When one says yes and the other says no; does calcineurin participate in physiologic cardiac hypertrophy?

Graduate prospects explain undergraduate program standing in university league sports science tables

UK university undergraduate programs are compared by independent subject-specific rankings (Complete, Guardian, and Times), based on data from the National Student Survey, Higher Education Statistics Agency, Universities and Colleges Admissions Service, Research Excellence Framework, and the universities. The sports and exercise science program at the University of Glasgow has steadily risen to currently rank as the top UK program. This investigation aimed to identify the underlying factors that explain this. Therefore, we obtained underlying scores for entry standard, student satisfaction, research foundation, graduate prospects, staff-to-student ratio, expenditure/student, continuation, program support to students, and teaching quality from the ranking providers for years 2010-2024, and statistically modeled which factors significantly affected the rankings. We found that entry standards and graduate prospects strongly correlated significantly with ranking results. Principal component analysis indicated that a model of graduate prospects and entry standards explained 66.2% of the variance in ranking results. Multiple linear regression with all underlying factors included in the model indicated they explained 78% (R2 = 0.78) of the total variance, while stepwise elimination of insignificant factors identified graduate prospects as the sole factor that significantly affected outcome by explaining 71% (R2 = 0.71) of the variance. Therefore, the primary predictor of ranking success in UK university league tables for sports science is graduates' professional success (graduate prospects).NEW & NOTEWORTHY University rankings are used by applicants and stakeholders to judge programs, including undergraduate studies. In the rankings, undergraduate UK programs are compared and contrasted against each other based on how they score for criteria that affect student life and future prospects. Here, we determined the relative influence of those criteria and found that graduate prospects, how students professionally benefit from their study after graduation, is the factor that matters most for the ranking results.

Association of the rs3039851 Insertion/Deletion in the Gene PPP3R1, Which Encodes the Regulatory Calcineurin Subunit B Type 1, with Left Ventricular Mass in Polish Full-Term Newborns

BACKGROUND

The five base-pair (bp) insertion/deletion (rs3039851) polymorphism in the PPP3R1 gene, which encodes calcineurin subunit B type 1, has been found to be associated with left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) in hypertensive patients and in athletes. The aim of this study is to analyze the possible association between PPP3R1:rs3039851 polymorphism and left ventricular mass (LVM) in full-term healthy newborns.

METHODS

The study group consisted of 162 consecutive, full-term, healthy newborns. Two-dimensional M-mode echocardiography was used to assess LVM. The PPP3R1:rs3039851 polymorphism was identified by PCR-RFLP in genomic DNA extracted from cord blood leukocytes.

RESULTS

No significant differences were found between newborns homozygous for the reference allele (5I/5I, n = 135) and newborns carrying at least one 5D allele (n = 27) for LVM standardized for body mass, body length or body surface area (LVM/BM, LVM/BL or LVM/BSA, respectively). However, the frequency of PPP3R1:rs3039851 genotypes with a 5D allele (5I/5D + 5D/5D) among newborns with the largest LVM/BM or LVM/BSA (upper tertile) was statistically significantly higher compared with the prevalence in individuals with the lowest values of both indices (lower tertile).

CONCLUSIONS

Our results suggest that the PPP3R1:rs3039851 polymorphism may contribute to subtle variation in left ventricular mass at birth.