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Day length may make geographical difference in body size and proportions: An ecological analysis of Japanese children and adolescents

There is a north-south gradient in the body heights of Japanese children. A hypothesis had previously been proposed that differences in thyroid hormone activity induced by geographical differences in effective day length (duration of photoperiod exceeding a predetermined light intensity) might cause...

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Autores principales: Yokoya, Masana, Higuchi, Yukito
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6342304/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30668608
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0210265
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author Yokoya, Masana
Higuchi, Yukito
author_facet Yokoya, Masana
Higuchi, Yukito
author_sort Yokoya, Masana
collection PubMed
description There is a north-south gradient in the body heights of Japanese children. A hypothesis had previously been proposed that differences in thyroid hormone activity induced by geographical differences in effective day length (duration of photoperiod exceeding a predetermined light intensity) might cause the differences in height. If thyroid hormone is involved, the effect should extend to body weight. This study examined whether geographical differences in body height and weight can be explained in terms of thyroid hormone activity induced by geographical differences in the photoperiodic environment using prefecture-level anatomical data and Japanese Mesh Climatic Data. Multiple regression analysis demonstrated that the combination of effective day length and weight was statistically significant as a predictor of height. Controlling for body weight revealed that effective day length was inversely correlated with height. Multiple regression analysis revealed that a combination of effective day length and height was statistically significant as a predictor of weight. Controlling for height demonstrated that effective day length was positively correlated with weight. Assuming an inverse correlation between effective day length and thyroid hormone activity, these results appear to show that short day-length will increase the activity of thyroid hormone and contribute to increasing height, but will inhibit weight gain; in contrast, long day-length will decrease the activity of thyroid hormone and contribute to increasing weight but will inhibit height gain. Geographical differences in height, and weight, and part of the prevalence of obesity in Japanese children and early adolescents may be explained by geographical differences in effective day length.
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spelling pubmed-63423042019-02-01 Day length may make geographical difference in body size and proportions: An ecological analysis of Japanese children and adolescents Yokoya, Masana Higuchi, Yukito PLoS One Research Article There is a north-south gradient in the body heights of Japanese children. A hypothesis had previously been proposed that differences in thyroid hormone activity induced by geographical differences in effective day length (duration of photoperiod exceeding a predetermined light intensity) might cause the differences in height. If thyroid hormone is involved, the effect should extend to body weight. This study examined whether geographical differences in body height and weight can be explained in terms of thyroid hormone activity induced by geographical differences in the photoperiodic environment using prefecture-level anatomical data and Japanese Mesh Climatic Data. Multiple regression analysis demonstrated that the combination of effective day length and weight was statistically significant as a predictor of height. Controlling for body weight revealed that effective day length was inversely correlated with height. Multiple regression analysis revealed that a combination of effective day length and height was statistically significant as a predictor of weight. Controlling for height demonstrated that effective day length was positively correlated with weight. Assuming an inverse correlation between effective day length and thyroid hormone activity, these results appear to show that short day-length will increase the activity of thyroid hormone and contribute to increasing height, but will inhibit weight gain; in contrast, long day-length will decrease the activity of thyroid hormone and contribute to increasing weight but will inhibit height gain. Geographical differences in height, and weight, and part of the prevalence of obesity in Japanese children and early adolescents may be explained by geographical differences in effective day length. Public Library of Science 2019-01-22 /pmc/articles/PMC6342304/ /pubmed/30668608 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0210265 Text en © 2019 Yokoya, Higuchi http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Yokoya, Masana
Higuchi, Yukito
Day length may make geographical difference in body size and proportions: An ecological analysis of Japanese children and adolescents
title Day length may make geographical difference in body size and proportions: An ecological analysis of Japanese children and adolescents
title_full Day length may make geographical difference in body size and proportions: An ecological analysis of Japanese children and adolescents
title_fullStr Day length may make geographical difference in body size and proportions: An ecological analysis of Japanese children and adolescents
title_full_unstemmed Day length may make geographical difference in body size and proportions: An ecological analysis of Japanese children and adolescents
title_short Day length may make geographical difference in body size and proportions: An ecological analysis of Japanese children and adolescents
title_sort day length may make geographical difference in body size and proportions: an ecological analysis of japanese children and adolescents
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6342304/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30668608
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0210265
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