No abstract

Bisphenol A (BPA), a ubiquitous endocrine-disrupting chemical (EDC), is increasingly hypothesized to be a factor contributing to changes in fetal growth velocity. BPA exposure may be environmental, occupational, and/or dietary, with canned foods and plastic bottles contributing significantly. Our systematic review aims to evaluate the current literature and to investigate the role of BPA in abnormal fetal growth patterns. A search was conducted in the PubMed and Cochrane databases. A total of 25 articles met the eligibility criteria and were included in this systematic review. Eleven of them failed to show a clear relationship between BPA and abnormal fetal growth. The majority of the remaining studies (9/14) found an inverse association of BPA with indicators of fetal growth, whereas three studies suggested increased fetal growth, and two studies produced contradictory findings. Of note, both of the studies that collected a sample (amniotic fluid) directly reflecting BPA concentration in the fetus during the first half of pregnancy revealed an inverse association with birth weight. In conclusion, there is mounting evidence that combined exposure to BPA from dietary and non-dietary sources during pregnancy may contribute to abnormal fetal growth; a tendency towards fetal growth restriction was shown, especially when exposure occurs during the first half.

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In this paper, a multiservice, local-area, wireless access ATM system is explored from a signaling protocol viewpoint. The signaling architecture considered here follows the signaling structure of Broadband ISDN (B-ISDN) User-Network Interface (UNI), thus offering the possibility for integration of the wireless ATM access system into fixed B-ISDN. It is shown that the use of the employed signaling structure substantially simplifies the call/bearer and handover control. The evaluation of the signaling protocol architecture yields results, which fall within acceptable ATM signaling performance measures. A comparison with alternate access signaling configurations is also carried out to quantify the relative gains.