Discrimination of apple juice and herbal liqueur brands with solid-state electrodes covered with polyaniline and thiacalixarenes.

Solid-contact ion-selective electrodes based on glassy carbon electrode covered with electropolymerized polyaniline and tetrasubstituted thiacalix[4]arene ionophores with hexyl and o-pyridylamido functional groups at the lower rim have been developed and examined in the discrimination of the brands of apple juices and herbal liqueurs. For this purpose, the liquids tested were diluted and spiked with a constant amount of Fe(3+) ions. The variation of the signal toward Fe(3+) ions was achieved due to their involvement in the reactions with the organic ligands and the antioxidants present. As was shown, the combination of the three electrodes with various receptors makes it possible to predict the brand of apple juices and herbal liqueurs using linear discriminant analysis in 95-100% cases. The discrimination procedure makes it possible to discriminate liquids within 20 min. Besides, the electrodes developed make it possible to detect individual antioxidants (ascorbic, malic, oxalic acids, hydroquinone, and quercetin) in the range from 5.0x10(-6) to 1.0x10(-2) M in direct potentiometric measurements and redox titration.

[Reflex therapy, massage, and manual therapy in the treatment of progressive myopia in children and adolescents].

The paper describes the methods and results of multimodality treatment for progressive myopia in children and adolescents, by applying acupuncture, massage, and manual therapy. Thirty-three patients aged 7 to 17 years who had progressive myopia of 0.5 to 10.8 diopters were treated by an original procedure as repeated courses. Their follow-up lasted 2 years. A beneficial therapeutic effect as increases in uncorrected and subcorrected visual acuity, ocular accommodation reserves, and myopia regression rates was observed in 64% of the patients. Two-year myopia stabilization was achieved in 45% of cases. There were neither complications nor side effects. The possible mechanism of the remedial effect of the procedure is discussed in the paper.