David Allison

• Indiana University Bloomington

A Scientific Integrity Consortium developed a set of recommended principles and best practices that can be used broadly across scientific disciplines as a mechanism for consensus on scientific integrity standards and to better equip scientists to operate in a rapidly changing research environment. The two principles that represent the umbrella unde...

In insects and other ectotherms, cold temperatures cause a coma resulting from loss of neuromuscular function, during which ionic and metabolic homeostasis are progressively lost. Cold adaptation improves homeostasis during cold exposure, but the ultimate targets of selection are still an open question. Cold acclimation and adaptation remodels mito...

Ouchi et al. [1] reported aggregated outcomes of four clinical trials that examined the effects of the SGLT2 inhibitor tofogliflozin (vs. placebo) on HbA1c and serum uric acid levels. The authors reported that the individuals with highest levels of HbA1c experienced greater reductions in HbA1c than did persons with lower baseline HbA1c levels withi...

Scientific progress depends on the quality and credibility of research methods. As discourse on rigor, transparency, and reproducibility joins the cacophony of nutrition information and misinformation in mass media, buttressing the real and perceived reliability of nutrition science is more important than ever. This broad topic was the focus of a 2...

Increased rates of obesity have occurred within virtually every race, age, sex, ethnicity, and economic group. Despite substantial punditry on the issue, the exact reasons are incompletely known. The two most common factors cited as contributing to the obesity epidemic, and those whose causal influence on increasing obesity levels in the population...

International Journal of Obesity accepted article preview online, 12 December 2017. doi:10.1038/ijo.2017.298.

Potential obesity-related policy approaches have recently been receiving more attention. While some have been implemented and others only proposed, few have been formally evaluated. We discuss the relevance, and in some cases irrelevance, of some of the types of evidence that are often brought to bear in considering obesity-related policy decisions...

Background: Much is to be learnt about human breast milk (HBM). Objectives: The purpose of this study is to extend our knowledge of HBM by investigating the role of maternal body mass index (BMI), sex and stage of lactation (month 1 vs. 6) on HBM insulin, glucose, leptin, IL-6 and TNF-α and their associations with infant body composition. Metho...

When we rely on science to inform decisions about matters such as the environment, teaching strategies, economics, government, and medicine, evidence- based decision- making can only be as reliable as the totality of the science itself. We must avoid distortions of the scientific literature such as publication bias, which is an expected systematic...

Oxidative damage caused by reactive oxygen species has been hypothesised to underpin the trade-off between reproduction and somatic maintenance, i.e., the life-history-oxidative stress theory. Previous tests of this hypothesis have proved equivocal, and it has been suggested that the variation in responses may be related to the tissues measured. He...

Being able to rapidly detect a low air flow rate with high accuracy is essential for various applications in the automotive and biomedical industries. We have developed a thermal-based low air flow sensor with a low-power sensor readout for biomedical applications. The thermal-based air flow sensor comprises a heater and three pairs of temperature...

Metabolic flexibility is an important component of adaptation to stressful environments, including thermal stress and latitudinal adaptation. A long history of population genetic studies suggest that selection on core metabolic enzymes may shape life histories by altering metabolic flux. However, the direct relationship between selection on thermal...

A list of candidates used in the reverse genetic screen of protein preference. The list is showing the genotype or treatment of candidates in descending orders of average preference index (PI). The summary of PI and candidate is graphically depicted in Figure 2A. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.16843.017

Summary statistics of samples represented in Time-dependent preference index (PI) plots. The list is showing genotype, cumulative PI, standard error of mean (SEM), and sample size (N) of the flies used in figures as noted. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.16843.018

ELife digest Limiting the amount of protein eaten, while still eating enough to avoid starving, has an unexpected effect: it can slow down aging and extend the lifespan in many animals from flies to mice. Previous work suggests that how an animal perceives food can also influence how fast the animal ages. For example, both flies and worms actually...

Background: Obesity is a global health concern but the United States has reported a leveling in obesity rates in the pediatric population. Objective: To provide updated waist circumference (WC) percentile values, identify differences across time and discuss differences within the context of reported weight stabilization in a nationally represent...

Metabolic cold adaptation is a pattern where ectotherms from cold, high-latitude, or -altitude habitats have higher metabolic rates than ectotherms from warmer habitats. When found, metabolic cold adaptation is often attributed to countergradient selection, wherein short, cool growing seasons select for a compensatory increase in growth rates and d...

Objective: This study assessed the prevalence and consistency of high values of weight, height, and BMI considered to be biologically implausible (BIV) using cut points proposed by WHO among 8.8 million low-income children (13.7 million observations). Methods: Cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses were performed among 2- to 4-year-olds who w...

Social justice issues remain some of the most pressing problems in the United States. One aspect of social justice involves the differential treatment of demographic groups in the criminal justice system. While data consistently show that Blacks and Hispanics are often treated differently than Whites, one understudied aspect of these disparities is...

Metabolic flexibility is an important component of adaptation to stressful environments, including thermal stress and latitudinal adaptation. A long history of population genetic studies suggest that selection on core metabolic enzymes may shape life histories by altering metabolic flux. However, the direct relationship between selection on thermal...

Metabolic flexibility is an important component of adaptation to stressful environments, including thermal stress and latitudinal adaptation. A long history of population genetic studies suggest that selection on core metabolic enzymes may shape life histories by altering metabolic flux. However, the direct relationship between selection on thermal...

Deriving statistical models to predict one variable from one or more other variables, or predictive modeling, is an important activity in obesity and nutrition research. To determine the quality of the model, it is necessary to quantify and report the predictive validity of the derived models. Conducting validation of the predictive measures provid...

Background: It has not been established whether control conditions with large weight losses (WLs) diminish expected treatment effects in WL or prevention of weight gain (PWG) randomized controlled trials (RCTs). Subjects/methods: We performed a meta-analysis of 239 WL/PWG RCTs that include a control group and at least one treatment group. A maxi...

Background: The WHO cutoffs to classify biologically implausible values (BIVs) for weight, height, and weight-for-height in children and adolescents are widely used in data cleaning. Objectives: We assess 1) the prevalence of these BIVs, 2) whether they were consistent with information on waist circumference, arm circumference, and leg lengths,...

Recent epidemiological and ecological trends in humans indicate a possible causal relationship between sleep duration and energy balance. We aimed to find experimental evidence that has tested this relationship between sleep duration and measures of body composition, food intake or biomarkers related to food intake. We conducted a systematic litera...

International Journal of Obesity is a monthly, multi-disciplinary forum for papers describing basic, clinical and applied studies in biochemistry, genetics and nutrition, together with molecular, metabolic, psychological and epidemiological aspects of obesity and related disorders

BACKGROUND High throughput meta‐research methods have made large meta‐research questions feasible, possibly at the cost of accuracy. We predict that double sampling with multiple imputation (DS+MI) will result in a precise and accurate estimate of adherence to CONSORT title and abstract guidelines. METHODS We retrieved all PubMed entries with filt...

That one or multiple measures of metabolic rate may be robustly associated with, or possibly even causative of, the progression of aging-resultant phenotypes such as lifespan is a long-standing, well-known mechanistic hypothesis. To broach this hypothesis, we assessed metabolic function and spontaneous locomotion in two genetic and one dietary mous...

Background Researchers and participants' expectations can influence treatment response. Less is known about the effects of researchers' expectations on the accuracy of data collection in the context of a weight loss trial.Methods Student raters (N = 58; age = 20.1 ± 2.3 years) were recruited to weigh individuals who they thought were completing a 1...

We want to thank Dr. Brown and his colleagues for their letter and for recalculating the estimated weight effects of varying caloric reductions in kids' meals with toy giveaways according to updated estimates for weight prediction. It is regrettable that Dr. Hall's study, “Dynamics of childhood growth and obesity: Development and validation of a qu...

Energy intake (EI) and physical activity energy expenditure (PAEE) are key modifiable determinants of energy balance, traditionally assessed by self-report despite its repeated demonstration of considerable inaccuracies. We argue here that it is time to move from the common view that self-reports of EI and PAEE are imperfect, but nevertheless deser...

Background: Public health and clinical interventions for obesity in free-living adults may be diminished by individual compensation for the intervention. Approaches to predict weight outcomes do not account for all mechanisms of compensation, so they are not well suited to predict outcomes in free-living adults. Our objective was to quantify the r...

We evaluated whether the obesity-associated years of life lost (YLL) have decreased over calendar time. We implemented a meta-analysis including only studies with two or more serial body mass index (BMI) assessments at different calendar years. For each BMI category (normal weight: BMI 18.5 to <25 [reference]; overweight: BMI 25 to <30; grade 1 obe...

We sought to evaluate whether residence at high altitude is associated with the development of obesity among those at increased risk of becoming obese. Obesity, a leading global health priority, is often refractory to care. A potentially novel intervention is hypoxia, which has demonstrated positive long-term metabolic effects in rats. Whether or n...

Aim: Body composition changes among elite athletes may influence competitive performance. This study aimed to characterize the body composition changes at the molecular, cellular, tissue, and whole-body level of analysis in elite junior basketball players during the course of a season. Methods: Twelve males and 11 females (16 to 17 years) were e...

Objective State-level estimates of obesity based on self-reported height and weight suggest a geographic pattern of greater obesity in the Southeastern US; however, the reliability of the ranking among these estimates assumes errors in self-reporting of height and weight are unrelated to geographic region. Design and Methods We estimated regional...

Obesity is a global public health problem that is linked with morbidity, mortality, and functional limitations and has limited options for sustained interventions. Novel targets for prevention and intervention require further research into the pathogenesis of obesity. Consistently, elevated markers of inflammation have been reported in association...

Four agents - acarbose (ACA), 17-α-estradiol (EST), nordihydroguaiaretic acid (NDGA), and methylene blue (MB) - were evaluated for lifespan effects in genetically heterogeneous mice tested at three sites. Acarbose increased male median lifespan by 22% (P < 0.0001), but increased female median lifespan by only 5% (P = 0.01). This sexual dimorphism i...

Study-level design characteristics that inform the optimal design of obesity randomized controlled trials (RCTs) have been examined in few studies. A pre-randomization run-in period is one such design element that may influence weight loss. We examined 311 obesity RCTs published between 1 January 2007 and 1 July 2009 that examine d weight loss or w...

The development of nutrition and health guidelines and policies requires reliable scientific information. Unfortunately, theoretical considerations and empirical evidence indicate that a large percentage of science-based claims rely on studies that fail to replicate. The session "Strategies to Optimize the Impact of Nutrition Surveys and Epidemiolo...

Objective Obesity, which is frequently associated with diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular diseases, is primarily the result of a net excess of caloric intake over energy expenditure. Human obesity is highly heritable, but the specific genes mediating susceptibility in non-syndromic obesity remain unclear. We tested candidate genes in pathwa...

We provide arguments to the debate question and update a previous meta-analysis with recently published studies on effects of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) on body weight/composition indices (BWIs). We abstracted data from randomized controlled trials examining effects of consumption of SSBs on BWIs. Six new studies met these criteria: (i) human...

Setting realistic weight loss goals may play a role in weight loss. We abstracted data from randomized controlled trials and observational studies conducted between 1998 and 2012 concerning the association of weight loss goals with weight loss. Studies included those that (i) were conducted in humans; (ii) delivered a weight loss intervention; (iii...

Objective The Medifast 5 & 1 Plan (MD) is a portion-controlled, nutritionally-balanced, low-fat weight-loss plan. We studied the effects of MD compared with a reduced-energy, food-based diet (FB) on body weight, waist circumference, fat mass, and other measures in adults. Design We conducted a 2 parallel-arm, randomized, controlled trial comparing...

Chinese are reported to have a higher percent body fat (%BF) and a higher percent trunk fat (%TF) than whites for a given body mass index (BMI). However, the associations of these ethnic differences in body composition with metabolic risks remain unknown. A total of 1 029 Chinese from Hangzhou, China, and 207 whites from New York, NY, USA, were rec...

Background: Obese individuals who have failed to achieve adequate weight loss with lifestyle changes have limited nonsurgical therapeutic options. We evaluated the efficacy and tolerability of zonisamide, an antiepileptic drug, for enhancing weight loss in obese patients receiving diet and lifestyle guidance. Methods: This was a 1-year, randomiz...

Globally, obesity and the related health consequences associated with excess body fat (heart disease and diabetes) continue to be a major public health problem. A healthy diet containing adequate protein may help people reduce energy intake, and during weight loss, protein can help preserve muscle mass that is often lost. Consumption of soy protein...

Background: The genetic predisposition to obesity may have contributed to the obesity epidemic through assortative mating. We investigated whether spouses were positively assorted by body mass index (BMI; = kg/m²) in late childhood, and whether changes in assorted marriage by upper BMI-percentiles occurred during the obesity epidemic. Methods: In t...

The application of low-calorie sweeteners (LCS) in foods and beverages has increased over the past 35 y. At the same time, many characteristics of the American diet have changed, including variations in fat and carbohydrate content and composition, increased nutrient additions, and new dietary patterns due to changing lifestyles and attitudes towar...

Odds ratios (ORs) are widely used in scientific research to demonstrate the associations between outcome variables and covariates (risk factors) of interest, and are often described in language suitable for risks or probabilities, but odds and probabilities are related, not equivalent. In situations where the outcome is not rare (e.g., obesity), OR...

The objective of this study was to determine the accuracy, precision, bias, and reliability of percent fat (%fat) determined by air-displacement plethysmography (ADP) with the pediatric option against the four-compartment model in 31 children (4.1 ± 1.2 years, 103.3 ± 10.2 cm, 17.5 ± 3.4 kg). %Fat was determined by (BOD POD Body Composition System;...

International Journal of Obesity is a monthly, multi-disciplinary forum for papers describing basic, clinical and applied studies in biochemistry, genetics and nutrition, together with molecular, metabolic, psychological and epidemiological aspects of obesity and related disorders

Children differ greatly in their ability to self-regulate food intake for reasons that are poorly understood. This laboratory-based twin study tested the genetic and environmental contributions to self-regulatory eating and body fat in early childhood. A total of 69 4-7 year-old same-sex twin pairs, including 40 monozygotic and 29 dizygotic pairs,...

Statistics in Human Genetics and Molecular Biology (C. Reilly) Xiang‐Yang Lou and David B. Allison Meta‐Analysis and Combining Information in Genetics and Genomics (R. Guerra and D. R. Goldstein) Peter H. Westfall Multivariate Nonparametric Methods with R. An Approach Based on Spatial Signs and Ranks (H. Oja) Mia Hubert Bayesian Analysis for Popula...

We examined ethnic difference in the association of body fat and trunk fat with bone mineral density (BMD) among Chinese, white, and black subjects. We found that, with greater body and trunk fat, both white and black subjects were more likely to have a low BMD than Chinese subjects. Ethnic differences in body fat, abdominal fat distribution, and B...

Faithful and complete reporting of trial results is essential to the validity of the scientific literature. An earlier systematic study of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) found that industry-funded RCTs appeared to be reported with greater quality than non-industry-funded RCTs. The aim of this study was to examine the association between system...

The close correspondence between energy intake and expenditure over prolonged time periods, coupled with an apparent protection of the level of body adiposity in the face of perturbations of energy balance, has led to the idea that body fatness is regulated via mechanisms that control intake and energy expenditure. Two models have dominated the dis...

To evaluate the association between body mass index (BMI, kg m⁻²) and mortality rate among Hispanic adults. Analysis of five data sets (total N=16,798) identified after searching for publicly available, prospective cohort data sets containing relevant information for at least 500 Hispanic respondents (≥18 years at baseline), at least 5 years of mor...

Obesity is highly prevalent throughout the world. Although modified-carbohydrate diets (MCDs) comprise one popular approach, questions remain about their utility for weight loss. The objective of the present study was to conduct a meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) of a specific MCD compared with various control diets on weight lo...

Anthropometric-based classification schemes for excess adiposity do not include direct assessment of obesity-related comorbidity and functional status and thus have limited clinical utility. We examined the ability of the Edmonton obesity staging system, a 5-point ordinal classification system that considers comorbidity and functional status, in pr...

HIV susceptibility and pathogenicity exhibit both interindividual and intergroup variability. The etiology of intergroup variability is still poorly understood, and could be partly linked to genetic differences among racial/ethnic groups. These genetic differences may be traceable to different regimes of natural selection in the 60,000 years since...

Nutritively sweetened beverages (NSBs) may play a role in the obesity epidemic. We abstracted data from randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and evidence-based reviews through January 2009 concerning effects of consumption of NSBs on changes in body weight and adiposity. Studies included were those (i) conducted in humans; (ii) lasting at least 3 we...

Many large-scale epidemiological data sources used to evaluate the body mass index (BMI: kg/m(2)) mortality association have relied on BMI derived from self-reported height and weight. Although measured BMI (BMI(M)) and self-reported BMI (BMI(SR)) correlate highly, self-reports are systematically biased. To rigorously examine how self-reporting bia...

Mutans streptococci (MS) are key organisms associated with the etiology of dental caries. Using probabilities that were tested by oversampling, we designed this study to determine the minimal number of MS isolates from an individual required to evaluate diversity of genotypes. MS isolates were genotyped by repetitive extragenic palindromic-polymera...

Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) in obesity are plagued by missing data due to participant dropouts. Most methodologists and regulatory bodies agree that the primary analysis of such RCTs should be based on the intent-to-treat (ITT) principle, such that all randomized subjects are included in the analysis, even those who dropped out. Unfortunate...

International Journal of Obesity is a monthly, multi-disciplinary forum for papers describing basic, clinical and applied studies in biochemistry, genetics and nutrition, together with molecular, metabolic, psychological and epidemiological aspects of obesity and related disorders

Cardiovascular disease has a progressively earlier age of onset, and disproportionately affects African Americans (AAs) in the United States. It has been difficult to establish the extent to which group differences are due to physiological, genetic, social or behavioural factors. In this study, we examined the association between blood pressure and...

Obesity and motor vehicle crash (MVC) injuries are two parallel epidemics in the United States. An important unanswered question is whether there are sex differences in the associations between the presence of obesity and non-fatal MVC injuries. To further understand the association between obesity and non-fatal MVC injuries, particularly the sex d...

To assess the inappropriate use of causal language in studies on obesity and nutrition. Titles and abstracts of 525 peer-reviewed papers in the 4 leading journals in the fields of obesity and nutrition were scrutinized for language implying causality in observational studies published in 2006. Such misleading language appeared in 161 papers (31%) i...

Objective The health and longevity effects of body weight reduction resulting from exercise and caloric restriction in rodents are well known, but less is known about whether similar effects occur with weight reduction from the use of a pharmaceutical agent such as sibutramine, a serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor. Results & Conclusion Us...

Breast cancer is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in women and its metastatic spread is the principal reason behind the fatal outcome. Metastasis-related research of breast cancer is however underdeveloped when compared with the abundant literature on primary tumors. We applied an unexplored approach comparing at high resolution the genomic...

Current clinical guidelines and public health statements generically prescribe body mass index (BMI; kg m(-2)) categories regardless of the individual's situation (age, risk for diseases, and so on). However, regarding BMI and mortality rate, two well-established observations are (1) there is a U-shaped (that is, concave) association-people with in...

Delineating the genetic basis of body composition is important to agriculture and medicine. In addition, the incorporation of gene-gene interactions in the statistical model provides further insight into the genetic factors that underlie body composition traits. We used Bayesian model selection to comprehensively map main, epistatic and sex-specifi...

To examine the association between physical fitness, assessed according to ability and time to complete a 400-m walk, on changes in body composition and muscle strength over a 7-year period. Prospective observational cohort study. Memphis, Tennessee, and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Two thousand nine hundred forty-nine black and white men and women ag...

Obesity is recognized as a contributor to health maladies and premature death for millennia and, given the worldwide increase in the prevalence of obesity, is currently one of the greatest public health challenges of the twenty-first century. Apart from obesity’s association with diseases in virtually every major organ system, it also adversely aff...

'White hat bias' (WHB) (bias leading to distortion of information in the service of what may be perceived to be righteous ends) is documented through quantitative data and anecdotal evidence from the research record regarding the postulated predisposing and protective effects of nutritively sweetened beverages and breastfeeding, respectively, on ob...

The purpose of this study was to examine whether prior evidence of an inverse relationship between initial body weight and subsequent antipsychotic-induced weight change represents true effect modification or a statistical artifact, regression to the mean (RTM). We conducted a post-hoc analysis after pooling seven randomized, placebo- or active-con...