Associations of body shapes with insulin resistance and cardiometabolic risk in middle-aged and elderly Chinese

Background We aimed to define refined body shapes by using multiple anthropometric traits that represent fat distribution, and evaluate their associations with risk of insulin resistance (IR) and cardiometabolic disorders in a Chinese population. Methods We performed a cross-sectional analysis in 6570 community-based participants aged ≥ 40 years. Four body circumferences (neck, waist, hip, and thigh) and their ratios were put simultaneously into an open-source Waikato Environment for Knowledge Analysis platform to select the worthiest indicators in determining IR. The ratio of the top 3 fat distribution indicators was used to define the refined body shapes. Results We defined 8 distinct body shapes based on sex-specific combinations of waist-to-hip ratio (WHR), waist-to-thigh ratio (WTR), and waist-to-neck ratio (WNR), which differed in participants’ distribution and risk of IR and related cardiometabolic disorders. In women, as compared to the low WHR-low WTR-low WNR shape, all body shapes were significantly associated with IR and related cardiometabolic disorders; while in men, the low WHR-high WTR-high WNR shape and the higher WHR related shapes were significantly associated with IR and related cardiometabolic disorders. Stratified by WHR, the results were consistent in women; however, no significant associations were detected in men. Conclusions We defined 8 distinct body shapes by taking WHR, WTR, and WNR, simultaneously into account, which differed in association with the risk of IR and related cardiometabolic disorders in women. This study suggests that body shapes defined by multiple anthropometric traits could provide a useful, convenient, and easily available method for identifying cardiometabolic risk.

Associations of Body Shapes with Insulin Resistance and Cardiometabolic Risk in Middle-aged and Elderly Chinese

Background: We aimed to define refined body shapes by using multiple anthropometric traits that represent fat distribution, and evaluate their associations with risk of insulin resistance (IR) and cardiometabolic disorders in a Chinese population. Methods: We performed a cross-sectional analysis in 6570 community-based participants aged ≥ 40 years. Four body circumferences (neck, waist, hip and thigh) and their ratios were put simultaneously into an open-source Waikato Environment for Knowledge Analysis platform to select the worthiest indicators in determining IR. The ratio of the top 3 fat distribution indicators were used to define the refined body shapes. Results: We defined 8 distinct body shapes based on sex-specific combinations of waist-to-hip ratio (WHR), waist-to-thigh ratio (WTR) and waist-to-neck ratio (WNR), which differed in participants’ distribution and risk of IR and related cardiometabolic disorders. In women, as compared to the low WHR-low WTR-low WNR shape, all body shapes were significantly associated with IR and related cardiometabolic disorders; while in men, the low WHR-high WTR-high WNR shape and the higher WHR related shapes were significantly associated with IR and related cardiometabolic disorders. Stratified by WHR, the results were consistent in women; however, no significant associations were detected in men. Conclusions: We defined 8 distinct body shapes by taking WHR, WTR, and WNR, simultaneously into account, which differed in association with risk of IR and related cardioembolic disorders in women. This study suggest that body shapes defined by multiple anthropometrics traits could provide a useful, convenient and easily available method for identification cardiometabolic risk.

The “Trickality” of Listening in Early Musical Trick Films

This chapter considers a small but distinct body of music-themed “trick films” that involve imaginative visualizations of music, sometimes also of the marvels and problems associated with new audio technologies. Exponents of the early “trick film” genre Georges Méliès and Segundo de Chomón saw the potential for film to facilitate both visual and audio-visual tricks, despite the medium’s material silence. The chapter suggests that the ubiquity of musical and vocal themes in early films, with sound visually materialized in imaginative ways, may reflect the fact that film-makers were struck by the inherent joke of the audio-visual incongruity created by a silent medium that displayed scenes taking place in a hearing world. These films often focused on new audio technologies, for which the opposite audio-visual relationship was true: sounds (re)produced by audio technologies lacked their visual source. For films involving sound reproduction subjects, there was a double incongruity—and perhaps, double the pleasure.

The role of the body in descriptions of emotions

This article presents the first systematic typological study of emotional expressions involving body parts at the scale of a continent, namely the Australian continent. The role of body parts in figurative descriptions of emotions, a well-established phenomenon across the world, is known to be widespread in Australian languages. This article presents a typology of body-based emotional expressions across a balanced sample of 67 languages, where we found that at least 30 distinct body parts occur in emotional expressions. The belly is by far the most frequent, and a dozen others also have significant representation. The study shows how the properties of these body parts – e.g., whether they are internal organs or visible facial parts – partly determine which historical scenarios led to their linguistic associations with emotions, and in turn, their semantic and figurative properties.

Post-Black Satire

This chapter collides the idiom of post-blackness with the dominant genre of the neo-slave narrative in contemporary African American literature. This distinct body of work—post-black neo-slave narratives—mines the historical scene of slavery in the mode of satire. Through absurd juxtapositions, surreal analogies, and farcical adventures, post-black satirists expose the contradictions of the insistence on the unending history of slavery amid declarations of a break from previous racial regimes. Viewing satire as the lens through which debates about race and postracialism articulate, the chapter explores how fictions by Paul Beatty and Mat Johnson combat the sentimental template of abolition and neo-abolition by refusing to collapse past and present. The chapter concludes with a look at what might be termed a post-black post-satire, as Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad (2016) stretches time and space to transform the slave narrative into a flexible portal to practices of exploitation worldwide.

“So we tell them”: articulating strong Black masculinities in an urban Indigenous community

There is a growing literature on Indigenous masculinities written by scholars in North America, Hawai‘i and New Zealand which draws on a variety of approaches. While there are signs of scholarly interest in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander masculinities in Australia, this has yet to translate into a distinct body of work. This article is a potential opening onto such a future corpus, foregrounding and privileging how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander men understand themselves. Interviews with 13 men, ranging in age from young teenagers through to Elders—among whom were Traditional Owners, school pupils, university students, community workers, health professionals and retirees—yielded a conception of Indigenous masculinities not concerned with recovering a lost masculinity. Rather, what was presented to us is a distinct conception of Indigenous masculinities rooted in place; a relationality motivated by an intergenerational sense of responsibility; a nuanced idea of “acting hard.”

The Evolution of the Discipline of Maqāṣid al-Sharī'ah in Islamic History

The discipline of Maqāṣid al-Sharī'ah is a body of knowledge that is both impactful and esteemed. It has existed in some shape or form since the time of the Prophet s.a.w. and his companions until the modern era. It ought to be said that this body of knowledge did not materialize at once. In fact, it has gone through various stages of evolution until it reached its current form as a distinct body of knowledge and turned into an academic discipline. Scholars started looking at this body of knowledge academically towards the beginning of the fourth century A. H. and beyond. Among the pioneers in this field were: Imam of al- Ḥaramayn al-Juwaynī in his book, al-Burhān fī Uṣūl al-Fiqh, then Imam al-Ghazālī in his book, al-Mustaṣfā fī Uṣūl al-Fiqh, then Imam Al-‘Iz bin ‘Abd al-Salām in his book, Qawā’id al-Aḥkām fī Maṣāliḥ al-Anām, and al-Shāṭibī in al-Muwāfaqāt, who is considered the reference in this discipline. Then came Ibn ‘Ashūr and his book, Maqāṣid al-SharīÑah al-Islāmiyyah; he is considered as the leader of this discipline in the modern age. In the context of the evolution and revival of modern Islamic thought and its major Islamic disciplines, there is increasing interest in the study of the higher objectives of Sharī'ah (Maqāṣid al-Sharī'ah) because it represents the fundamental values of Islam and its basic doctrines and legislative principles. It comprises the basic ingredients of permanency, uniformity, and harmony of the revival of Islamic thought in its myriad issues and dimensions. The interest in this field continues to rise to the extent that you can coin the term Maqaṣidic Revival in the various Islamic disciplines and thought.

Disruption of brain-derived neurotrophic factor production from individual promoters generates distinct body composition phenotypes in mice

Brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) is a key neuropeptide in the central regulation of energy balance. The Bdnf gene contains nine promoters, each producing specific mRNA transcripts that encode a common protein. We sought to assess the phenotypic outcomes of disrupting BDNF production from individual Bdnf promoters. Mice with an intact coding region but selective disruption of BDNF production from Bdnf promoters I, II, IV, or VI (Bdnf-e1−/−, -e2−/−, -e4−/−, and -e6−/−) were created by inserting an enhanced green fluorescent protein-STOP cassette upstream of the targeted promoter splice donor site. Body composition was measured by MRI weekly from age 4 to 22 wk. Energy expenditure was measured by indirect calorimetry at 18 wk. Food intake was measured in Bdnf-e1−/− and Bdnf-e2−/− mice, and pair feeding was conducted. Weight gain, lean mass, fat mass, and percent fat of Bdnf-e1−/− and Bdnf-e2−/− mice (both sexes) were significantly increased compared with wild-type littermates. For Bdnf-e4−/− and Bdnf-e6−/− mice, obesity was not observed with either chow or high-fat diet. Food intake was increased in Bdnf-e1−/− and Bdnf-e2−/− mice, and pair feeding prevented obesity. Mutant and wild-type littermates for each strain (both sexes) had similar total energy expenditure after adjustment for body composition. These findings suggest that the obesity phenotype observed in Bdnf-e1−/− and Bdnf-e2−/− mice is attributable to hyperphagia and not altered energy expenditure. Our findings show that disruption of BDNF from specific promoters leads to distinct body composition effects, with disruption from promoters I or II, but not IV or VI, inducing obesity.