxological conference held at Aschau, Germany, to particularly discuss the interaction between social factors and human growth, and to highlight several topics of general interest to the regulation of human growth. Humans are social mammals. Humans show and share personal interests and needs, and are able to strategically adjust size according to social position, with love and hope being prime factors in the regulation of growth. In contrast to Western societies, where body size has been shown to be an important predictor of socioeconomic status, egalitarian societies without formalized hierarchy and material wealth-dependent social status do not appear to similarly integrate body size and social network. Social network structures can be modeled by Monte Carlo simulation. Modeling dominance hierarchies suggests that winner-loser effects play a pivotal role in robust self-organization that transcends the specifics of the individual. Further improvements of the St. Nicolas House analysis using re-sampling/bootstrap techniques yielded encouraging results for exploring dense networks of interacting variables. Customized pediatric growth references, and approaches towards a Digital Rare Disease Growth Chart Library were presented. First attempts with a mobile phone application were presented to investigate the associations between maternal pre-pregnancy overweight, gestational weight gain, and the child’s future motor development. Clinical contributions included growth patterns of individuals with Silver-Russell syndrome, and treatment burden in children with growth hormone deficiency. Contributions on sports highlighted the fallacy inherent in disregarding the biological maturation status when interpreting physical performance outcomes. The meeting explored the complex influence of nutrition and lifestyle on menarcheal age of Lithuanian girls and emphasized regional trends in height of Austrian recruits. Examples of the psychosocial stress caused by the forced migration of modern Kyrgyz children and Polish children after World War II were presented, as well as the effects of nutritional stress during and after World War I. The session concluded with a discussion of recent trends in gun violence affecting children and adolescents in the United States, and aspects of life history theory using the example of "Borderline Personality Disorder." The features of this disorder are consistent with the notion that it reflects a "fast" life history strategy, with higher levels of allostatic load, higher levels of aggression, and greater exposure to both childhood adversity and chronic stress. The results were discussed in light of evolutionary guided research. In all contributions presented here, written informed consent was obtained from all participants in accordance with institutional Human investigation committee guidelines in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki amended October 2013, after information about the procedures used.
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- 2023
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4. Attitude towards purchasing consumer items can be extracted from Demographic and health survey India-2019-2020 (NFHS 5)
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Singha Roy Soumyajit, Mithun Sikdar, Nitish Mondal, Christiane Scheffler, Detlef Groth, and Michael Hermanussen
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consumer items ,national health surveys ,associated chains ,gross domestic production ,antropometry ,Medicine ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
Background: National Health Surveys have been part of national health services in many countries, but their data are summary com- pilations and commonly used only for describing trends in health and living conditions. Aim: Tostatisticallydisclosenetworksofinteractingvariableswithin National Health Survey data. Sample and methods: We used anthropometric, educational, environ- mental and economic information of people of Sikkim, West Bengal, Telangana, and Gujarat, India, obtained by the Fifth Indian National Family Health Survey (NFHS-5). We applied a new statistical approach labeled as “St. Nicholas House Analysis” (SNHA). SNHA ranks absolute bivariate correlation coef- ficients in descending order according to magnitude. The method creates hierarchic “association chains” of correlation coefficients de- fined by sequences where reversing the start and end point does not alter the ordering of elements. Association chains characterize de- pendence structures within networks of extensively interacting variables. Results: SNHA disclosed fundamental differences in the network of anthropometric, educational, environmental and economic variables of the people of Sikkim, and the people of West Ben- gal, Telangana and Gujarat. Whereas relevant interactions among these variables were largely absent in the people of Sikkim, the variables formed characteristic star-shaped networks with wealth quintile and the possession of motorcycles in a strong central position, in the people of West Bengal, Telangana and Gujarat. Conclusion: Depicting association chains within net- works of extensively interacting variables such as health survey data appears to be a promising statisti- cal tool for disentangling the effects of environmen- tal circumstances, education, and social, economic, political and emotional (SEPE) factors on human growth.
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- 2023
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5. Significant, but not biologically relevant: Nosema ceranae infections and winter losses of honey bee colonies
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Vivian Schüler, Yuk-Chien Liu, Sebastian Gisder, Lennart Horchler, Detlef Groth, and Elke Genersch
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Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
The analysis of a dataset collected over 15 years reveals no biological relevance of Nosema ceranae infections for colony losses; hence, N. ceranae is not considered a serious threat for honey bees in the background of Varroa destructor infestations.
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- 2023
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6. Environment, social behavior, and growth
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Michael Hermanussen, Christiane Scheffler, Aman Pulungan, Arup Ratan Bandyopadhyay, Jyoti Ratan Ghosh, Ayşegül Özdemir, Başak Koca Özer, Martin Musalek, Lidia Lebedeva, Elena Godina, Barry Bogin, Janina Tutkuviene, Milda Budrytė, Simona Gervickaite, Yehuda Limony, Sylvia Kirchengast, Peter Buston, Detlef Groth, Antonia Rösler, Nikolaos Gasparatos, Sergei Erofeev, Masiar Novine, Bárbara Navazo, Silvia Dahinten, Aleksandra Gomuła, Natalia Nowak-Szczepańska, and Sławomir Kozieł
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St. Nicolas House Analysis ,child growth ,body proportions ,social network ,public health ,migration ,Medicine ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
Twenty-four scientists met for the annual Auxological conference held at Krobielowice castle, Poland, to discuss the diverse influences of the environment and of social behavior on growth following last year’s focus on growth and public health concerns (Hermanussen et al., 2022b). Growth and final body size exhibit marked plastic responses to ecological conditions. Among the shortest are the pygmoid people of Rampasasa, Flores, Indonesia, who still live under most secluded insular conditions. Genetics and nutrition are usually considered responsible for the poor growth in many parts of this world, but evidence is accumulating on the prominent impact of social embedding on child growth. Secular trends not only in the growth of height, but also in body proportions, accompany the secular changes in the social, economic and political conditions, with major influences on the emotional and educational circumstances under which the children grow up (Bogin, 2021). Aspects of developmental tempo and aspects of sports were discussed, and the impact of migration by the example of women from Bangladesh who grew up in the UK. Child growth was considered in particular from the point of view of strategic adjustments of individual size within the network of its social group. Theoretical considerations on network characteristics were presented and related to the evolutionary conservation of growth regulating hypothalamic neuropeptides that have been shown to link behavior and physical growth in the vertebrate species. New statistical approaches were presented for the evaluation of short term growth measurements that permit monitoring child growth at intervals of a few days and weeks.
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- 2023
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7. Human growth data analysis and statistics – the 5th Gülpe International Student Summer School
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Detlef Groth, Christiane Scheffler, and Michael Hermanussen
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Summer Schools ,Statistical Exercise ,Repetition ,Medicine ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
The Summer School in Gülpe (Ecological Station of the University of Potsdam) offers an exceptional learning opportunity for students to apply their knowledge and skills to real-world problems. With the guidance of experienced human biologists, statisticians, and programmers, students have the unique chance to analyze their own data and gain valuable insights. This interdisciplinary setting not only bridges different research areas but also leads to highly valuable outputs. The progress of students within just a few days is truly remarkable, especially when they are motivated and receive immediate feedback on their questions, problems, and results. The Summer School covers a wide range of topics, with this year’s focus mainly on two areas: understanding the impact of socioeconomic and physiological factors on human development and mastering statistical techniques for analyzing data such as changepoint analysis and the St. Nicolas House Analysis (SNHA) to visualize interacting variables. The latter technique, born out of the Summer School’s emphasis on gaining comprehensive data insights and understanding major relationships, has proven to be a valuable tool for researchers in the field. The articles in this special issue demonstrate that the Summer School in Gülpe stands as a testament to the power of practical learning and collaboration. Students who attend not only gain hands-on experience but also benefit from the expertise of professionals and the opportunity to engage with peers from diverse disciplines.
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- 2023
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8. In Python available: St. Nicolas House Algorithm (SNHA) with bootstrap support for improved performance in dense networks
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Tim Hake, Bernhard Bodenberger, and Detlef Groth
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Python ,correlation ,network reconstruction ,bootstrap ,St. Nicolas house algorithm ,Medicine ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
The St. Nicolas House algorithm (SNHA) finds association chains of direct dependent variables in a data set. The dependency is based on the correlation coefficient, which is visualized as an undirected graph. The network prediction is improved by a bootstrap routine. It enables the computation of the empirical p-value, which is used to evaluate the significance of the predicted edges. Synthetic data generated with the Monte Carlo method were used to firstly compare the Python package with the original R package, and secondly to evaluate the predicted network using the sensitivity, specificity, balanced classification rate and the Matthew's correlation coefficient (MCC). The Python implementation yields the same results as the R package. Hence, the algorithm was correctly ported into Python. The SNHA scores high specificity values for all tested graphs. For graphs with high edge densities, the other evaluation metrics decrease due to lower sensitivity, which could be partially improved by using bootstrap,while for graphs with low edge densities the algorithm achieves high evaluation scores. The empirical p-values indicated that the predicted edges indeed are significant.
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- 2023
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9. Growth and Public Health Concerns
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Michael Hermanussen, Christiane Scheffler, Liza Wilke, Sonja Böker, Detlef Groth, Sylvia Kirchengast, Dominik Hagmann, Lidia Lebedeva, Elena Godina, Aleksandra Gomula, Jan M Konarski, Ayşegül Özdemir Başaran, Başak Koca Özer, Janina Tutkuviene, Simona Gervickaite, Dziugile Kersnauskaite, and Slawomir Koziel
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dominance ,prestige ,nutrition ,spatial difference ,developmental tempo ,Medicine ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
Seventeen scientists met for this year’s conference on Auxology held at Krobielowice castle, Poland, to discuss growth and public health concerns. The regulation of growth is complex and besides metabolic and endocrine components including hypothalamic releasing factors, growth hormone and multiple downstream effectors, comprises the full spectrum of the psychosocial, economic and emotional environment including signaling dominance, competence, prestige, or subordination and indulgence, all of this being sensitive to urban or rural lifestyle, the political climate and with marked plasticity throughout history. New statistical techniques (St. Nicolas House Analysis) are presented for analyzing anthropometric variables for public health concerns. The impact of spatial differences on developmental tempo, growth in height, and the prevalence of childhood obesity are discussed as well as the impact of social mobility on obesity, and the benefits of the biopsychosocial status when getting along with socio-economic disasters and the COVID-19 pandemic.
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- 2022
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10. The arithmetic dilemma when defining thinness, overweight and obesity in stunted populations
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Michael Hermanussen, Masiar Novine, Christiane Scheffler, and Detlef Groth
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BMI ,stunting ,prevalence ,thinness ,obesity ,misclassification ,Medicine ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
Background: Critical cut-off values of BMI-for-age z-scores (BAZ) are used to define “thinness”, “overweight” and “obesity”, but the validity of these cut-off values needs to be questioned in populations that are shorter or taller than the reference. We hypothesized that the prevalence of thinness, overweight, and obesity depends on population height and performed a random simulation. Methods: We created virtual child populations aged 2-10 years with normally distributed height expressed as height-for-age z-scores (HAZ) and weight expressed as weight-for-age z-score (WAZ), based on WHO growth standards and references, with a correlation r=0.7 between height and weight. We adjusted weight-for-height and calculated BAZ. Results: BAZ depends on height and age. In short children (mean HAZ=-2 to HAZ=-3), the prevalence of thinness falls to less than 1% in the youngest and rises up to 10% (mean HAZ=-2) and up to 13% (mean HAZ=-3) at age 10 years. The prevalence of obesity rises to up to 7% in the shortest and youngest and falls close to zero at age 10. Short young children and tall older children are more prone to be misclassified as overweight. Conclusions: The prevalence of thinness, overweight and obesity depends on height and age. The coexistence of being short and being overweight – currently referred to as “double burden of malnutrition” – needs consideration as to what extent this condition is a health issue or reflects calculation artefacts. The arithmetic dilemma particularly affects young children in short populations. We suggest abstaining from defining “thinness”, “overweight”, or “obesity” by BMI z-scores. Different states of under- and malnutrition should rather be classified by direct or indirect measures of body fat.
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- 2022
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11. Network reconstruction based on synthetic data generated by a Monte Carlo approach
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Masiar Novine, Cecilie Cordua Mattsson, and Detlef Groth
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Monte Carlo method ,network reconstruction ,mcgraph ,random sampling ,linear enamel hypoplasia ,Medicine ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
Background: Network models are useful tools for researchers to simplify and understand investigated systems. Yet, the assessment of methods for network construction is often uncertain. Random resampling simulations can aid to assess methods, provided synthetic data exists for reliable network construction. Objectives: We implemented a new Monte Carlo algorithm to create simulated data for network reconstruction, tested the influence of adjusted parameters and used simulations to select a method for network model estimation based on real-world data. We hypothesized, that reconstructs based on Monte Carlo data are scored at least as good compared to a benchmark. Methods: Simulated data was generated in R using the Monte Carlo algorithm of the mcgraph package. Benchmark data was created by the huge package. Networks were reconstructed using six estimator functions and scored by four classification metrics. For compatibility tests of mean score differences, Welch’s t-test was used. Network model estimation based on real-world data was done by stepwise selection. Samples: Simulated data was generated based on 640 input graphs of various types and sizes. The real-world dataset consisted of 67 medieval skeletons of females and males from the region of Refshale (Lolland) and Nordby (Jutland) in Denmark. Results: Results after t-tests and determining confidence intervals (CI95%) show, that evaluation scores for network reconstructs based on the mcgraph package were at least as good compared to the benchmark huge. The results even indicate slightly better scores on average for the mcgraph package. Conclusion: The results confirmed our objective and suggested that Monte Carlo data can keep up with the benchmark in the applied test framework. The algorithm offers the feature to use (weighted) un- and directed graphs and might be useful for assessing methods for network construction.
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- 2022
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12. PRI: Re-Analysis of a Public Mass Cytometry Dataset Reveals Patterns of Effective Tumor Treatments
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Yen Hoang, Stefanie Gryzik, Ines Hoppe, Alexander Rybak, Martin Schädlich, Isabelle Kadner, Dirk Walther, Julio Vera, Andreas Radbruch, Detlef Groth, Sabine Baumgart, and Ria Baumgrass
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multi-parametric analysis ,re-analysis ,combinatorial protein expression ,high-dimensional cytometry data ,mass cytometry data ,pattern perception ,Immunologic diseases. Allergy ,RC581-607 - Abstract
Recently, mass cytometry has enabled quantification of up to 50 parameters for millions of cells per sample. It remains a challenge to analyze such high-dimensional data to exploit the richness of the inherent information, even though many valuable new analysis tools have already been developed. We propose a novel algorithm “pattern recognition of immune cells (PRI)” to tackle these high-dimensional protein combinations in the data. PRI is a tool for the analysis and visualization of cytometry data based on a three or more-parametric binning approach, feature engineering of bin properties of multivariate cell data, and a pseudo-multiparametric visualization. Using a publicly available mass cytometry dataset, we proved that reproducible feature engineering and intuitive understanding of the generated bin plots are helpful hallmarks for re-analysis with PRI. In the CD4+T cell population analyzed, PRI revealed two bin-plot patterns (CD90/CD44/CD86 and CD90/CD44/CD27) and 20 bin plot features for threshold-independent classification of mice concerning ineffective and effective tumor treatment. In addition, PRI mapped cell subsets regarding co-expression of the proliferation marker Ki67 with two major transcription factors and further delineated a specific Th1 cell subset. All these results demonstrate the added insights that can be obtained using the non-cluster-based tool PRI for re-analyses of high-dimensional cytometric data.
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- 2022
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13. Growth during times of fear and emotional stress
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Christiane Scheffler, Alan D. Rogol, Mirela Iancu, Tomasz Hanc, Annang Giri Moelyo, Andrej Suchomlinov, Lidia Lebedeva, Yehuda Limony, Martin Musalek, Gudrun Veldre, Elena Z. Godina, Sylvia Kirchengast, Rebekka Mumm, Detlef Groth, Janina Tutkuviene, Sonja Böker, Basak Koca Ozer, Barbara Navazo, Laure Spake, Slawomir Koziel, and Michael Hermanussen
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stunting ,birth weight ,fear ,emotional stress ,economy ,SEPE ,Medicine ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
Twenty-one scientists met for this year’s virtual conference on Auxology held at the University Potsdam, Germany, to discuss child and adolescent growth during times of fear and emotional stress. Growth within the broad range of normal for age and sex is considered a sign of good general health whereas fear and emotional stress can lead to growth faltering. Stunting is a sign of social disadvantage and poor parental education. Adverse childhood experiences affect child development, particularly in families with low parental education and low socioeconomic status. Negative effects were also shown in Indian children exposed prenatally and in early postnatal life to the cyclone Aila in 2009. Distrust, fears and fake news regarding the current Corona pandemic received particular attention though the effects generally appeared weak. Mean birth weight was higher; rates of low, very and extremely low birth weight were lower. Other topics discussed by the participants, were the influences of economic crises on birth weight, the measurement of self-confidence and its impact on growth, the associations between obesity, peer relationship, and behavior among Turkish adolescents, height trends in Indonesia, physiological neonatal weight loss, methods for assessing biological maturation in sportsmen, and a new method for skeletal age determination. The participants also discussed the association between acute myocardial infarction and somatotype in Estonia, rural-urban growth differences in Mongolian children, socio-environmental conditions and sexual dimorphism, biological mortality bias, and new statistical techniques for describing inhomogeneity in the association of bivariate variables, and for detecting and visualizing extensive interactions among variables.
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- 2021
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14. Growth, Nutrition and Economy
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Michael Hermanussen, Christiane Scheffler, Lidia Martin, Detlef Groth, James G. Waxmonsky, James Swanson, Natalia Nowak-Szczepanska, Aleksandra Gomula, Anna Apanasewicz, Jan M. Konarski, Robert M. Malina, Sylwia Bartkowiak, Lidia Lebedeva, Andrej Suchomlinov, Vsevolod Konstantinov, Werner Blum, Yehuda Limony, Raja Chakraborty, Sylvia Kirchengast, Janina Tutkuviene, Egle Marija Jakimaviciene, Ramune Cepuliene, Daniel Franken, Bárbara Navazo, Annang G. Moelyo, Takashi Satake, and Slawomir Koziel
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nutrition ,stunting ,socioeconomy ,education ,secular changes ,pubertal timing ,Medicine ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
Twenty-three scientists met at Krobielowice, Poland to discuss the role of growth, nutrition and economy on body size. Contrasting prevailing concepts, re-analyses of studies in Indonesian and Guatemalan school children with high prevalence of stunting failed to provide evidence for an association between nutritional status and body height. Direct effects of parental education on growth that were not transmitted via nutrition were shown in Indian datasets using network analysis and novel statistical methods (St. Nicolas House Analysis) that translate correlation matrices into network graphs. Data on Polish children suggest significant impact of socioeconomic sensitivity on child growth, with no effect of maternal money satisfaction. Height and maturation tempo affect the position of a child among its peers. Correlations also exist between mood disorders and height. Secular changes in height and weight varied across decades independent of population size. Historic and recent Russian data showed that height of persons whose fathers performed manual work were on average four cm shorter than persons whose fathers were high-degree specialists. Body height, menarcheal age, and body proportions are sensitive to socioeconomic variables. Additional topics included delayed motherhood and its associations with newborn size; geographic and socioeconomic indicators related to low birth weight, prematurity and stillbirth rate; data on anthropometric history of Brazil, 1850-1950; the impact of central nervous system stimulants on the growth of children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder; and pituitary development and growth hormone secretion. Final discussions debated on reverse causality interfering between social position, and adolescent growth and developmental tempo.
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- 2021
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15. Identification of a super-functional Tfh-like subpopulation in murine lupus by pattern perception
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Stefanie Gryzik, Yen Hoang, Timo Lischke, Elodie Mohr, Melanie Venzke, Isabelle Kadner, Josephine Poetzsch, Detlef Groth, Andreas Radbruch, Andreas Hutloff, and Ria Baumgrass
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autoimmune disease ,cytokine expression ,multi-parametric analysis ,combinatorial protein expression ,cd4+ t cells ,high-dimensional flow cytometry ,Medicine ,Science ,Biology (General) ,QH301-705.5 - Abstract
Dysregulated cytokine expression by T cells plays a pivotal role in the pathogenesis of autoimmune diseases. However, the identification of the corresponding pathogenic subpopulations is a challenge, since a distinction between physiological variation and a new quality in the expression of protein markers requires combinatorial evaluation. Here, we were able to identify a super-functional follicular helper T cell (Tfh)-like subpopulation in lupus-prone NZBxW mice with our binning approach "pattern recognition of immune cells (PRI)". PRI uncovered a subpopulation of IL-21+ IFN-γhigh PD-1low CD40Lhigh CXCR5- Bcl-6- T cells specifically expanded in diseased mice. In addition, these cells express high levels of TNF-α and IL-2, and provide B cell help for IgG production in an IL-21 and CD40L dependent manner. This super-functional T cell subset might be a superior driver of autoimmune processes due to a polyfunctional and high cytokine expression combined with Tfh-like properties.
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- 2020
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16. The gonadal transcriptome of the unisexual Amazon molly Poecilia formosa in comparison to its sexual ancestors, Poecilia mexicana and Poecilia latipinna
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Ina Maria Schedina, Detlef Groth, Ingo Schlupp, and Ralph Tiedemann
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Differential gene expression ,Gynogenesis ,Hybrid speciation ,Meiosis ,Poecilia formosa ,Poecilia latipinna ,Biotechnology ,TP248.13-248.65 ,Genetics ,QH426-470 - Abstract
Abstract Background The unisexual Amazon molly (Poecilia formosa) originated from a hybridization between two sexual species, the sailfin molly (Poecilia latipinna) and the Atlantic molly (Poecilia mexicana). The Amazon molly reproduces clonally via sperm-dependent parthenogenesis (gynogenesis), in which the sperm of closely related species triggers embryogenesis of the apomictic oocytes, but typically does not contribute genetic material to the next generation. We compare for the first time the gonadal transcriptome of the Amazon molly to those of both ancestral species, P. mexicana and P. latipinna. Results We sequenced the gonadal transcriptomes of the P. formosa and its parental species P. mexicana and P. latipinna using Illumina RNA-sequencing techniques (paired-end, 100 bp). De novo assembly of about 50 million raw read pairs for each species was performed using Trinity, yielding 106,922 transcripts for P. formosa, 115,175 for P. latipinna, and 133,025 for P. mexicana after eliminating contaminations. On the basis of sequence similarity comparisons to other teleost species and the UniProt databases, functional annotation, and differential expression analysis, we demonstrate the similarity of the transcriptomes among the three species. More than 40% of the transcripts for each species were functionally annotated and about 70% were assigned to orthologous genes of a closely related species. Differential expression analysis between the sexual and unisexual species uncovered 2035 up-regulated and 564 down-regulated genes in P. formosa. This was exemplary validated for six genes by qRT-PCR. Conclusions We identified more than 130 genes related to meiosis and reproduction within the apomictically reproducing P. formosa. Overall expression of these genes seems to be down-regulated in the P. formosa transcriptome compared to both ancestral species (i.e., 106 genes down-regulated, 29 up-regulated). A further 35 meiosis and reproduction related genes were not found in the P. formosa transcriptome, but were only expressed in the sexual species. Our data support the hypothesis of general down-regulation of meiosis-related genes in the apomictic Amazon molly. Furthermore, the obtained dataset and identified gene catalog will serve as a resource for future research on the molecular mechanisms behind the reproductive mode of this unisexual species.
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- 2018
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17. Long-Term Temporal Trends of Nosema spp. Infection Prevalence in Northeast Germany: Continuous Spread of Nosema ceranae, an Emerging Pathogen of Honey Bees (Apis mellifera), but No General Replacement of Nosema apis
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Sebastian Gisder, Vivian Schüler, Lennart L. Horchler, Detlef Groth, and Elke Genersch
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honey bee ,Apis mellifera ,Nosema spp. ,epidemiology ,replacement ,Microbiology ,QR1-502 - Abstract
The Western honey bee (Apis mellifera) is widely used as commercial pollinator in worldwide agriculture and, therefore, plays an important role in global food security. Among the parasites and pathogens threatening health and survival of honey bees are two species of microsporidia, Nosema apis and Nosema ceranae. Nosema ceranae is considered an emerging pathogen of the Western honey bee. Reports on the spread of N. ceranae suggested that this presumably highly virulent species is replacing its more benign congener N. apis in the global A. mellifera population. We here present a 12 year longitudinal cohort study on the prevalence of N. apis and N. ceranae in Northeast Germany. Between 2005 and 2016, a cohort of about 230 honey bee colonies originating from 23 apiaries was sampled twice a year (spring and autumn) resulting in a total of 5,600 bee samples which were subjected to microscopic and molecular analysis for determining the presence of infections with N. apis or/and N. ceranae. Throughout the entire study period, both N. apis- and N. ceranae-infections could be diagnosed within the cohort. Logistic regression analysis of the prevalence data demonstrated a significant increase of N. ceranae-infections over the last 12 years, both in autumn (reflecting the development during the summer) and in spring (reflecting the development over winter) samples. Cell culture experiments confirmed that N. ceranae has a higher proliferative potential than N. apis at 27° and 33°C potentially explaining the increase in N. ceranae prevalence during summer. In autumn, characterized by generally low infection prevalence, this increase was accompanied by a significant decrease in N. apis-infection prevalence. In contrast, in spring, the season with a higher prevalence of infection, no significant decrease of N. apis infections despite a significant increase in N. ceranae infections could be observed. Therefore, our data do not support a general advantage of N. ceranae over N. apis and an overall replacement of N. apis by N. ceranae in the studied honey bee population.
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- 2017
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18. Human growth data analyses and statistics
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Michael Hermanussen, Detlef Groth, and Christiane Scheffler
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Students learn by repetition. Repetition is essential, but repetition needs questioning, and questioning the repertoire belongs to the essential tasks of student education. Guiding students to questioning was and is our prime motive to offer our International Student Summer Schools. The data were critically discussed among the students, in the twilight of Just So Stories, common knowledge, and prompted questioning of contemporary solutions. For these schools, the students bring their own data, carry their preliminary concepts, and in group discussions, they may have to challenge these concepts. Catch-up growth is known to affect long bone growth, but different opinions exist to what extent it also affects body proportions. Skeletal age and dental development are considered appropriate measures of maturation, but it appears that both system develop independently and are regulated by different mechanisms. Body weight distributions are assumed to be skewed, yet, historic data disproved this assumption. Many discussions focused on current ideas of global growth standards as a common yardstick for all populations world-wide, with new statistical tools being developed including network reconstruction and evaluation of the reconstructs to determine the confidence of graph prediction methods.
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- 2022
19. The Social status influences human growth
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Liza Wilke, Sonja Boeker, Rebecca Mumm, and Detlef Groth
- Abstract
Background: In the animal kingdom body size is often linked to dominance and subsequently the standing in social hierarchy. Similarly, human growth has been associated and linked to socioeconomic factors, including one’s social status. This has already been proposed in the early 1900s where data on young German school girls from different social strata have been compared. Objectives: This paper aims to summarize and analyze these results and make them accessible for non-German speakers. The full English translation of the historic work of Dikanski (Dikanski, 1914) is available as a supplement. Further, this work aims to compare the historical data with modern references, to test three hypotheses: (1) higher social class is positively associated with body height and weight, (2) affluent people from the used historical data match modern references in weight and height and (3) weight distributions are skewed in both modern and historical populations. Methods: Comparison of historical data from 1914 with WHO and 1980s German data. The data sets, for both body weight and height for 6.0- and 7.0-year-old girls, were fitted onto centile curves and quantile correlation coefficients were calculated. Results: In historical data social status is positively associated with body height and weight while both are also normally distributed, which marks a significant difference to modern references. Conclusion: Social status is positively associated with height, signaling social dominance, making children of affluent classes taller. Children from the historical data do not reach the average height of modern children, even under the best environmental conditions. The children of the upper social class were not skewed in weight distribution, although they had the means to become as obese as modern children.
- Published
- 2022
20. Statistical significance and biological relevance: The case of Nosema ceranae and honey bee colony losses in winter
- Author
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Vivian Schüler, Yuk-Chien Liu, Sebastian Gisder, Lennart Horchler, Detlef Groth, and Elke Genersch
- Abstract
Managed and wild insect pollinators play a key role in ensuring that mankind is adequately supplied with food. Among the pollinating insects, the managed Western honey bee providing about 90% of commercial pollination is of special importance. Hence, diseases as well as disease causing pathogens and parasites that threaten honey bees, have become the focus of many research studies. The ectoparasitic mite Varroa destructor together with deformed wing virus (DWV) vectored by the mite have been identified as the main contributors to colony losses, while the role of the microsporidium Nosema ceranae in colony losses is still controversially discussed. In an attempt to solve this controversy, we statistically analyzed a unique data set on honey bee colony health comprising data on mite infestation levels, Nosema spp. infections and winter losses continuously collected over 15 years. We used various statistical methods to investigate the relationship between colony mortality and the two pathogens, V. destructor and N. ceranae. Our multivariate statistical analysis confirmed that V. destructor is the major cause of colony winter losses. When using cumulative data sets, we also found a significant relationship between N. ceranae infections and colony losses. However, determining the effect size revealed that this statistical significance was of low biological relevance, because the deleterious effects of N. ceranae infection are normally masked by the more severe effects of V. destructor on colony health and therefore only detectable in the few colonies that are not infested with mites or are infested at low levels.
- Published
- 2022
21. Analysis of phylogenetic signal in protostomial intron patterns using Mutual Information.
- Author
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Natascha Hill, Alexander Leow, Christoph Bleidorn, Detlef Groth, Ralph Tiedemann, Joachim Selbig, and Stefanie Hartmann
- Published
- 2013
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
22. The end of the secular trend in Norway: spatial trends in body height of Norwegian conscripts in the 19th, 20th and 21st century
- Author
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Johanna Krüger, Detlef Groth, Alexander Rybak, and Dominik Bents
- Subjects
Poverty ,business.industry ,World War II ,Distribution (economics) ,General Medicine ,Norwegian ,Population density ,language.human_language ,Secular variation ,Geography ,Income distribution ,Anthropology ,Urbanization ,language ,Animal Science and Zoology ,business ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Demography - Abstract
Aim: We aimed to examine the distribution and secular changes of conscript body height in the geographic network of Norway since 1878 and to study its association with the degree of urbanization, and population density. Material and methods: Data on body height of Norwegian military conscripts were provided by the Statistics Norway Department (SSB). The sample comprised eight cohorts with the following measurement years: 1st 1877, 1878 and 1880, 2nd 1895-1897, 3rd 1915-1917, 4th 1935-1937, 5th 1955-1957, 6th 1975-1977, 7th 1995-1997, and 8th 2009-2011. For determining neighborhood correlations, a network was created consisting of neighboring counties, sharing a common border. Results: Average body height of Norwegian men increased by 10.9 cm between 1878 and 2010, but this trend was heterogeneous. Some counties increased by more than 1 cm per decade (Finmark) others by only 7 mm per decade (Sor-Trondelag). Urban counties and counties with higher population density showed stronger height trends than rural counties. The largest spread in body height between the various counties was observed in 1936 when for the first time people living in the more urban counties got taller than rural people. The height advantage of urban counties however, disappeared after 1996. At this time, also the secular trend in height had come to a halt. The secular trend in height had become obvious after the dissolution of the union between Norway and Sweden in 1905 and World War I, and was strongest between 1936 and 1956. During this period maximum between-county heterogeneity in height existed with body height differences of more than 6 cm between the tallest and the shortest county. The end of this period was characterized by social democratic reforms that flattened the income distribution, eliminated poverty, and ensured social services after World War II. Conclusion: The temporal coincidence between the trends in height, the degree of urbanization and the onset of the political transition of Norway from a Swedish province into an independent democratic wealthy modern European state after World War I and particularly after World War II, and the abatement of this trend after this period of transition had stabilized, suggest social and political components interfering with the regulation of physical growth in humans.
- Published
- 2020
23. The network effects on conscripts’ height in the central provinces of Russian empire in the middle of XIX century – at the beginning of XX century
- Author
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Lidia Lebedeva, Michael Hermanussen, Elena Godina, Detlef Groth, and Christiane Scheffler
- Subjects
Male ,Body height ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Empire ,History, 19th Century ,Context (language use) ,General Medicine ,History, 20th Century ,Body Height ,Russia ,Military Personnel ,Geography ,Anthropology ,Serfdom ,Humans ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Poland ,Physical geography ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,media_common ,Transport infrastructure - Abstract
Background: We investigated average body height in the central provinces of the Russian empire in the middle of XIX century in view of the concept of "community effects on height". We analyzed body height correlations between neighboring districts at this time. We added information about secular changes in body height during the 19th century of this territory. Material and methods: The study used height data of conscripts, which were born in the years 1853-1863, and age 21 at the time of measurement. The territory of seven provinces was considered as a network with 105 nodes, each node representing one district with information on average male body height. In order to define neighboring districts three different approaches were used: based on the "common borders" method, based on Euclidean distances (from 60 to 120 km), based on real road connections. Results: Small but significant correlation coefficients were observed between 1st order districts in the network based on Euclidean distance of 100 km (r = 0.256, p-value = 0.006) and based on "the common borders" approach (r = 0.25, p-value = 0.02). Wherein no significant correlations were observed in the network based on road connections and between second order neighbors regardless of the method. Conclusion: Height correlation coefficients between 1st order neighboring districts observed in the Russian districts were very similar to values observed in the Polish study (r = 0.24). The considered Russian territory and the territory of Poland have a lot in common. They consist of both plains without mountains. In contradistinction to Poland the transport infrastructure in Russia was weakly developed in the middle of XIX century. In addition, the mobility of people was limited by serfdom. In this context the absent of significant correlation of second order neighbors can be explained by low population density and lack of migration and communication between the districts.
- Published
- 2019
24. Influence of network properties on a migration induced secular height trend by Monte Carlo simulation
- Author
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Detlef Groth, Kaspar Staub, Amelie Fritz, Angelina Makeyeva, University of Zurich, and Groth, Detlef
- Subjects
Evolution ,Monte Carlo method ,Population ,610 Medicine & health ,Network topology ,Behavior and Systematics ,Statistics ,Humans ,ddc:610 ,education ,Institut für Biochemie und Biologie ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Mathematics ,Event (probability theory) ,education.field_of_study ,Ecology ,Node (networking) ,General Medicine ,Emigration and Immigration ,Body Height ,Secular variation ,1105 Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Anthropology ,11294 Institute of Evolutionary Medicine ,3314 Anthropology ,Animal Science and Zoology ,1103 Animal Science and Zoology ,Centrality ,Monte Carlo Method ,Switzerland ,Heterogeneous network - Abstract
Background: Recent research reported height biased migration of taller individuals and a Monte Carlo simulation showed that such preferential migration of taller individuals into network hubs can induce a secular trend of height. In the simulation model taller agents in the hubs raise the overall height of all individuals in the network by a community effect. However, it could be seen that the actual network structure influences the strength of this effect. In this paper the background and the influence of the network structure on the strength of the secular trend by migration is investigated. Material and methods: Three principal network types are analyzed: networks derived from street connections in Switzerland, more regular fishing net like networks and randomly generated ones. Our networks have between 10 and 152 nodes and between 20 and 307 edges connecting the nodes. Depending on the network size between 5.000 and 90.000 agents with an average height of 170 cm (SD 6.5 cm) are initially released into the network. In each iteration new agents are regenerated based on the actual average body height of the previous iteration and, to a certain proportion, corrected by body heights in the neighboring nodes. After generating new agents, a certain number of them migrated into neighbor nodes, the model let preferentially taller agents migrate into network hubs. Migration is balanced by back migration of the same number of agents from nodes with high centrality measures to less connected nodes. The latter is random as well, but not biased by the agents height. Furthermore the distribution of agents per node and their correlation to the centrality of the nodes is varied in a systematic manner. After 100 iterations, the secular trend, i.e. the gain in body height for the different networks, is investigated in relation to the network properties. Results: We observe an increase of average agent body height after 100 iterations if height biased migration is enabled. The increase rate depends on the height of the neighboring factor, the population distribution, the relationship between population in the nodes and their centrality as well as on the network topology. Networks with uniform like distributions of the agents in the nodes, uncorrelated associations between node centrality and agent number per node, as well as very heterogeneous networks with very different node centralities lead to biggest gains in average body height. Conclusion: Our simulations show, that height biased migration into network hubs can possibly contribute to the secular trend of height increase in the human population. The strength of this "tall by migration" event depends on the actual properties of the underlying network. There is a possible significance of this mechanism for social networks, when hubs are represented by individuals and edges as their personal relationships. However, the required high number of iterations to achieve significant effects in more natural network structures in our models requires further studies to test the relevance and real effect sizes in real world scenarios.
- Published
- 2019
25. Body height in stunted Indonesian children depends directly on parental education and not via a nutrition mediated pathway – Evidence from tracing association chains by St. Nicolas House Analysis
- Author
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Michael Hermanussen, Christiane Scheffler, and Detlef Groth
- Subjects
Male ,Parents ,Nutritional Status ,010501 environmental sciences ,Tracing ,01 natural sciences ,Standard deviation ,Correlation ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Statistics ,Humans ,030212 general & internal medicine ,Child ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Partial correlation ,0105 earth and related environmental sciences ,Mathematics ,Anthropometry ,General Medicine ,Circumference ,Body Height ,language.human_language ,Indonesian ,Ranking ,Indonesia ,Anthropology ,language ,Educational Status ,Female ,Animal Science and Zoology - Abstract
Background: Multiple linear correlations between parameters can be shown in correlation matrices. Correlations can be ranked, but can also be visualized in network graphs. Yet, translating a correlation matrix into a network graph is not trivial. In view of a popular child game, we propose to name this method St. Nicolas House Analysis. Material and methods: We present a new method (St. Nicolas House Analysis) that helps translating correlation matrices into network graphs. The performance of this and other network reconstruction methods was tested in randomly created virtual scale-free networks, networks consisting of bands or hubs, using balanced classification rate and the F1-Score for correctly predicting existing and non-existing edges. Thereafter we analyzed anthropometric data and information on parental education, obtained from an anthropometric survey in 908 Indonesian boys and 808 Indonesian girls. Seven parameters were analyzed: child height standard deviation score (hSDS), child BMI standard deviation scores (BMI_SDS), mid-upper-arm circumference (MUAC), mean thickness of subscapular and triceps skinfold (mean SF), and elbow breadth; as well as maternal and paternal education (years of schooling). The parameters were considered as the nodes of the network; the edges represent the correlations between the nodes. Results: Performance measures, balanced classification rate and the F1-score, showed that St. Nicolas' House Analysis was superior to methods using sophisticated correlation value thresholds and methods based on partial correlations for analyzing bands and hubs. We applied this method also in an Indonesia data set. Ranking correlations showed the direct association between parental education and child growth. Conclusion: St. Nicolas House Analysis confirmed that growth of Indonesian school children directly depends on maternal education, with no evidence that this effect is mediated by the state of nutrition.
- Published
- 2019
26. GOblet: a platform for Gene Ontology annotation of anonymous sequence data.
- Author
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Detlef Groth, Hans Lehrach, and Steffen Hennig
- Published
- 2004
- Full Text
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27. Automated Gene Ontology annotation for anonymous sequence data.
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Steffen Hennig, Detlef Groth, and Hans Lehrach
- Published
- 2003
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
28. Statistical Approaches to Developmental and Growth Data of Children and Adolescents – an editorial to student research conducted during the 3rd International Student Summer School, July 2019, Potsdam and Gülpe, Germany
- Author
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Michael Hermanussen, Detlef Groth, and Christiane Scheffler
- Subjects
Medical education ,Parental education ,Anthropology ,Growth data ,Animal Science and Zoology ,General Medicine ,Psychology ,Student research ,Socioeconomic status ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics - Published
- 2020
29. Growth, Nutrition and Economy : Proceedings of the 27th Aschauer Soiree, held at Krobielowice, Poland, November 16th 2019
- Author
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Andrej Suchomlinov, Sylvia Kirchengast, Raja Chakraborty, Sylwia Bartkowiak, Slawomir Koziel, Robert M. Malina, Lidia Lebedeva, Takashi Satake, Egle Marija Jakimaviciene, Daniel Franken, Christiane Scheffler, Michael Hermanussen, Detlef Groth, Aleksandra Gomula, Jan M. Konarski, James M. Swanson, Ramune Cepuliene, Yehuda Limony, Lidia Martin, Werner F. Blum, Natalia Nowak-Szczepanska, Bárbara Navazo, Vsevolod Konstantinov, Janina Tutkuviene, Anna Apanasewicz, Annang G. Moelyo, and James G. Waxmonsky
- Subjects
education ,Body proportions ,socioeconomy ,secular changes ,pubertal timing ,stunting ,Anthropometry ,Affect (psychology) ,medicine.disease ,Growth hormone secretion ,Low birth weight ,nutrition ,Economy ,Mood disorders ,medicine ,Social position ,Nutrition ,Stunting ,Socioeconomy ,Education ,Secular changes ,Pubertal timing ,Ciencias Naturales ,medicine.symptom ,Psychology ,Socioeconomic status - Abstract
Twenty-three scientists met at Krobielowice, Poland to discuss the role of growth, nutrition and economy on body size. Contrasting prevailing concepts, re-analyses of studies in Indonesian and Guatemalan school children with high prevalence of stunting failed to provide evidence for an association between nutritional status and body height. Direct effects of parental education on growth that were not transmitted via nutrition were shown in Indian datasets using network analysis and novel statistical methods (St. Nicolas House Analysis) that translate correlation matrices into network graphs. Data on Polish children suggest significant impact of socioeconomic sensitivity on child growth, with no effect of maternal money satisfaction. Height and maturation tempo affect the position of a child among its peers. Correlations also exist between mood disorders and height. Secular changes in height and weight varied across decades independent of population size. Historic and recent Russian data showed that height of persons whose fathers performed manual work were on average four cm shorter than persons whose fathers were high-degree specialists. Body height, menarcheal age, and body proportions are sensitive to socioeconomic variables. Additional topics included delayed motherhood and its associations with newborn size; geographic and socioeconomic indicators related to low birth weight, prematurity and stillbirth rate; data on anthropometric history of Brazil, 1850-1950; the impact of central nervous system stimulants on the growth of children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder; and pituitary development and growth hormone secretion. Final discussions debated on reverse causality interfering between social position, and adolescent growth and developmental tempo., Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo
- Published
- 2021
30. Chain Reversion for Detecting Associations in Interacting Variables—St. Nicolas House Analysis
- Author
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Detlef Groth, Christian Aßmann, and Michael Hermanussen
- Subjects
association chains ,Rank (linear algebra) ,Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Association (object-oriented programming) ,lcsh:Medicine ,Bivariate analysis ,01 natural sciences ,Article ,Correlation ,010104 statistics & probability ,03 medical and health sciences ,Statistics ,0101 mathematics ,Spurious relationship ,030304 developmental biology ,Mathematics ,Statistical hypothesis testing ,media_common ,0303 health sciences ,Variables ,data matrices ,lcsh:R ,Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health ,Linear model ,bivariate correlation coefficients ,network graphs ,St. Nicolas House Analysis - Abstract
(1) Background: We present a new statistical approach labeled as “St. Nicolas House Analysis” (SNHA) for detecting and visualizing extensive interactions among variables. (2) Method: We rank absolute bivariate correlation coefficients in descending order according to magnitude and create hierarchic “association chains” defined by sequences where reversing start and end point does not alter the ordering of elements. Association chains are used to characterize dependence structures of interacting variables by a graph. (3) Results: SNHA depicts association chains in highly, but also in weakly correlated data, and is robust towards spurious accidental associations. Overlapping association chains can be visualized as network graphs. Between independent variables significantly fewer associations are detected compared to standard correlation or linear model-based approaches. (4) Conclusion: We propose reversible association chains as a principle to detect dependencies among variables. The proposed method can be conceptualized as a non-parametric statistical method. It is especially suited for secondary data analysis as only aggregate information such as correlations matrices are required. The analysis provides an initial approach for clarifying potential associations that may be subject to subsequent hypothesis testing.
- Published
- 2021
31. Data integration using scanners with SQL output - The Bioscanners project at sourceforge.
- Author
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Detlef Groth, Stefanie Hartmann, Martin Friemel, Natascha Hill, Stefan Muller, Albert J. Poustka, and Georgia Panopoulou
- Published
- 2010
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
32. Author response: Identification of a super-functional Tfh-like subpopulation in murine lupus by pattern perception
- Author
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Stefanie Gryzik, Andreas Hutloff, Elodie Mohr, Melanie Venzke, Ria Baumgrass, Andreas Radbruch, Yen Hoang, Timo Lischke, Detlef Groth, Isabelle Kadner, and Josephine Poetzsch
- Subjects
Murine lupus ,Identification (biology) ,Pattern perception ,Biology ,Neuroscience - Published
- 2020
33. Identification of a super-functional Tfh-like subpopulation in murine lupus by pattern perception
- Author
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Josephine Poetzsch, Elodie Mohr, Ria Baumgrass, Stefanie Gryzik, Detlef Groth, Yen Hoang, Melanie Venzke, Andreas Hutloff, Timo Lischke, Andreas Radbruch, and Isabelle Kadner
- Subjects
0301 basic medicine ,Mouse ,Autoimmunity ,Lymphocyte Activation ,CXCR5 ,Pattern Recognition, Automated ,Pathogenesis ,Mice ,Immunology and Inflammation ,0302 clinical medicine ,T-Lymphocyte Subsets ,Lupus Erythematosus, Systemic ,Biology (General) ,cd4+ t cells ,B-Lymphocytes ,Mice, Inbred NZB ,biology ,General Neuroscience ,T-Lymphocytes, Helper-Inducer ,General Medicine ,Flow Cytometry ,Cell biology ,medicine.anatomical_structure ,Medicine ,Female ,medicine.symptom ,multi-parametric analysis ,Research Article ,combinatorial protein expression ,QH301-705.5 ,T cell ,Science ,Inflammation ,autoimmune disease ,General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology ,high-dimensional flow cytometry ,03 medical and health sciences ,Immune system ,medicine ,Animals ,cytokine expression ,B cell ,Autoimmune disease ,CD40 ,General Immunology and Microbiology ,Interleukins ,Cell Biology ,medicine.disease ,Antigens, Differentiation ,Coculture Techniques ,030104 developmental biology ,biology.protein ,Immunologic Memory ,030215 immunology - Abstract
Dysregulated cytokine expression by T cells plays a pivotal role in the pathogenesis of autoimmune diseases. However, the identification of the corresponding pathogenic subpopulations is a challenge, since a distinction between physiological variation and a new quality in the expression of protein markers requires combinatorial evaluation. Here, we were able to identify a super-functional follicular helper T cell (Tfh)-like subpopulation in lupus-prone NZBxW mice with our binning approach "pattern recognition of immune cells (PRI)". PRI uncovered a subpopulation of IL-21+ IFN-γhigh PD-1low CD40Lhigh CXCR5- Bcl-6- T cells specifically expanded in diseased mice. In addition, these cells express high levels of TNF-α and IL-2, and provide B cell help for IgG production in an IL-21 and CD40L dependent manner. This super-functional T cell subset might be a superior driver of autoimmune processes due to a polyfunctional and high cytokine expression combined with Tfh-like properties.
- Published
- 2020
34. Traumatized women's infants are bigger than children of mothers without traumas
- Author
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Magdalena Piosek, Christiane Scheffler, Magdalena Babiszewska, Detlef Groth, Michael Hermanussen, Anna Apanasewicz, Patrycja Wychowaniec, Anna Ziomkiewicz, and Olga Barbarska
- Subjects
Offspring ,Early life stress ,Mothers ,Breast milk ,Affect (psychology) ,Life history theory ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Medicine ,Animals ,Humans ,Child ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,030304 developmental biology ,0303 health sciences ,Human studies ,Milk, Human ,business.industry ,Body Weight ,Infant ,General Medicine ,Anthropometry ,Accelerated Growth ,Anthropology ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Female ,business ,030217 neurology & neurosurgery ,Demography - Abstract
Life history theory predicts that experiencing stress during the early period of life will result in accelerated growth and earlier maturation. Indeed, animal and some human studies documented a faster pace of growth in the offspring of stressed mothers. Recent advances in epigenetics suggest that the effects of early developmental stress might be passed across the generations. However, evidence for such intergenerational transmission is scarce, at least in humans. Here we report the results of the study investigating the association between childhood trauma in mothers and physical growth in their children during the first months of life. Anthropometric and psychological data were collected from 99 mothers and their exclusively breastfed children at the age of 5 months. The mothers completed the Early Life Stress Questionnaire to assess childhood trauma. The questionnaire includes questions about the most traumatic events that they had experienced before the age of 12 years. Infant growth was evaluated based on the anthropometric measurements of weight, length, and head circumference. Also, to control for the size of maternal investment, the composition of breast milk samples taken at the time of infant anthropometric measurements was investigated. The children of mothers with higher early life stress tended to have higher weight and bigger head circumference. The association between infant anthropometrics and early maternal stress was not affected by breast milk composition, suggesting that the effect of maternal stress on infant growth was independent of the size of maternal investment. Our results demonstrate that early maternal trauma may affect the pace of growth in the offspring and, in consequence, lead to a faster life history strategy. This effect might be explained via changes in offspring epigenetics.
- Published
- 2020
35. The end of the secular trend in Norway: spatial trends in body height of Norwegian conscripts in the 19
- Author
-
Alexander, Rybak, Dominik, Bents, Johanna, Krüger, and Detlef, Groth
- Subjects
Male ,Military Personnel ,World War II ,Norway ,Humans ,World War I ,Body Height - Published
- 2020
36. No correlation between short term weight gain and lower leg length gain in healthy German children
- Author
-
Daniel J Naumenko, Detlef Groth, Michael Hermanussen, Arusa Maqsood, and Christiane Scheffler
- Subjects
Pulsatile flow ,General Medicine ,Body weight ,Term (time) ,body regions ,Correlation ,Chronic nutritional deficiency ,Animal science ,Anthropology ,medicine ,Animal Science and Zoology ,ddc:610 ,medicine.symptom ,Weight gain ,Institut für Biochemie und Biologie ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Lower Leg Length ,Mathematics - Abstract
Background: Length-for-age is considered the indicator of choice in monitoring the long-term impact of chronic nutritional deficiency. Aim: We hypothesized that short term increments of body weight cross-correlate with increments of the lower leg length. Sample and methods: We re-analyzed the association between weekly measurements of weight and of lower leg length in 34 healthy German children, aged 2.9-15.9 years. The data are a subset of measurements originally published in 1988 (Hermanussen et al. 1988a). As the growth measurements were often not equally spaced in time due to interposed holidays and illness, the incremental rates for weight and lower leg length were smoothed using spline functions. Autocorrelation and cross-correlation functions were calculated for weight increments and lower leg length increments. Results: Height and weight increments are pulsatile. Autocorrelations indicated that mini growth spurts occur at irregular intervals. Lack of cross-correlations between weight and lower leg length indicated that mini spurts in weight gain do not coincide with mini spurts in length gain even when considering lag times of up to 10 weeks. Short term changes of weight gain and lower leg length gain in healthy children show no temporal association.
- Published
- 2020
37. GOblet: Annotation of anonymous sequence data with Gene Ontology and Pathway terms.
- Author
-
Detlef Groth, Stefanie Hartmann, Georgia Panopoulou, Albert J. Poustka, and Steffen Hennig
- Published
- 2008
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
38. Environmental stimulation on height: The story from Indonesia
- Author
-
Christiane Scheffler, Aman B Pulungan, Detlef Groth, Michael Hermanussen, and Susi Natalia Hasibuan
- Subjects
Adult ,Male ,Adolescent ,Cross-sectional study ,Population ,010501 environmental sciences ,01 natural sciences ,Population density ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Humans ,030212 general & internal medicine ,Growth Charts ,education ,Child ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,0105 earth and related environmental sciences ,education.field_of_study ,Sex Characteristics ,Infant ,General Medicine ,Crowding ,language.human_language ,Adult height ,Body Height ,Indonesian ,Sexual dimorphism ,Geography ,Cross-Sectional Studies ,Indonesia ,Anthropology ,language ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Female ,Demography ,Sex characteristics - Abstract
Background: Since the 19th century, sexual dimorphism has been known to be sensitive to adverse environmental conditions. Migrants are sensitive to economic and political affluence, and tend to adjust in height towards height of their hosts. We aim to study growth, sexual dimorphism, and height of native and migrant children in three primary schools in Nabire, Papua, Indonesia. Material and Methods 1: Cross-sectional data on height were obtained from 186 children (59 and 56 native Papuan girls and boys, respectively; 38 and 33 trans-migrant girls and boys respectively; who are aged 7.0-7.7 (mean 7.45) years from three primary schools in Nabire, Papua, Indonesia. The Indonesian National Growth Charts were used as references for height. Results 1: With 118.4 cm (SD 6.7) cm, trans-migrant 7-year old boys were almost 3 cm taller compared to their native-age-matched-peers (115.7 cm (5.0 SD) cm, p < 0.05). The case was different among the girls. Trans-migrant girls were not significantly taller than native girls. Material and Method 2: We re-analyzed the height data from over 300,000 infants, children and adolescents, age 0-18 year, from 34 Indonesian provinces. The data were obtained from the latest Indonesian 2013 National Basic Health Survey (NHBS), and have previously been used to construct National Indonesian Growth Charts. St. Nicolas House Analysis was used to translate correlation matrices into network graphs and visualizing chains of associations between parameters that were multiply correlated. Results 2: St. Nicolas House Analysis suggested that the growth of male sex were more sensitive to population crowding, and that crowding contributes to the greater height dimorphism in taller populations. Conclusion: Economic prosperity and increased population density stimulate male adult height to a greater extent than female adult height, and increase the sexual dimorphism in height among the tall populations of densely populated wealthy countries.
- Published
- 2019
39. Influence of the A/T polymorphism of the FTO gene and sport specializations on the body composition of young Russian athletes
- Author
-
Maria F Zaharova, Detlef Groth, O. I. Parfenteva, and Christiane Scheffler
- Subjects
biology ,Athletes ,business.industry ,nutritional and metabolic diseases ,Regression analysis ,General Medicine ,biology.organism_classification ,FTO gene ,Physical activity level ,Polymorphism (computer science) ,Anthropology ,ddc:570 ,Cohort ,Aerobic exercise ,Medicine ,Animal Science and Zoology ,business ,Body mass index ,human activities ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Institut für Biochemie und Biologie ,Demography - Abstract
Background: The polymorphism in FTO gene (rs9939609) is known to be associated with higher BMI and body fat mass content. However, environmental factors can modify this effect. The purpose of the present study was to investigate an association between sport specialization and the rs9939609 SNP in FTO gene in the cohort of professional and amateur young athletes. Methods: A total number of 250 young individuals 8-18 years old living in Moscow or Moscow district participated in the study. Individuals were divided into 3 groups in accordance with their physical activity level: control group (n = 49), amateurs (n = 67) and professionals (n = 137). Amateur and professional athletes were subdivided into groups according to their sport specialization. Quantile regression was used as a regression model, where the dependent (outcome) variable was BMI, along with percentage of body fat mass, and the independent variables (predictors) were the rs9939609 SNP in FTO gene, physical activity (active versus inactive), sport specialization (aerobic, intermittent sports and martial arts), nationality, level of sport experience (in years), gender and percentage of free fat mass content. Results: The regression analysis revealed that physical activity and sport specialization had greater impact compared to FTO allele in the group of physically active individuals. Physical activity, in particular aerobic, had negative associations with body fat mass and BMI. The rs9939609 SNP in FTO gene is associated with physical activity and aerobic activity. The magnitude of association becomes significantly larger at the upper quantiles of the body fat mass distribution. Conclusion: Physical activity and sport specialization explained more variance in body composition of physically active young individuals compared to the FTO polymorphism. Effect of interaction of physical activity, in particular aerobic, with the FTO polymorphism on body composition of young athletes was found.
- Published
- 2019
40. Editorial Perceiving stunting – Student research and the 'Lieschen Müller effect' in nutrition science
- Author
-
Michael Hermanussen, Detlef Groth, Christiane Scheffler, and Barry Bogin
- Subjects
Gerontology ,Nutritional Sciences ,Nutritional Status ,Child Nutrition Disorders ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,030225 pediatrics ,Prevalence ,medicine ,Humans ,030212 general & internal medicine ,Child ,Students ,Student research ,Growth Disorders ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Research ,Competitive growth ,Infant ,Nutritional status ,General Medicine ,medicine.disease ,Nutrition science ,Malnutrition ,Anthropology ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Nutritional science ,Psychology - Abstract
Editorial Perceiving stunting - student research and the "Lieschen Mueller effect" in nutrition science
- Published
- 2018
41. The secular trend and network effects on height of male Japanese students from 1955 to 2015
- Author
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Dominik Bents, Takashi Satake, and Detlef Groth
- Subjects
Male ,Adolescent ,Body height ,Tall Stature ,General Medicine ,Short stature ,Body Height ,Secular variation ,Geography ,Japan ,ddc:570 ,Anthropology ,medicine ,Humans ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Community effect ,School health ,medicine.symptom ,Human height ,Students ,Institut für Biochemie und Biologie ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Demography - Abstract
Introduction: Body height is influenced by biological factors such as genetics, nutrition and health, but also by the social network, and environmental and economical factors. During centuries, the Japanese society has developed on islands. This setting provides ideal natural conditions for studying the influence of social networks on human height. Material and methods: We investigated body height of male Japanese students aged 17.5 years obtained in 47 prefectures, from the Japanese school health survey of the years 1955, 1975, 1995, and 2015. Results: Japanese students increased in height from 163.23 cm in 1955 to 170.84 cm in 1995, with no further increase thereafter (170.63 cm in 2015). Students living in neighboring prefectures were similar in height. The correlation of height between neighboring prefectures ranged between r = 0.79 and r = 0.49 among first degree neighbors, between r = 0.49 and r = 0.21 among second degree neighbors and dropped to insignificance among third degree neighbors indicating psychosocial effects of the community on body height. Tall stature and short stature prefectures did not remain tall or short throughout history. Autocorrelations of height within the same prefectures decreased from the 20 years periods of 1955-1975, 1975-1995 and 1995-2015 (r = 0.52, r = 0.61, r = 0.63, respectively) to the 40 years periods of 1955-1995 and 1975-2015 (r = 0.49, r = 0.52), down to the 60 years period of 1955-2015 (r = 0.27), indicating significant volatility of height. Conclusion: Body height of 17.5 years old Japanese students increased since 1955. Body height depended on height of the neighboring prefecture, but was volatile with decreasing autocorrelation during a period of 60 years.
- Published
- 2018
42. The effect of neighboring districts on body height of Polish conscripts
- Author
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Tadeusz Bielicki, Detlef Groth, Slawomir Koziel, and Aleksandra Gomula
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Adult ,Male ,Adolescent ,Injury control ,Body height ,Accident prevention ,Poison control ,Anthropology, Physical ,Young Adult ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,ddc:570 ,Humans ,0601 history and archaeology ,Community effect ,Institut für Biochemie und Biologie ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Statistical software ,060101 anthropology ,Anthropometry ,Geography ,06 humanities and the arts ,General Medicine ,First order ,Body Height ,Military Personnel ,Anthropology ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Poland ,030217 neurology & neurosurgery ,Demography - Abstract
The aim of the study was to investigate the correlation of heights of conscripts living in neighboring districts in Poland. The study used 10% of a nationally representative sample of 26,178 males 18.5-19.5 years old examined during the National survey of Polish conscripts conducted in 2001. The sample represented all regions and social strata of the country and included 354 different districts within 16 voivodships (provinces). Analyses were performed with the R statistical software. A small but significant correlation (0.24, p < 0.0001) was observed for height between 1st order neighboring districts. Correlations decreased with increased distances between neighboring districts, but remained significant for 7th node neighbors (0.18, p < 0.0001). Regarding voivodships (provinces), average height showed a geographical trend from the northwest (relatively tall) to the southeast (relatively short), and the correlation was stronger for first order neighboring provinces (0.796, p < 0.001). This study revealed clusters of tall people and short people, providing a support for hypothesis of the community effect in height. Small correlations between 1st order neighbors than in another country (Switzerland) may be associated with differences in geography, since in Poland there are no natural barriers (e.g., mountains) and road infrastructure is well-developed.
- Published
- 2017
43. Spatial conscript body height correlation of Norwegian districts in the 19th century
- Author
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Detlef Groth, Alexander Rybak, and Dominik Bents
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0106 biological sciences ,060101 anthropology ,Body height ,Autocorrelation ,Magnitude (mathematics) ,06 humanities and the arts ,General Medicine ,Norwegian ,Minimum spanning tree ,010603 evolutionary biology ,01 natural sciences ,language.human_language ,Euclidean distance ,Correlation ,ddc:570 ,Anthropology ,Statistics ,language ,0601 history and archaeology ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Community effect ,Institut für Biochemie und Biologie ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Demography ,Mathematics - Abstract
Background: We investigated height of Norwegian conscripts in view of the hypothesis of a "community effect on height" using autocorrelation analysis of district heights within a time-span of 20 years at the end of the 19th century and correlations between neighboring districts at this time. Material and methods: After digitalizing available body height data of Norwegian draftees in 1877-1878, 1880 (averaged as 1878), and 1895-1897 (averaged as 1896) we calculated the magnitude of autocorrelation of body height within the same municipality at different time points. Furthermore, we generated three different neighborhood networks, (1) based on Euclidean distances, (2) a minimum spanning tree build on those distances, (3) a network founded on real world road connections. The networks were used to determine the correlation between body height of neighboring districts depending on the number of edges required to connect two municipalities. Results: The autocorrelation value for body heights was around r = 0.5 (for all p < 0.001) in the years 1878 and 1896. The correlation between neighboring districts varied in the Euclidean distance based network between 0.47 and 0.27 approximately for both years in a sorted order, descending from nearest (0-50 km) to farthest (150-200 km, for all p < 0.001). First order neighbors in the minimum spanning tree network correlation was 0.36 in 1878 and 0.42 in 1896 (for all p < 0.001). The values of neighbor correlation in the road connection based network ranged in 1878 from 0.42 (first order neighbors) to 0.17 (forth order neighbors, for all p < 0.01) and in 1896 from 0.46 (first order neighbors) to 0.12 (forth order neighbors, for all p < 0.05). Conclusion: This initial study of Norwegian conscript height data from the 19th century showed significant medium sized effects for the within district autocorrelation between 1878 and 1896 as well as medium neighborhood correlation, slightly lower in comparison to a recent study regarding Swiss conscripts. Digitalizing more data from other years in this and later time spans as well as using older road and ship connections instead of the actual road data might stabilize and improve those findings.
- Published
- 2017
44. Association of anthropometric indices of nutritional status with growth in height among Limboo children of Sikkim, India
- Author
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Michael Hermanussen, Barry Bogin, Detlef Groth, Binu Dorjee, Jaydip Sen, and Christiane Scheffler
- Subjects
Male ,Adolescent ,Cross-sectional study ,Body height ,Population ,India ,Nutritional Status ,010501 environmental sciences ,Biology ,01 natural sciences ,Short stature ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Nutritional Indices ,medicine ,Humans ,030212 general & internal medicine ,education ,Child ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Growth Disorders ,0105 earth and related environmental sciences ,education.field_of_study ,Anthropometry ,Nutritional status ,General Medicine ,Body Height ,Sikkim ,Cross-Sectional Studies ,Sample size determination ,Anthropology ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Female ,medicine.symptom ,Demography - Abstract
Aim: Influence of nutrition in human growth failure, especially stunting, is a well-accepted idea. The present study assesses the influence of nutrition and non-nutritional factors on height growth in a short stature population. Material and methods: The present study was conducted among the children and adolescents of Sikkim, India. The sample size was 538 (boys and girls) of age 2-18 years. The anthropometric indices mid upper arm circumference-for-age Z-scores (MUACZ) and BMI-for-age Z-scores (BAZ) were utilised as proxy of nutritional status and growth was assessed using height-for-age Z-scores (HAZ). Associations were assessed using correlation, St. Nicolas house analysis (SNHA), principal component analysis (PCA) and regression. Results: Nutritional status of the participating children and adolescents as assessed by MUACZ and BAZ were largely normal. Despite variation in HAZ from -4 to +2 there was no influence of the nutritional indices on height. Further, there was clear lack of association between HAZ and socio-economic variables in the present study. Conclusion: The findings of the present study suggest nutrition is not the primary regulator of human growth. The possible influence of community effects on height is discussed.
- Published
- 2019
45. Student work on trends in infant and child growth - an editorial
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Barry Bogin, Detlef Groth, Michael Hermanussen, and Christiane Scheffler
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MEDLINE ,Physical activity ,Infant ,General Medicine ,Child development ,Developmental psychology ,Child Development ,Work (electrical) ,Anthropology ,Humans ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Child growth ,Psychology ,Child ,Socioeconomic status ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics - Published
- 2019
46. Influence of the A/T polymorphism of the
- Author
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Olga I, Parfenteva, Detlef, Groth, Christiane, Scheffler, and Maria F, Zaharova
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Adolescent ,Genotype ,Athletes ,Body Composition ,Alpha-Ketoglutarate-Dependent Dioxygenase FTO ,Humans ,Athletic Performance ,Child ,Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide ,Body Mass Index ,Russia ,Sports - Published
- 2018
47. Meeting Report: Growth and Social Environment. Proceedings of the 25th Aschauer Soiree, held at Krobielowice, Poland, November 18th 2017
- Author
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Slawomir, Kozie, Christiane, Scheffler, Janina, Tutkuviene, Egle Marija, Jakimaviciene, Rebekka, Mumm, Davide, Barbieri, Elena, Godina, Mortada, El-Shabrawi, Mona, Elhusseini, Martin, Musalek, Paulina, Pruszkowska-Przybylska, Hanaa H, El Dash, Hebatalla Hassan, Safar, Andreas, Lehmann, James, Swanson, Barry, Bogin, Yuk-Chien, Liu, Detlef, Groth, Sylvia, Kirchengast, Anna, Siniarska, Joanna, Nieczuja-Dwojacka, Miroslav, Králík, Takashi, Satake, Tomasz, Hanć, Mathieu, Roelants, and Michael, Hermanussen
- Abstract
Twenty-two scientists met at Krobielowice, Poland, to discuss the impact of the social environment, spatial proximity, migration, poverty, but also psychological factors such as body perception and satisfaction, and social stressors such as elite sports, and teenage pregnancies, on child and adolescent growth. The data analysis included linear mixed effects models with different random effects, Monte Carlo analyses, and network simulations. The work stressed the importance of the peer group, but also included historic material, some considerations about body proportions, and growth in chronic liver, and congenital heart disease.
- Published
- 2018
48. Body height, social dominance and the political climate - a comment
- Author
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Detlef Groth and Yuk-Chien Liu
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Male ,Rural Population ,Adolescent ,Urban Population ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Population ,Social group ,Politics ,Japan ,Voting ,Political climate ,Humans ,education ,Socioeconomic status ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,media_common ,education.field_of_study ,General Medicine ,Per capita income ,Democracy ,Body Height ,Geography ,Social Dominance ,Socioeconomic Factors ,Anthropology ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Demographic economics ,Female - Abstract
Background: The association between stature and social dominance is known. Dominance within social groups and current politics are related issues. We therefore aimed to compare estimates of the opinion of a population about their current political issues, with physical growth. Material and methods: We used data on the 2012 and the 2014 elections for the Japanese House of Representatives and the percent proportion of votes of the 47 prefectures of Japan, and regional data on body height of 17.5 year old men and women. Information on capita income, possession of mobile phones, urban/rural population ratio, and age distribution were added to capture socioeconomic factors. Four political parties were present in most of the 47 prefectures: the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), the New Komeito Party (Kom) that is known for their social network community, and the Japanese Communist Party (JCP). Results: A dense network of associations exists between height, age distribution, per capita income, number of smartphones, and voting results. Male and female body height was inversely related with the proportion of votes for New Komeito Party. Average stature decreases by one mm per percent votes for this political party. Medium strong positive associations were found for male body height and voting results of the DPJ and for female body height with the JCP election results. Conclusion: In modern Japan, popular preferences for conservative political structures coincide with shorter stature.
- Published
- 2018
49. Modeling a secular trend by Monte Carlo simulation of height biased migration in a spatial network
- Author
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Detlef Groth
- Subjects
Adult ,Male ,Human Migration ,Standard deviation ,Anthropology, Physical ,Young Adult ,Spatial network ,ddc:570 ,Statistics ,Humans ,Computer Simulation ,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics ,Institut für Biochemie und Biologie ,Mathematics ,Network model ,Models, Statistical ,Geography ,Human migration ,business.industry ,Null model ,Simulation modeling ,General Medicine ,Body Height ,Secular variation ,Military Personnel ,Anthropology ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Centrality ,business ,Monte Carlo Method ,Switzerland - Abstract
Background: In a recent Monte Carlo simulation, the clustering of body height of Swiss military conscripts within a spatial network with characteristic features of the natural Swiss geography was investigated. In this study I examined the effect of migration of tall individuals into network hubs on the dynamics of body height within the whole spatial network. The aim of this study was to simulate height trends. Material and methods: Three networks were used for modeling, a regular rectangular fishing net like network, a real world example based on the geographic map of Switzerland, and a random network. All networks contained between 144 and 148 districts and between 265-307 road connections. Around 100,000 agents were initially released with average height of 170 cm, and height standard deviation of 6.5 cm. The simulation was started with the a priori assumption that height variation within a district is limited and also depends on height of neighboring districts (community effect on height). In addition to a neighborhood influence factor, which simulates a community effect, body height dependent migration of conscripts between adjacent districts in each Monte Carlo simulation was used to re-calculate next generation body heights. In order to determine the direction of migration for taller individuals, various centrality measures for the evaluation of district importance within the spatial network were applied. Taller individuals were favored to migrate more into network hubs, backward migration using the same number of individuals was random, not biased towards body height. Network hubs were defined by the importance of a district within the spatial network. The importance of a district was evaluated by various centrality measures. In the null model there were no road connections, height information could not be delivered between the districts. Results: Due to the favored migration of tall individuals into network hubs, average body height of the hubs, and later, of the whole network increased by up to 0.1 cm per iteration depending on the network model. The general increase in height within the network depended on connectedness and on the amount of height information that was exchanged between neighboring districts. If higher amounts of neighborhood height information were exchanged, the general increase in height within the network was large (strong secular trend). The trend in the homogeneous fishnet like network was lowest, the trend in the random network was highest. Yet, some network properties, such as the heteroscedasticity and autocorrelations of the migration simulation models differed greatly from the natural features observed in Swiss military conscript networks. Autocorrelations of district heights for instance, were much higher in the migration models. Conclusion: This study confirmed that secular height trends can be modeled by preferred migration of tall individuals into network hubs. However, basic network properties of the migration simulation models differed greatly from the natural features observed in Swiss military conscripts. Similar network-based data from other countries should be explored to better investigate height trends with Monte Carlo migration approach.
- Published
- 2017
50. Target specificity among canonical nuclear poly(A) polymerases in plants modulates organ growth and pathogen response
- Author
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Hjoerdis Czesnick, Michael Lenhard, Gerda Trost, William M. Gray, Christian Kappel, Thomas Laux, Son Lang Vi, Nishta Rao, James L. Manley, Peggy Lange, Diana Lieber, and Detlef Groth
- Subjects
Gene isoform ,Genetics ,Multidisciplinary ,Genotype ,Polyadenylation ,Arabidopsis Proteins ,Mutant ,Active Transport, Cell Nucleus ,Arabidopsis ,Polynucleotide Adenylyltransferase ,RNA ,Biological Sciences ,Biology ,Microarray Analysis ,Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction ,Substrate Specificity ,Plant Leaves ,Gene Expression Regulation, Plant ,Polynucleotide adenylyltransferase ,Mutation ,Gene expression ,RNA Precursors ,Polyadenylate ,RNA, Messenger ,Nuclear export signal - Abstract
Polyadenylation of pre-mRNAs is critical for efficient nuclear export, stability, and translation of the mature mRNAs, and thus for gene expression. The bulk of pre-mRNAs are processed by canonical nuclear poly(A) polymerase (PAPS). Both vertebrate and higher-plant genomes encode more than one isoform of this enzyme, and these are coexpressed in different tissues. However, in neither case is it known whether the isoforms fulfill different functions or polyadenylate distinct subsets of pre-mRNAs. Here we show that the three canonical nuclear PAPS isoforms in Arabidopsis are functionally specialized owing to their evolutionarily divergent C-terminal domains. A strong loss-of-function mutation in PAPS1 causes a male gametophytic defect, whereas a weak allele leads to reduced leaf growth that results in part from a constitutive pathogen response. By contrast, plants lacking both PAPS2 and PAPS4 function are viable with wild-type leaf growth. Polyadenylation of SMALL AUXIN UP RNA ( SAUR ) mRNAs depends specifically on PAPS1 function. The resulting reduction in SAUR activity in paps1 mutants contributes to their reduced leaf growth, providing a causal link between polyadenylation of specific pre-mRNAs by a particular PAPS isoform and plant growth. This suggests the existence of an additional layer of regulation in plant and possibly vertebrate gene expression, whereby the relative activities of canonical nuclear PAPS isoforms control de novo synthesized poly(A) tail length and hence expression of specific subsets of mRNAs.
- Published
- 2013
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