Objective To investigate associations between single polymorphisms (SNPs) rs1800469 and rs1982073 in the transforming growth factor-β1 gene ( TGF-β1) and knee osteoarthritis (OA) susceptibility in a Chinese Han population. Methods TGF-β1 rs1800469 and rs1982073 were genotyped in patients with knee OA and age- and sex-matched OA-free controls from a Chinese Han population. The association was fu...

While much has been written about the medical, economic, and social causes of cross-national differences in some mortality related phenomena such as in life expectancy and infant mortality, much less attention has been given to maternal mortality, the focus of the present study. In the studies of maternal mortality that have been done, there has been very little effort to assess the potential r...

Cardiovascular risk can be calculated using the Framingham cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk score and provides a risk stratification from mild to very high CVD risk percentage over 10 years. This equation represents a complex interaction between age, gender, cholesterol status, blood pressure, diabetes status, and smoking. Heart rate variability (HRV) is a measure of how the autonomic nervous ...

OBJECTIVES Multiple sclerosis (MS) is an autoimmune demyelinating disease of the central nervous system (CNS) with unknown etiology. Various genetics and environmental factors contribute to the pathogenesis of the disease. The interleukin-7 receptor alpha chain (IL-7Ra) was identified as the first non-major histocompatibility complex (non-MHC) MS susceptibility locus. In this study we are tryin...

Socioeconomic, racial/ethnic, and gender inequalities in academic achievement have been widely reported in the US, but how these three axes of inequality intersect to determine academic and non-academic outcomes among school-aged children is not well understood. Using data from the US Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten (ECLS-K; N = 10,115), we apply an intersectionality approach to...

....................................................................................................v CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION...........................................................................1 Social Changes and Their Impacts on Gender Relations – A Case of the United States........3 Changes in Work and Family........................................................................3 Dem...

Abstract How and why does social origin matter for gender-segregated field of study choices? Analyses gender-(a)typical educational interests have framed differentials primarily through the lens socialization, resting on idea that children from socioeconomically advantaged families develop less gender-stereotypical via more egalitarian notions gender roles. The stratification literature, other ...