Muscular fatigue in the training athlete or military recruit has been hypothesized to cause increased bone strain that may contribute to the development of a stress fracture. Under normal circumstances, muscles exert a protective effect by contracting to reduce bending strains on cortical bone surfaces. In vivo strain studies in dogs show that muscle fatigue following strenuous exercise elevates bone strain and changes strain distribution. However, a similar experiment has yet to be performed in humans. The purpose of this work was to test the hypothesis in humans that strenuous fatiguing exercise causes an elevation in bone strain. It was also hypothesized that this elevation is greater in younger people than in older people due to the decline in muscle strength and endurance that normally occurs with age. To test these hypotheses, strain in the tibiae of seven human volunteers was measured during walking before and after a period of fatiguing exercise. Neither hypothesis was sustained. Post-hoc analysis of the strain data suggests that strain rate increases after fatigue with a greater increase in younger as opposed to older persons. Although not conclusive, this suggests that it is strain rate, rather than strain magnitude, that may be causal for stress fracture.

Artemisia species have been extensively used for the management of diabetes in folklore medicine. The current study was designed to investigate the antidiabetic and antihyperlipidemic effects of Artemisia amygdalina. Petroleum ether, ethyl acetate, methanol, and hydroethanolic extracts of Artemisia amygdalina were tested for their antidiabetic potentials in diabetic rats. The effect of extracts was observed by checking the biochemical, physiological, and histopathological parameters in diabetic rats. The hydroethanolic and methanolic extracts each at doses of 250 and 500 mg/kg b. w significantly reduced glucose levels in diabetic rats. The other biochemical parameters like cholesterol, triglycerides, low density lipoproteins (LDL), serum creatinine, serum glutamate pyruvate transaminase (SGPT), serum glutamate oxaloacetate transaminase (SGOT), and alkaline phosphatise (ALP), were found to be reduced by the hydroethanolic and methanolic extracts. The extracts also showed reduction in the feed and water consumption of diabetic rats when compared with the diabetic control. The histopathological results of treated groups showed the regenerative/protective effect on β-cells of pancreas in diabetic rats. The current study revealed the antidiabetic potential of Artemisia amygdalina being effective in hyperglycemia and that it can effectively protect against other metabolic aberrations caused by diabetes in rats, which seems to validate its therapeutic traditional use.

This work aimed to appraise growth performance, immune responsiveness, bacterial disease resistance and mRNA expression of two antimicrobial peptides in Labeo rohita fingerlings fed diets supplemented with seaweed Sargassum wightii and its fucoidan-rich extract. Two hundred and twenty-five fingerlings were divided into five experimental groups in triplicates, each replicate having 15 fish in a 90-L tank. Different groups were fed with isonitrogenous (35% crude protein) and isoenergetic (1408.16 kJ/100 g) diets containing either 0% fucoidan-rich seaweed extract (FRSE), 1% FRSE, 2% FRSE, 3% seaweed powder and 6% seaweed powder for 60 days. Partial nucleotide sequences of the antimicrobial peptides, hepcidin and defensin, were characterized in Labeo rohita fingerlings, and gene expression in the different tissues of experimental fish was studied. The fish-fed FRSE-supplemented diets showed significant increase (P \ 0.05) in the mRNA expression of antimicrobial peptides in liver, skin and intestine tissues. Bacterial challenge study using Aeromonas hydrophila showed higher survival in the FRSE-fed groups. Fish-fed FRSE-supplemented diets also showed better non-specific immune response (NBT reduction, serum lysozyme activity, serum albumin: globulin ratio and phagocytic activity) in pre-challenge and post-challenge periods. No significant difference was observed in the growth performance in the different experimental groups. The study indicates that although dietary FRSE is a potential immunostimulant in Labeo rohita fingerlings, it does not improve growth performance.