[COVID-19 in haemodialysis patients: result analysis of the first year of the pandemic].

BACKGROUND: Present concepts of the novel coronavirus infection prognosis in haemodialysis (HD) patients are rather controversial. There is little information on therapy efficiency and safety in such patients. We studied COVID-19 course specifics, prognostic factors associated with fatal outcomes, therapy efficiency and its transformation at different stages of the pandemic first year. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Single-centre retrospective uncontrolled study included 653 COVID-19 HD-patients treated at Moscow City Nephrology Centre from April 1 to December 31, 2020. RESULTS: This period mortality rate was 21.0%. Independent predictors of COVID-19 unfavourable outcome in HD patients were pulmonary lesion extension (CT grades 34), high comorbidity index, and mechanical ventilation. Approaches to COVID-19 treatment modified significantly at different periods. Immunomodulatory drugs (monoclonal antibodies to IL-6, corticosteroids) were used largely at later stages. With tocilizumab administration, mortality was 15.1%, tocilizumab together with dexamethasone 13.3%; without them 37.8% (р0,001). Tocilizumab administration in the first 3 days after hospitalization of patients with CT grades 12 was associated with more favourable outcomes: 1 out of 29 died vs 6 out of 20 (tocilizumab administered at later periods); p0.04. There was no significant difference in death frequency in patients with CT grades 34 depending on tocilizumab administration time. CONCLUSION: COVID-19 in HD patients can manifest in a severe course with unfavourable outcome. It is urgent to identify reliable disease outcome predictors and develop efficient treatment in this population.

Acoustic structure of alarm calls in Indian sambar (Rusa unicolor) and Indian muntjac (Muntiacus vaginalis) in South Vietnam.

The alarm call acoustic structure and nonlinear vocal phenomena of the Indian sambar (Rusa unicolor) and northern Indian muntjac (Muntiacus vaginalis) have been analyzed in detail as well as their vocal behavior in response to mobbing humans under natural conditions of southern Vietnam. The alarm calls of sambars, tonal barks separated by large intervals, were produced by animals standing on the place and gazing at a potentially dangerous object. Muntjacs flee off in danger and produced a series of dull barks interrupted with short intervals from a distance. The alarm call frequencies were characterized for sambars and muntjacs. The results of our study have been compared with the published data on alarm calls of other Cervidae species.

[A rare concurrence of polymyalgia rheumatica and AA-amyloidosis]. / Redkoe sochetanie revmaticheskoi polimialgii s AA-amiloidozom.

Polymyalgia rheumatica (PMR) is a rare chronic inflammatory disease. It predominantly affects the elderly. The disease has a slow onset, pain and stiffness in the muscles of the shoulder and pelvic girdle, fever, weight loss, and a high acute-phase inflammatory response. The disease is concurrent with giant cell arteritis in a quarter of cases, which allows some authors to consider them as two different manifestations of the same pathological process. The kidneys are rarely involved. This disease is rarely complicated by AA amyloidosis. The authors describe a case of RPM in a patient who has developed secondary AA amyloidosis.

[RHEUTMATIC MYALGIA COMPLICATED BY AA-AMYLOIDOSIS].

Rheumatic myalgia is associated with intense inflammation and, unlike other diseases, is very rarely complicated by AA- amyloidosis. Only 12 such cases have been described worldwide, most of them in combination with giant cell arteritis. The present article reports the first case of rheumatic myalgia complicated by AA-amyloidosis encountered in Russia and the relevant literature review.

Vocalization toward conspecifics in silver foxes (Vulpes vulpes) selected for tame or aggressive behavior toward humans.

We examined the production of different vocalizations in three strains of silver fox (unselected, aggressive, and tame) attending three kinds of behavior (aggressive, affiliative, and neutral) in response to their same-strain conspecifics. This is a follow-up to previous experiments which demonstrated that in the presence of humans, tame foxes produced cackles and pants but never coughed or snorted, whilst aggressive foxes produced coughs and snorts but never cackled or panted. Thus, cackle/pant and cough/snort were indicative of the tame and aggressive fox strains respectively toward humans. Wild-type unselected foxes produced cough and snort toward humans similarly to aggressive foxes. Here, we found that vocal responses to conspecifics were similar in tame, aggressive and unselected fox strains. Both cackle/pant and cough/snort occurred in foxes of all strains. The difference in the use of cackle/pant and cough/snort among these strains toward humans and toward conspecifics suggest that silver foxes do not perceive humans as their conspecifics. We speculate that these vocalizations are produced in response to a triggering internal state, affiliative or aggressive, that is suppressed by default in these fox strains toward humans as a result of their strict selection for tame or aggressive behavior, whilst still remaining flexible toward conspecifics.

[Indicators of emotional arousal in vocal emissions of the humans and nonhuman mammals].

Human speech is not homologous to animal vocalizations, but these two different communication systems overlap in the area of expression of emotional arousal. The latter can be revealed in any mammalian vocal emissions: in human speech, in infant crying, and in calls of animals. Animals are able to perceive information about emotional arousal from human speech emissions and, in their turn, the humans are able to estimate emotional arousal from vocalizations of animals. Numerous studies conducted with many mammal species suggest the presence of vocal indicators of emotional arousal shared by the humans and nonhuman mammals. Here we appraise parameters used for description of call structures, overview fundamental studies constituting a framework for understanding the relationships between call structures and degrees of emotional arousal in mammals, and provide a synthesis of the available data allowing to establish integral vocal indicators of emotional arousal in the humans and nonhuman mammals.

[High-dose gamma-irradiation enhance expression of transgene under control of immediate-early CMV promoter in stably transfected tumor cells].

Gamma-irradiation is a usual method to inactivate whole-cellular anticancer vaccines consisting viable tumor cells. To evaluate the effect of gamma-irradiation to transgene expression in tumor cells we constructed several stably transfected clones of human and mouse cell lines expressing transgenic GM-CSF or GFP under control of IE-CMV promoter. Irradiation of those cells with different doses (ranged from 20 to 100 Gr) of gamma-radiation caused loss of proliferation capacity with survival of the cells population clearly depended on irradiation dose. Cell-cycle staining reveals accumulation of the cells with G2/M DNA content and almost loss of cells in S-phase. Substantial proportion of irradiated cells shows beta-galactosidase activity and morphological changes associated with cell senescence. An irradiated cell shows no changes in the level of mitochondrial dehydrogenase activity regardless irradiation dose exposed. Irradiated cells retain their ability to express transgene. Moreover, amount of the secreted GM-CSF as well as MFI in GFP-expressing cells significantly increases after gamma-irradiation up to 10 fold for cells exposed with 100 Gr. Enhancing of the transgene expression in both human and mouse cells positively correlates with total dose of gamma-irradiation gained by the cells and demonstrates gradual nature. Overall, our results supports using of 100 Gr of gamma-irradiation as the optimal dose for whole-cell anticancer vaccine inactivation.

[Structure, occurrence and functional significance of nonlinear phenomena in sounds of terrestrial mammals].

Subharmonics, deterministic chaos, biphonations, sidebands and frequency jumps, known under joining name nonlinear phenomena, represent acoustical appearances that occur in calls of various mammals, from insectivorous to humans. Although the physical basis for appearances of the nonlinear phenomen is known in principle, such aspects as occurrence and functional significance of nonlinear phenomena, are poorly understood. We described here the structural peculiarities of these appearances based on domestic dogs' whines demonstrating all kinds of the nonlinear phenomena. The nonlinear phenomena result directly from the work of mammalian vocal apparatus--lunges, vocal folds, and vocal tract, which are responsible for its inherent functional characteristics. The mammalian vocal folds represent a system of two coupled oscillators functioning in different vibratory regimes depending on degree of synchronization in their vibrations and occurrence of coupling between the vocal folds. This functioning does not need in direct neural control for turning on the complex regimes of vocal folds' vibration and switching from one regime to another. Besides, many mammals possess anatomical structures, such as vocal membranes, pads on vocal folds, or laryngeal air sacs, that are to participate in sound production as additional oscillators extend the range of possibilities for arising of nonlinear phenomena in vocalization. On the basis of published and own data, we provide and overview of the occurrence of nonlinear phenomena in sounds of humans, nonhuman primates, canids, and rodents, and discuss the supposed functional significance of these acoustical appearances in mammalian vocal communication systems. From one side, nonlinear phenomena may be related to various physiological disorders in humans and animals. In such cases, their appearance in calls may be nonadaptive, because they permit conspecifics' to avoid owners of such "ill" voices, and points easy prey to predators. From another side, in some cases the nonlinear phenomena may arise especially for performing of some signal functions in species communication system: to enhance reliability of individual recognition, to transmit information about size of a caller over the large distance, to permit individuals of not great size mimicry acoustically under more larger animal, to introduce variety into monotonous vocal sequences in order to force other group members to pay attention to a caller, and to facilitate distance estimation to a caller and direction of its movement.

[Air decontamination and the fine filtration system "Potok 150MK"]. / Ustanovka obezzarazhivaniia i tonkoi fil'tratsii vozdukha "Potok 150MK".

Longevity of space stations is dependent on efficiency and robustness of the life support systems. The article describes the principle of operation of air decontamination system Potok 150MK intended for providing microbial safety of the orbital station environment. High quality of air disinfection and decontamination has been demonstrated aboard SS Mir and the International space station.

[Immunopharmacological method for the diagnosis of multiple sclerosis]. / Immunofarmakologicheskii sposob diagnostiki rasseiannogo skleroza.

Using the data on increased level of opioids in the internal media of patients with multiple sclerosis it was found that blood lymphocytes from MS patients had elevated adhesive activity to opiates, including morphine, in the reaction of specific rosette formation. Immunopharmacologic method for MS diagnosis is proposed based on detection of considerably increased level of the rosette forming cells, specific to morphine (morphine test). This test is a reliable additional marker for all clinical forms of the disease and provides differential diagnosis of both MS and some other diseases with similar clinical symptomatology at any age, any duration and a character of a course of the disease.

[The combined treatment of lichen ruber planus of the mouth mucosa]. / Kompleksnoe lechenie krasnogo ploskogo lishaia slizistoi rta.

The treatment of 53 patients with lichen planus of the buccal mucosa included common methods of detoxication and immunomodulators in order to normalize the immune status and was supplemented with applications of codfish oil enriched with polyunsaturated fatty acids. As a result of such treatment, the duration of exacerbation was shorter and a stable more than one-year remission was attained, associated with normalization of the immunological parameters. In patients with the erosive ulcerative form of lichen local applications of codfish oil and gargling with Potentilla tormentilla tincture were conducive to a sooner control of the process.

[Results of integrated tests of the facility to disinfect gaseous environment of orbital stations]. / Rezul'taty kompleksnykh ispytanii ustanovki dlia obezzarazhivaniia gazovoi sredy orbital'nykh stantsii.

The microbiological safety control with the use of the Potok 150M facility aboard operational orbital station of Mir series is discussed. The test results indicated that the facility does not actually influence the content of harmful microscopic admixtures in a gaseous medium of the mock-up compartments of the Mir orbital station, elevates slightly the noise level during operation and provides the highly effective purification of gaseous medium from dust and microorganisms. It allows us to conclude that an application of the Potok 150M facility aboard operational station shows promise.