[New approaches to primary differentiation of dyspnea in patients with pulmonary and cardiac pathology].

This study was aimed at searching new instruments for primary differentiation of dyspnea associated with lung or heart pathology. The study consisted of 3 stages and included analysis of "glossary dyspnea" of 482 patients aged 18-90yr. Stages i and II involved 359 patients with the known diagnosis: chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) (n=114, 31.8%), bronchial asthma (BA) (n=134, 3 7.3%), chronic heart failure (CHF) unrelated to lung pathology (n=111, 30.9%). The patients were 205 (57.1%) men and 154 (42.9%) women. Stage III involved 123 patients complaining ofdyspneapresumably ofpulmnonary or cardiac origin. 75 (61.0%) of these patients were men, 48 (39.0%) women aged 18-89 yr. Subsequent comprehensive diagnostics revealed BA in 47 (38.2%), COPD in 46 (37.4%), CHF in 30 (24.4%) patents. Stage I was designed to evaluate the dyspnea language based on the frequency of the phases of glossary dyspnea (Simon et al., 1999) and Fisher's Z criterion. It permitted to create the modified glossary dyspnea (MGD) consisting of 11i phrases and 7 clusters that revealed statistically significant differences between patients with BA, COPD, and CHE At stage II, we developed the model for estimating the probability of a priori diagnosis (PPD) as a possible cause of dyspnea based on the data of MGD and modified Bayesian classificator. At stage III, the PPD model was verified using blindly selected patients. Prior to verification, the patients filled MGD. The final diagnosis was specified in accordance with the national recommendations. on diagnostics of BA, COPD and CHE Comparison of the frequency of coincidence between preliminary (a priori) and definitive (a posteriori) diagnoses made it possible to evaluate sensitivity and specificity of the PPD model for BA, COPD, and CHF unrelated to lung pathology.

[Comparative evaluation of the health status of descendants of people residing in environmentally unfriendly regions by means of mathematical modeling].

The aim of the study was to evaluate reproductive health of descendants of people who experienced effects of adverse environmental factors, such as radiation and chemical contamination (the descendants themselves were unaffected by these factors). Reproductive health of women was assessed by mathematical modeling. Factors of greatest importance for the health status of the descendants were distinguished among the 76 ones studied. It was shown that reproductive health of the subjects descending from the people exposed to radiation deteriorated more significantly than of those whose ancestors were affected by chemical factors.

[The possibility of clinical diagnosis of non-massive pulmonary thromboembolism under conditions of limited availability of instrumental diagnostic tools].

The study included 105 patients with local segmental microcirculatory disturbances in the lungs and X-ray detectable pathologic changes of different localization or without them. The control group comprised 71 patients in whom perfusion scintiography revealed normal pulmonary circulation. Data on the patients' history, clinical and physical characteristics, results of laboratory analysis, functional-diagnostic, ultrasound and X-ray studies are presented. Discriminative analysis revealed significant differences between selected parameters that were used together with relevant canonical discrimination function coefficients to calculate "integral indices" characterizing clinical condition of individual patients. Their comparison in the affected and control patients allows to predict the probability of local segmental microcirculatory disturbances in the lungs and to enhance efficiency of diagnosis of non-massive thromboembolism of pulmonary artery.

Computer modeling of three-dimensional reconstruction algorithm of cathodoluminescence material properties, analysis of errors, and optimization of variable parameters.

Three-dimensional (3-D) reconstruction of cathodoluminescence (CL) properties of materials (Saparin et al. 1997) is a new nondestructive technique that measures quantum yield information of subsurface layers as a set of two-dimensional image sections. This technique is able to synthesize a 3-D image without destroying the sample. The basis for this technique is the fact that the electrons in scanning electron microscopy penetrate the sample at different depths with a variation of accelerating voltage. The detected CL emission integrates the information from the full volume occupied by the charge carriers. Estimating the errors that occur during the reconstruction process is complex since these errors are caused by necessary approximations, noise, and the imperfection of the 3-D reconstruction algorithm that is employed. An analysis of the factors that affect the accuracy of the technique has been made. The estimation of systematic errors and the optimization of variable parameters were calculated by computer modeling.

Kinetic model of imidazologlycerol-phosphate synthetase from Escherichia coli.

Based on the available experimental data, we developed a kinetic model of the catalytic cycle of imidazologlycerol-phosphate synthetase from Escherichia coli accounting for the synthetase and glutaminase activities of the enzyme. The rate equations describing synthetase and glutaminase activities of imidazologlycerol-phosphate synthetase were derived from this catalytic cycle. Using the literature data, we evaluated all kinetic parameters of the rate equations characterizing individually synthetase and glutaminase activities as well as the contribution of each activity depending on concentration of the substrates, products, and effectors. As shown, in the presence of 5 -phosphoribosylformimino-5-aminoimidazolo-4-carboxamideribonucleotide (ProFAR) and imidazologlycerol phosphate (IGP) glutaminase activity dominates over synthetase activity at sufficiently low concentrations of 5 -phosphoribulosylformimino-5-aminoimidazolo-4-carboxamideribonucleotide (PRFAR). Increased PRFAR concentrations resulted in decreased contribution of glutaminase activity and, consequently, increased the contribution of synthetase activity in the enzyme functioning.

The systems biology markup language (SBML): a medium for representation and exchange of biochemical network models.

MOTIVATION: Molecular biotechnology now makes it possible to build elaborate systems models, but the systems biology community needs information standards if models are to be shared, evaluated and developed cooperatively. RESULTS: We summarize the Systems Biology Markup Language (SBML) Level 1, a free, open, XML-based format for representing biochemical reaction networks. SBML is a software-independent language for describing models common to research in many areas of computational biology, including cell signaling pathways, metabolic pathways, gene regulation, and others. AVAILABILITY: The specification of SBML Level 1 is freely available from http://www.sbml.org/