Doctoral Dissertation Improvement: Female Adolescent Energy Expenditure in The Gambia

博士论文改进：冈比亚女性青少年能量消耗

• 批准号: 0925768
• 负责人: Peter Ellison
• 金额: $ 1.5万
• 依托单位: Harvard University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-09-01 至 2012-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0925768&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Improvement; Female; Adolescent

Intellectual Merit: The proposed research has three objectives, each of which makes timely and significant contributions to human biology. First, it develops activity monitoring with accelerometers as an innovative and non-invasive method for estimating energy expenditure in human ecology field studies. Second, it explores the relationship of energy expenditure profiles in adolescent females in a subsistence agricultural society to body composition and pubertal maturation. Third, it investigates whether the relationship between energy expenditure and adolescent development is modified by early life energy availability.The project takes advantage of a unique opportunity in The Gambia to directly address the effects of early life factors in a human population where differences in maternal energetic status during pregnancy are known. Between 1989 and 1994, the British Medical Research Council gave standardized nutritional supplements to a sub-set of pregnant women in the West Kiang District. This project follows up both the children of both supplemented and unsupplemented individuals to investigate the interaction of developmental and current energetic conditions on adolescent development.Broader Impact: Populations in developing nations show evidence of a shift over time toward sedentism and associated health problems, including obesity and diabetes. This study will help to establish a field technique capable of generating high-quality, comparative data on energy expenditure with minimal invasiveness and low cost. It will quantify energy expenditure in activity in a subsistence agricultural population and its relation to body composition and pubertal progression, providing an important comparison for urban industrial settings. It will constitute a rare randomized test of the impact of prenatal conditions on adolescent physiology and development. Furthermore, it will build capacity in an undergraduate research assistant, who will participate in data collection and complete a senior thesis, and in three Gambian field assistants in the West Kiang District, who will be learn accelerometer techniques. This doctoral dissertation research project will also provide training and development opportunities for a female graduate student.

智力价值：拟议的研究有三个目标，每个目标都对人类生物学做出及时而重大的贡献。首先，它开发了使用加速度计进行活动监测，作为一种创新且非侵入性的方法，用于估计人类生态学领域研究中的能量消耗。其次，它探讨了自给农业社会中青春期女性的能量消耗状况与身体成分和青春期成熟的关系。第三，它调查了能量消耗和青少年发展之间的关系是否会因生命早期能量的可用性而改变。该项目利用冈比亚的一个独特机会，直接解决早期生命因素对人口的影响，其中母亲能量的差异怀孕期间的状况是已知的。 1989年至1994年间，英国医学研究委员会向西江地区的部分孕妇提供标准化营养补充剂。该项目对补充和未补充个体的孩子进行跟踪调查，以调查发育状况和当前精力状况对青少年发育的相互作用。更广泛的影响：有证据表明，随着时间的推移，发展中国家的人口出现了久坐不动和相关健康问题（包括肥胖）的趋势和糖尿病。这项研究将有助于建立一种现场技术，能够以最小的侵入性和低成本生成高质量的能量消耗比较数据。它将量化自给农业人口活动中的能量消耗及其与身体成分和青春期进展的关系，为城市工业环境提供重要的比较。它将构成一项罕见的随机测试，探讨产前状况对青少年生理和发育的影响。此外，还将培养一名本科生研究助理的能力，他们将参与数据收集并完成高级论文，以及西江区的三名冈比亚现场助理，他们将学习加速度计技术。该博士论文研究项目还将为女研究生提供培训和发展机会。