TUESDAY, June 16 (HealthDay News) -- Antioxidants play an important role in semen quality, according to new research from Spain.

The study found that "men with good semen quality ate more vegetables and fruit (more vitamins, folic acid and fiber and less protein and fats) than those men with low seminal quality," the lead author, Jaime Mendiola, a researcher at the University of Murcia, said in a news release.

Antioxidants, found mainly in fruits and vegetables, lower the level of oxidative stress that can affect semen quality, the researchers explained, and also improve sperm concentration and mobility.

The study included 61 men -- 30 with reproductive problems and 31 who did not have such issues. It appears online in the journal Fertility and Sterility.

An earlier study by the same team "showed that men who eat large amounts of meat and full-fat dairy products have lower seminal quality than those who eat more fruit, vegetables and reduced-fat dairy products," Mendiola said.

But the new study "found that people who consume more fruits and vegetables are ingesting more antioxidants, and this is the important point," Mendiola said. "A healthy diet is not only a good way of avoiding illness but could also have an impact on improving seminal quality."

"What we still do not understand is the difference between taking these vitamins naturally and in the form of supplements," the researcher added. "In the studies we are going to carry out in the United States (where the consumption of vitamins in tablet form is very common), we will be looking at the role of supplements."

More information

The U.S. National Institute of Child Health and Human Development has more about reproductive health.

THURSDAY, June 11 (HealthDay News) -- Postpartum anxiety may delay puberty in biological and adopted daughters, research on mice has found.

The study found that mice with low levels of the hormone prolactin in early pregnancy had substantial anxiety after giving birth and that their female offspring had delayed onset of puberty.

Prolactin, which is associated with lactation, is believed to protect against anxiety, according to a news release about the study from the Endocrine Society.

In the study, the researchers divided mice into four groups: mothers with normal prolactin and their offspring; mothers with low prolactin and their offspring; and two mixed groups, mothers with low prolactin raising female offspring of mice with normal prolactin levels, and mothers with normal prolactin levels raising the female offspring of mice with low levels of prolactin.

Puberty was delayed for the young mice in the low-prolactin group and in both mixed groups -- mice born to an anxious mother or raised by an anxious mother.

"Remarkably, puberty was still delayed even if the daughters of anxious mothers were raised by non-anxious mice," said lead study author Caroline Larsen, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand. "And delayed puberty also occurred in daughters born to non-anxious mothers who were raised by anxious mothers," she noted.

"Postpartum anxiety disorders are poorly understood and difficult to treat," Larsen said. "There is growing evidence that untreated anxiety disorder during pregnancy may contribute to premature birth and also can have major and lasting adverse effects on the infant's development and behavior," she added.

Women have a higher incidence of anxiety disorders during pregnancy and for two years after giving birth, noted Larsen.

The study was presented Wednesday at the Endocrine Society annual meeting in Washington, D.C.

The findings show that hormonal changes in early pregnancy, as well as changes in maternal behavior caused by these hormonal shifts, can alter brain development in the offspring and delay puberty, Larsen said.

Further research may show a similar mechanism occurs in humans.

"Finding the hormonal mechanisms that trigger the timing of puberty in mice may help identify potential targets for the prevention and treatment of delayed or early puberty in humans," she said.

Late puberty in humans is linked to shorter height and psychological problems, according to the study.

More information

Nemours   has more on delayed puberty.

SUNDAY, May 17 (HealthDay News) -- Raising hopes for the development of an AIDS vaccine that might actually work, researchers report they were able to protect monkeys against infection with simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV), the primate version of HIV.

They did so by using a novel approach that delivered antibody-producing genes directly to the animals' muscles. Typically, vaccines are aimed at ramping up the immune system to fight off infection, but this strategy eliminated that middle step.

"Traditional approaches toward developing an HIV vaccine that have worked for other viruses like influenza have just has not worked for HIV and, quite frankly, might not work for a long time or ever," explained the study's author, Dr. Philip R. Johnson, chief scientific officer at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and a professor of pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

"But Mother Nature has allowed us a few breaks, in that we know that in a very few cases, people who have been infected for a very long time have been able to naturally develop antibodies that neutralize a lot of the circulating virus," he said. "So, we thought perhaps we could take the genes that represent these antibodies 'off the shelf,' so to speak, give them directly to patients and, in essence, bypass the immune system."

"So, first we worked through mice and showed we could do it with mice," Johnson explained. "And now we've shown that we can actually transfer these genes into monkeys and protect these animals from SIV."

The findings are in the May 17 online issue of Nature Medicine.

The researchers' efforts focused on preventing SIV infection in nine macaque monkeys who were "immunized" against SIV by inserting genes already known to express anti-SIV antibodies directly into the monkeys' muscles.

Once the genes were injected, they prompted the muscles to produce antibodies that were released into the bloodstream and began attacking the SIV.

After being exposed to SIV four weeks later, six of the nine monkeys appeared to be fully protected from infection because they remained completely uninfected, and none of the nine immunized monkeys went on to develop AIDS or died from exposure to the virus, the researchers reported.

In contrast, six non-immunized monkeys exposed to SIV all became infected, and two-thirds died.

Johnson and his team concluded that their immunization strategy triggered the development of long-lasting and complete protection against SIV infection among monkeys.

"I'm not about to over-hype this," Johnson cautioned. "But we are continuing our work with monkeys in parallel with moving forward to begin human trials in two years, if everything goes perfectly with our work with the FDA to develop safety preparations, which is absolutely appropriate. And if the immunization trials work, then you have another few years to gear up. So, in the best of all possible worlds, you're looking at five years down the road for a practical benefit for patients. But, scientifically, we believe we are on the right track."

Rowena Johnston, director of research at the Foundation for AIDS Research in New York City, described the work as "one of the most interesting and potentially promising concepts to come out of the vaccine field in quite a while."

"They've cut straight to the chase and eliminated the middle man," she explained. "That is the really exciting thing they've done. We already all know that the traditional approaches to a vaccine won't work for HIV. And so HIV is a field where researchers are required to come up with ideas that nobody has needed to think about before, and that is where the challenge is. And here what they've done is to get antibodies to the virus themselves being produced directly, rather than waiting for the very slow-moving immune system to respond. And that is so elegant."

"Of course, the caveat is that this paper is a concept, and not yet a solution," Johnston noted. "But as concepts go, this is very, very interesting, even if it seems so obvious after you see it, like all good research."

More information

The World Health Organization has details on efforts to develop an HIV vaccine  .

SATURDAY, March 7 (HealthDay News) -- Grandparents might be known for spoiling grandchildren, but a new study says they might also be helping the kids improve their social skills and behavior.

Spending time with grandma and grandpa especially appears to help children from single-parent, divorced/separated or stepfamily households, according to the report, published in the February Journal of Family Psychology.

"Grandparents are a positive force for all families but play a significant role in families undergoing difficulties," the study's lead author, Shalhevet Attar-Schwartz, of The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, said in an American Psychological Association news release. "They can reduce the negative influence of parents separating and be a resource for children who are going through these family changes."

In interviewing 11- to 16-year olds from England and Wales, Attar-Schwartz and her team found that the more conversations the youths had with a grandparent, including asking for advice or even money, the better they got along with their peers and the fewer problems they had, such as hyperactivity and disruptive behavior.

"This was found across all three family structures," she said. "But adolescents in single-parent households and stepfamilies benefited the most. The effect of their grandparents' involvement was stronger compared to children from two biological parent families."

The study did not look at children who lived solely with their grandparents, though.

The findings have great implications for people in the United States, the authors said, because American grandparents are increasingly sharing living space with their grandchildren. A 2004 U.S. Census Bureau survey found that more than 5 million households include a grandparent and a grandchild under 18, up 30 percent since 1990, according to background information in the news release.

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about raising safe and healthy children.