The Vegan Evolution

Cultural evolution of cooperation: The interplay between forms of social learning and group selection

The prevalence of obesity in Egypt among young adults is high, particularly among females. Eating habits display general trends over time, reflecting sociocultural trends in food availability and nutritional knowledge and goals; lifestyle changes toward unhealthy dietary patterns such as high fast food consumption are becoming trendy among young adults. The purpose of this study was to assess the prevalence of overweight and obesity in a sample of students from the University of Pharos, Alexandria, Egypt (PUA) and to examine their eating habits. A cross-sectional survey of 398 university students (males and females) aged 18-26 years, who were chosen randomly from Pharos University campus during the spring semester 2016-2017. Students were asked to fill out a self-reported questionnaire that included questions on their eating, drinking and smoking habits, their weight, and height. Body mass index (BMI) was used to assess students' weight status. The results showed that 28.9% of the students were overweight, 11.8 % were obese, while (55.8%) were of normal weight (49.6% of males compared to 59.1% of females), and 3.5% were underweight. Eating habits of the students showed that the majority (80%) was taking meals irregularly. Almost half of students (45.7%) reported eating two meals per day (44.4% of females as compared to 48.2% males). About 57.6% of female students reported eating breakfast daily or three to four times per week compared to 55.3% male students. Two third of the student were taking snacks daily or three to four times per week (68.1% female vs. 71.6% males, with a statistically significant difference between males and females (p=0.034). Male students tend to eat more fruits daily as compared to females (39.7% vs. 36.2% respectively). Smoking was not common among students. The study concluded that obesity and overweight were prevalent among PUA college students, irregular and infrequent meals together with low vegetables intake and frequent snaking were the most common unhealthy eating habits of the participants. In terms of eating patterns, significant differences were observed between the two genders with respect to frequent snacking by males.

PurposeAlthough research on vegetarianism is becoming more prevalent, to date, only a few research has been conducted on relationship between vegetarian diet and orthorexia nervosa (ON). The objective of the present study was to examine the orthorexic dietary patterns and eating behaviours among individuals following a vegetarian, vegan, and meat diet. We examined the moderating role of ethical and health reasons for following a meat-free diet on the relation between vegan versus vegetarian diet and eating behaviours and ON. The study aimed to determine the predictors of ON in individuals with differential food preferences.MethodsSeventy-nine individuals following a meat-free diet and 41 individuals following an omnivore diet completed the EHQ and the TFEQ-R18.ResultsOur findings indicated that individuals following a vegan diet showed a higher level of knowledge of healthy eating than those who followed a vegetarian diet and those who followed an omnivore diet. Participants maintaining a vegan diet for health reasons were more likely to have greater knowledge about healthy eating. Cognitive restraint was a predictor of ON among a sample following a meat-free diet.ConclusionsOur results could contribute to identify potential risk factors for strict health-oriented eating patterns and to gain a better insight into ON.Level of evidenceLevel V, descriptive study.

Assessment of Anemia Prevalence Among Non-Pregnant Women in Urban Areas of Shanghai and Tokyo: A Retrospective Observational Study

Beliefs of Nutrition and Healthy Lifestyle among Women in a Hospital Setting Objective: Evaluate beliefs of nutrition and healthy lifestyle among a cohort of women. Methods: Between May and October 2012, women approached at a tertiary care Centre, completed a voluntary questionnaire regarding eating habits, nutritional intake and physical activity. Results: One thousand women completed questionnaire, majority were pregnant (73%). Only 45% consumed three meals per day, 70% did not eat breakfast, 48% ate dessert every day, 74% did not partake in any exercise and 62% took vitamins. Only 54% of the participants read the ingredients on food labeling. The majority (78%) of participants believed that pregnant women were required to double their food intake, and 59% did not know they need specific dietary requirements. Fifty-nine percent of the participants also believed that a healthy diet consisted of regular meals of fruit, vegetables, proteins and grains, and 60% believed that the five food groups were fat, protein, grains, dairy products, and fruit and vegetables. The vast majority (98%) of participants wanted to learn more about healthy eating and lifestyle habits. Conclusions: Significant proportions of women exhibit an unhealthy lifestyle habits, and had misconceptions regarding the constituents of a healthy lifestyle, and the additional dietary requirements that are recommend during pregnancy.

STEVEN McCulloch's recent article raises important and timely questions about the role of the veterinary profession in addressing climate change, public health and animal welfare (VR, 17/24 January 2026, vol 198, p 95). Few farm vets would dispute the scale of the challenges outlined, nor the need for science-led change across global food systems. Where many in the profession may wish to add nuance is in how those changes are framed, implemented and communicated – particularly in a UK context. Farm vets work at the intersection of animal health, food production and environmental stewardship every day. We see firsthand that ‘animal agriculture’ is not a single, homogeneous activity. Different farming systems have markedly different impacts, and UK livestock production – across ruminant, monogastric and mixed systems – operates within a very different environmental, regulatory and welfare framework from many intensive global models that often dominate international datasets. UK farmers manage around 70 per cent of the country's land, much of which is permanent pasture, unsuitable for cropping, but well suited to ruminant livestock. These systems can support biodiversity, maintain soil carbon, protect landscapes and convert grass into high-quality, nutrient-dense food. Alongside these land-based systems, other UK livestock sectors, including poultry, play a key role in providing affordable, efficient sources of high-quality protein within tightly regulated production frameworks. From a planetary health perspective, the issue is therefore not simply one of ‘less versus more’ meat, but of what kind of meat, produced how and where. Balanced diets that include appropriate amounts of meat and dairy are well supported by nutritional science, particularly when those foods are produced to high welfare and environmental standards. UK-reared meat has relatively low food miles for UK consumers. It is produced under some of the world's most stringent animal welfare and antimicrobial use regulations and is subject to continuous veterinary oversight. Across sectors, this includes ongoing efforts to improve environmental performance, such as reducing reliance on imported feed ingredients, improving feed efficiency, and lowering the carbon footprint of production systems. Replacing this food with imported alternatives – whether animal or plant based – risks exporting environmental impact rather than reducing it. Farm vets also recognise the progress already made. Antimicrobial use in UK livestock has fallen dramatically over the past decade, driven by close collaboration between farmers and vets, improved husbandry and better disease prevention. Welfare outcomes in many sectors have improved for the same reasons. These gains are rarely the result of blunt targets alone, but of sustained, sector-specific change supported by veterinary expertise. At a time of significant economic pressure on UK agriculture, it is also vital to consider resilience and food security. Supporting domestic production reduces reliance on imports from countries with lower welfare or environmental standards, helps maintain rural economies and preserves the skills and infrastructure needed to adapt farming systems for the future. This applies across all livestock sectors, including those with more intensive housing and supply chains that face distinct sustainability challenges. Championing UK farmers is not about protecting the status quo, but about enabling them to continue improving while remaining economically viable. The veterinary profession is well placed to lead a constructive, evidence-based conversation about sustainable diets – one that acknowledges the need for moderation, reduction of waste and improvement in production systems, while also recognising the value of responsibly produced animal-source foods. Many vets already advocate ‘less and better’ not as a defence of profit, but as a pragmatic route to higher welfare, lower environmental impact and better public trust. “Rather than framing the debate as a binary choice between meat reduction and professional integrity, there is an opportunity to emphasise shared objectives

The El Argar society of the Bronze Age in the southeast of the Iberian Peninsula (2200–1550 cal BCE) was among the first complex societies in Europe. Its economy was based on cereal cultivation and metallurgy, it was organized hierarchically, and successively expanded its territory. Most of the monumentally fortified settlements lay on steeply sloped mountains, separated by fertile plains, and allowed optimal control of the area. Here, we explore El Argar human diets, animal husbandry strategies, and food webs using stable carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis of charred cereal grains as well as human and animal bone collagen. The sample comprised 75 human individuals from the sites of La Bastida (n = 52) and Gatas (n = 23), 32 domesticated and wild animals as well as 76 barley and 29 wheat grains from two chronological phases of a total time span of ca. 650 years. The grains indicate extensive cereal cultivation under rain-fed conditions with little to moderate application of manure. Especially at La Bastida, crops and their by-products contributed significantly to the forage of the domesticated animals, which attests to a strong interrelation of cultivation and animal husbandry. Trophic level spacing and Bayesian modelling confirm that human diets were largely based on barley with some contribution of meat or dairy products. A cross-sectional analysis of bone collagen suggests that children were breastfed until about 1.5–2 years old, and infants from Gatas may have suffered from more metabolic stress than those at La Bastida. Adults of both sexes consumed similar diets that reflect social and chronological variation to some extent. Despite significantly higher δ13C and δ15N values at La Bastida than at Gatas, the isotopic data of the staple crops and domestic animals from both sites indicate that such differences do not necessarily correspond to different average human diets, but to agricultural strategies. These results urge for a reassessment of previous isotope studies in which only human remains have been taken into account. The study highlights that disentangling the complex influences on human isotope compositions requires a firm set of comparative data.

연구배경: 인간의 식습관은 유아기에 형성되며 이 시기의 식습관은 유아의 영양 상태에 직접적인 영향을 주게 되므로 미취학 아동의 식습관 형성이 매우 중요하다. 미취학아동의 식습관 형성은 가정생활, 학교생활, 대중매체에 의해 영향을 받으며 그 중 어머니가 가장 직접적인 영향을미친다. 즉 학령전기 아동 건강은 아동, 어머니, 환경적 특성의 상호작용의 결과이므로 아동의 식습관 형성을 위한영양교육 프로그램을 가정과 연계시켜 고안할 필요가 있다. 그러나 맞벌이의 증가로 부모에게 유아의 식습관 형성을 교육하는데 어려움을 겪고 있고 가정연계 활동을 적용하여 영양교육을 개발하는 것이 효과적임을 선행연구에서제안하고 있음에도 이를 실행에 옮기지는 못하였다. 이에본 연구에서는 아동의 바람직한 식습관 형성을 행동, 개인, 환경의 역동적인 상호작용을 강조하는 모델인 사회인지이론에 근거하여 프로그램을 개발하고 그 효과를 검정하고자 하였다. 방법: 본 연구의 설계는 유사 실험연구로서 비동등성 대조군 전-후 설계이다. 최종 분석에 포함된 연구대상은 참여를 동의한 아동과 그 부모로 실험집단 18명, 통제집단 16 명이었다. 본 연구의 개념적 틀인 사회인지이론의 개인적, 행동적, 환경적 측면의 주요한 요소를 토대로 각 요소가 프로그램 각 차시별 주제에 맞도록 고안하였다. 미취학 아동의 눈높이에서 다양한 방법과 자료를 활용하여 아동의 지루함을 막고 흥미를 유발해 참여도를 높일 뿐 아니라 프로그램의 목표달성에 유리하도록 구성하였다. 어린이 집의 여건에 맞추어 2, 3주에 한 번씩 10주간 진행한 각 차시별 교육의 주제는 식사 위생, 식사 예절, 음식과 성장, 음식과 건강으로 5회에 걸쳐 실시하였다. 프로그램 효과를 아동의 영양과 식습관 지식, 부모가 생각하는 아동의 식습관변화를통해 확인하였는데 프로그램 적용 전후의 차이 검정은 paired t-test로, 두 집단 간 차이 검정은 two-sample t-test를 사용하여 분석하였다. 결과: 프로그램 종료 후, 영양(t＝-2.74, P＝0.010)과 식습관 지식(t＝-3.67, P＜0.001) 점수는 실험집단의 점수가 통제집단에 비해 통계적으로 유의하게 높았다. 그러나 부모가 생각하는 자녀의 식습관 변화는 두 집단 간에 통계적으로 유의한 차이가 없었다(t＝1.13, P＝0.265). 결론: 본 연구결과는 추후 미취학 아동의 식습관 교육에서 하나의 근거자료로 활용될 수 있을 것이며, 지역사회 내대학과 어린이집이 상호 협조하여 미취학 아동의 바람직한식습관 형성을 돕는 영유아 건강증진사업의 일례로 활용될수 있을 것이다.

Food additives are factors in both health reason and food production. Sweeteners are utilized in large scale because of biochemistry, production, obesity, food structure, economy, functional property, and research and development efforts of food industry. Intake of high calorie nutrients such as sugar in the nutrition are important factors against increasing trends of obesity, cardiovascular disease and diabetes and some of chronic diseases. In healthy nutrition, the sufficient calorie intake must be recommended for basal metabolism and usual daily activities due to individual and environment conditions. Sweeteners are also food additives and using commonly for low calorie nutrition or from other reasons such as bulk of foods. natural sweeteners can be suggested such as stevia, together with balanced and low calorie diet including vegetables, and other food types due to diet originality that change in different societies, economies, regions and education levels of people. Traditional nutrition such as Mediterranean diet can be recommended for balanced diet. This topic was reviewed under light of literature.

On a global basis, eggs are one of the most recognized and accepted foods by consumers. They are naturally extremely nutritious and widely acknowledged as a great source of protein and selected vitamins and minerals. Numerous studies have demonstrated that the nutritional content of eggs can be easily and repeatedly modified to enrich them in various nutrients, making the eggs one of the most natural functional foods. A number of health benefits derived from the consumption of eggs enriched with omega-3, lutein, vitamin E and selenium have been clearly demonstrated in sound clinical studies and will be reviewed. For example, the consumption of omega-3 enriched eggs has been shown to have some positive effects during pregnancy and lactation of infants. Eggs with additional omega-3 were also shown to benefit patients already under medication to control high cholesterol levels. Finally, the ease and natural way to produce functional eggs are further strengths for their use in human nutrition. Unfortunately, while functional foods are more readily accepted when the base product is considered healthy, the attitudes of consumers towards eggs and especially on the issue of cholesterol still limit the use of functional eggs. Surveys in a number of countries demonstrate that consumers are extremely ambivalent about eggs, consuming more eggs and fewer eggs for the same health reasons! Other issues like the lack of visual differentiation of functional eggs, the consumer disbelief about information provided by marketers and the lack of enthusiasm by the medical profession to recommend the consumption of functional eggs are slowing the beneficial impacts that functional eggs can make for human health. However, with our aging population and the rising cost of health care, it is fair to consider that functional eggs can play a bigger role for human health. In addition, nutritional gaps like that created by the low consumption of fish in several Western societies create some opportunities for functional eggs enriched with omega-3. Regardless, consumer education along with that of health professionals will likely be one of the keys to the success of functional eggs for human health.

Concerns about calcium in hypertensive men: Author's reply

This paper embraces the future-open, anti-humanist sensibility of cyborgism from a societal perspective and locates the origin of the ongoing historical transformation of human identities and ways of life in the technology-induced transformation of societal communication dynamics. The evolution of language, and later of writing systems, is identified as crucial empowering engines of human productive cooperation and cultural evolution. Equally crucial for collective human self-transformation is the ever-evolving construction of artificial environments. Built environments are as much a human universal as language and all societal evolution depends on them as frames within which an increasingly complex social order can emerge and evolve. They constitute an indispensable material substrate of societal evolution. These built environments do not only function as physical ordering channels but also operate as information-rich spatio-visual languages, as a form of writing. This insight opens up the project of architectural semiology as task to radically upgrade the communicative capacity of the built environment via deliberate design efforts that understand the design of built environments primarily as the design of an eloquent text formulated by an expressive architectural language. The paper ends with a critical description of a recent academic design research project illustrating how such a semiological project can be conceived. Extrapolating from this leads the authors to speculate about a potentially far-reaching, new medium of communication and means of societal integration, facilitating a ‘cyborg super-society’.

Analysis of Food Safety and Security Challenges in Emerging African Food Producing Areas through a One Health Lens: The Dairy Chains in Mali

Mutagens in human urine: effects of cigarette smoking and diet

The production and availability of dairy and meat products of animal husbandry is the most important condition for a healthy diet of the country's population. The solution to the problem lies in the concentration of the industry in the forest zone, which is most favorable for the intensive use of mesophytic herbaceous vegetation, the main food resource for ruminants. The most important advantages of perennial herbaceous vegetation compared to annual vegetation are: productivity, feed quality and high return on anthropogenic costs, resistance to adverse environmental factors, adaptability, longevity, the possibility of permanent cultivation, anti-erosion resistance, reproduction of soil fertility, decarbonization [1–5]. When using perennial grasses in the hay-pasture regime, the cost of feed production is 1.5–2.7 times lower compared to annual crops [6; 7], which significantly increases the profitability of production. In general, forage resources, including extensive natural lands, make it possible to form a "dairy belt" of Russia with intensive animal husbandry. In fact, the production of dairy and meat products in the vast territory of the forest zone is the main competitive advantage of agricultural production.