Protein composition of the phase I Coxiella burnetii soluble antigen prepared by extraction with trichloroacetic acid.

Q fever is a highly infectious, widespread airborne zoonosis caused by Coxiella burnetii bacterium. Humans usually acquire the disease by inhalation of contaminated aerosol produced by infected livestock. Vaccination is the most practical way for prevention and control of the disease in the exposed population. In this work, we reviewed the most important Q-fever outbreaks in Slovakia as well as the progress in vaccine development. One of them represents a soluble antigen complex produced by extraction with trichloroacetic acid from a highly purified C. burnetii phase I strain Nine Mile. It was developed at the Institute of Virology in Bratislava. The protein content of this vaccine was separated by gel electrophoresis and analyzed by mass spectrometry. The study has resulted in the identification of 39 bacterial proteins from which 12 were recognized as immunoreactive. Most of the proteins were involved in bacterium pathogenicity (41.6%) and cell wall maintenance (25%). Four of the immunoreactive proteins may possess the moonlighting activity. Definition of the vaccine components represents a prerequisite for vaccine standardization and approval by governmental authorities.

Systems biology is an efficient tool for investigation of low-dose chronic irradiation influence on plants in the Chernobyl zone.

The paper discusses different methodological approaches to the study of transgenerational alterations of metabolic pathways in soybean and flax seeds in the process of adaptation to chronic irradiation in the Chernobyl alienation zone. A combination of general biological methods and novel approaches, such as genomics, proteomics, cytogenetics, and mutagenesis, allows researchers to analyze an organism's systemic response and identify the latent chronic irradiation effects in plants from the Chernobyl zone. The proteomic approaches are especially efficient, since they range from the identification of changes in abundance and folding of individual proteins to the characterization of posttranslational modifications, trends of qualitative changes during seed maturation, or protein-protein interactions during plant growth and development under permanent impacts of stress factors. The application of proteomics opens new horizons in the understanding of the hidden mechanisms behind the impact of chronic low-dose radiation on living cells and makes it possible to visualize metabolic network alterations regardless of their transcriptional, translational, or epigenetic nature.

[The characteristics of a Russian-made kit for the serological identification of streptococci groups A, B and C]. / Kharakteristika otechestvennogo nabora dlia serologicheskoi identifikatsii streptokokkov grupp A, B, C.

The first Soviet kits for the serological identification of streptococci, groups A, B, and C, on the basis of the coagglutination test were developed. Each kit was intended for 35-40 determinations. The optimum concentration of streptococci during their identification by means of the reagents making up the kit was about 1.6 x 10(9) cells/ml. The specificity of the reagents in comparison with the results of the identification of streptococci by reference methods was 97.3 +/- 0.9%. The reagents making up the kits can be presumably used for solving a number of practical problems in the epidemiological surveillance of streptococcal infection.

[The effect of sodium nucleinate on the population characteristics of Streptococcus groups A and C]. / Vliianie nukleinata natriia na populiatsionnye kharakteristiki streptokokkov grupp A i C.

The influence of sodium nucleinate on the growth kinetics, streptokinase activity and virulence of streptococcal populations, groups A and C, was studied. As revealed in these studies, the kinetics of the growth of the populations of both strains in the exponential phase did not depend on the concentration of sodium nucleinate in the culture medium. Measurements made on hours 15, 20 and 24 of growth showed the presence of close, direct and statistically significant correlation between the content of biomass, as well as streptokinase activity and specific streptokinase activity, and the concentration of sodium nucleinate in the culture medium. On the basis of the calculation of the coefficients of determination, the main part (70-96%) of the total dispersion of each of the above-mentioned characteristics dispersion of each of the above-mentioned characteristics could be attributed to variations in the concentration of sodium nucleinate. Five passages of faintly virulent streptococcal strains, groups A and C, were not accompanied by a rise in their virulence.

[Anticholinesterase activity and toxicity of substituted O,O-dialkyl-S-vinyl phosphates and thiovinyl phosphonium salts]. / Antikholinesteraznaia aktivnost' i toksichnost' zameshchennykh O,O-dialkil-S-vinilfosfatov i solei tiovinilfosfoniia.

A kinetic investigation of the human erythrocyte and housefly head acetylcholinesterase irreversible inhibition with thiovinyl phosphates is performed and an activation effect of thioalkyl alpha-substituents in the vinyl group is observed. Thiovinyl phosphates in vitro are less selective to the insect enzyme than the corresponding oxygen analogues. Their inhibitory potency rises with lengthening of the alkoxyl radicals at a phosphorus atom but the correlation with the toxicity is absent. Phosphonium salts having a thiovinyl substituent inhibit the enzyme via the reversible mechanism typical for onium compounds.