This study aimed to identify the types of foods that constitute a vegan diet and establish patterns within the diet. Dietary pattern analysis, a key instrument for exploring the correlation between health and disease, was used to identify patterns within the vegan diet.

A modified version of the EPIC-Norfolk FFQ was created and validated to include vegan foods and launched on social media.

UK participants, recruited online.

A convenience sample of 129 vegans voluntarily completed the FFQ. Collected data were converted to reflect weekly consumption to enable factor and cluster analyses.

Factor analysis identified four distinct dietary patterns including: (1) convenience (22 %); (2) health conscious (12 %); (3) unhealthy (9 %) and (4) traditional vegan (7 %). Whilst two healthy patterns were defined, the convenience pattern was the most identifiable pattern with a prominence of vegan convenience meals and snacks, vegan sweets and desserts, sauces, condiments and fats. Cluster analysis identified three clusters, cluster 1 ‘convenience’ (26·8 %), cluster 2 ‘traditional’ (22 %) and cluster 3 ‘health conscious’ (51·2 %). Clusters 1 and 2 consisted of an array of ultraprocessed vegan food items. Together, both clusters represent almost half of the participants and yielding similar results to the predominant dietary pattern, strengthens the factor analysis.

These novel results highlight the need for further dietary pattern studies with full nutrition and blood metabolite analysis in larger samples of vegans to enhance and ratify these results.

To test the feasibility of implementing and evaluating a healthier checkout pilot study in a convenience store chain.

A quasi-experimental study was conducted comparing a 3-month ‘healthier checkouts’ intervention in ten convenience stores which stocked eight healthier items in the checkout space and ten comparison stores assigned to continue stocking their current checkout space product mix. All aspects of the intervention were implemented by the retailer. The research team conducted in-person fidelity checks to assess implementation. Sales data were collected from the retailer in order to compare mean baseline to intervention sales of the eight healthier items in intervention and comparison groups while controlling for overall store sales.

Convenience store chain.

Twenty convenience stores in New Hampshire.

The increases in sales of healthier items between the baseline and intervention periods among the intervention and comparison stores were not statistically significant; however, the overall pattern of the results showed promising changes that should be expanded on in future studies. Intervention fidelity checks indicated that results may have been attenuated by variability in intervention implementation.

This study advances the evidence for effective promotion of healthier food purchases in the convenience store chain setting and adds to the current literature on retail checkout space interventions. Additional research is needed to confirm and expand these results.

There is an urgent need to identify and develop cross-sectoral policies which promote and support a healthy, safe and sustainable food system. To help shape the political agenda, a critical first step is a shared definition of such a system among policy makers across relevant sectors. The aim of the present study was to determine how Australian policy actors define, and contribute to, a healthy, safe and sustainable food system.

A Delphi survey, consisting of two rounds, was conducted. Participants were asked how they define, and contribute to, a healthy, safe and sustainable food system (Round 1) and indicate their level of agreement with summary statements (Round 2).

This was an online Delphi survey conducted in Australia.

Twenty-nine and fourteen multisectoral and multilevel policy makers completed Round 1 and Round 2, respectively.

The definition included food processing regulation, environmentally friendly food production and access to nutritious food. All agreed that it was important for them to improve access and supply of healthy food and ensure healthy planning principles are applied.

There were cross-sectoral differences in definitions and contributions; however, critical consensus was achieved. The study contributes to the definition of key elements of a cross-sectoral food and nutrition policy to meet today’s environmental, health, social and economic challenges; however, further research using a more representative multisectoral sample is warranted.

Brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) seems to play an important role in the course of depression including the response to antidepressants in patients with depression. We aimed to study the effect of an antidepressant intervention on peripheral BDNF in healthy individuals with a family history of depression.

We measured changes in BDNF messenger RNA (mRNA) expression and whole-blood BDNF levels in 80 healthy first-degree relatives of patients with depression randomly allocated to receive daily tablets of escitalopram 10 mg versus placebo for 4 weeks.

We found no statistically significant difference between the escitalopram and the placebo group in the change in BDNF mRNA expression and whole-blood BDNF levels. Post hoc analyses showed a statistically significant negative correlation between plasma escitalopram concentration and change in whole-blood BDNF levels in the escitalopram-treated group.

The results of this randomised trial suggest that escitalopram 10 mg has no effect on peripheral BDNF levels in healthy individuals.

Studies exploring relation of visual memory to white matter are extensively lacking. The Rey Visual Design Learning Test (RVDLT) is an elementary motion, colour and word independent visual memory test. It avoids a significant contribution from as many additional higher order visual brain functions as possible to visual performance, such as three-dimensional, colour, motion or word-dependent brain operations. Based on previous results, we hypothesised that test performance would be related with white matter of dorsal hippocampal commissure, corpus callosum, posterior cingulate, superior longitudinal fascicle and internal capsule.

In 14 healthy subjects, we measured intervoxel coherence (IC) by diffusion tensor imaging as an indication of connectivity and visual memory performance measured by the RVDLT. IC considers the orientation of the adjacent voxels and has a better signal-to-noise ratio than the commonly used fractional anisotropy index.

Using voxelwise linear regression analyses of the IC values, we found a significant and direct relationship between 11 clusters and visual memory test performance. The fact that memory performance correlated with white matter structure in left and right dorsal hippocampal commissure, left and right posterior cingulate, right callosal splenium, left and right superior longitudinal fascicle, right medial orbitofrontal region, left anterior cingulate, and left and right anterior limb of internal capsule emphasises our hypothesis.

Our observations in healthy subjects suggest that individual differences in brain function related to the performance of a task of higher cognitive demands might partially be associated with structural variation of white matter regions.

To describe the ‘Smart Lunch Box’ intervention and provide details on feedback from the participants on the acceptability and usability of the intervention materials.

A cluster randomised controlled trial, randomised by school. English schools were stratified on percentage free-school-meals eligibility and attainment at Key Stage 2. A ‘Smart Lunch Box’ with supporting materials and activities on healthy eating was delivered to parents and children via schools in the intervention group. Feedback forms containing information on a total of fifteen intervention items were filled out by the parents and/or children participating in the intervention and were collected after each of the three phases of the intervention.

Eighty-nine primary schools in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, randomly selected; forty-four schools in the intervention arm.

A total of 1294 children, aged 9–10 years, took part in the trial. Of the 604 children in the intervention arm, 343 provided feedback after at least one of the three phases.

A median of twelve items out of a total of fifteen were used by responders. The two intervention items most likely to be used were the individual food boxes and the cooler bags. Whether a participant liked an item significantly affected whether they used it for all items except the cooler bag, fruity face and individual food boxes.

Practical intervention items aimed at parents are likely to be used in the longer term and therefore may be appropriate for use in an intervention strategy to improve packed lunches.

Recent evidence suggests that dopamine (DA) agonist-induced disruption of prepulse inhibition (PPI) depends on basal PPI values, in a manner that suggests an inverted U-shaped relationship between PPI and prefrontal DA levels. This is the first study to examine possible genetic determinants of PPI and the catechol O-methyltransferase (COMT) Val158Met polymorphism, the main catabolic pathway of released DA in the prefrontal cortex (PFC).

PPI was measured in 93 healthy males presented with 75-dB and 85-dB prepulses at 60-ms and 120-ms prepulse–pulse intervals. Subjects were grouped according to their COMT status into a Val/Val, a Val/Met and a Met/Met group.

ANOVAs showed that at all prepulse and interval conditions, Val/Val individuals had the lowest PPI, Met/Met the highest, and Val/Met were intermediate.

These results suggest that PPI is regulated by DA neurotransmission in the PFC and its levels depend on the COMT Val158Met gene polymorphism. These findings enhance the value of the PPI paradigm in examining individual variability of early information processing in healthy subjects and psychiatric disorders associated with changes in PFC DA activity and attentional deficits such as schizophrenia.