Non-neutralizing Antibodies Directed at Conservative Influenza Antigens.

At the moment, developing new broad-spectrum influenza vaccines which would help avoid annual changes in a vaccine's strain set is urgency. In addition, developing new vaccines based on highly conserved influenza virus proteins could allow us to better prepare for potential pandemics and significantly reduce the damage they cause. Evaluation of the humoral response to vaccine administration is a key aspect of the characterization of the effectiveness of influenza vaccines. In the development of new broad-spectrum influenza vaccines, it is important to study the mechanisms of action of various antibodies, including non-neutralizing ones, as well as to be in the possession of methods for quantifying these antibodies after immunization with new vaccines against influenza. In this review, we focused on the mechanisms of anti-influenza action of non-neutralizing antibodies, such as antibody-dependent cellular cytotoxicity (ADCC), antibody-dependent cellular phagocytosis (ADCP), and antibody-mediated complement-dependent cytotoxicity (CDC). The influenza virus antigens that trigger these reactions are hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA), as well as highly conserved antigens, such as M2 (ion channel), M1 (matrix protein), and NP (nucleoprotein). In addition, the mechanisms of action and methods for detecting antibodies to neuraminidase (NA) and to the stem domain of hemagglutinin (HA) of the influenza virus are considered.

The Analysis of B-Cell Epitopes of Influenza Virus Hemagglutinin.

Vaccination has been successfully used to prevent influenza for a long time. Influenza virus hemagglutinin (HA), which induces a humoral immune response in humans and protection against the flu, is the main antigenic component of modern influenza vaccines. However, new seasonal and pandemic influenza virus variants with altered structures of HA occasionally occur. This allows the pathogen to avoid neutralization with antibodies produced in response to previous vaccination. Development of a vaccine with the new variants of HA acting as antigens takes a long time. Therefore, during an epidemic, it is important to have passive immunization agents to prevent and treat influenza, which can be monoclonal or single-domain antibodies with universal specificity (broad-spectrum agents). We considered antibodies to conserved epitopes of influenza virus antigens as universal ones. In this paper, we tried to characterize the main B-cell epitopes of hemagglutinin and analyze our own and literature data on broadly neutralizing antibodies. We conducted a computer analysis of the best known conformational epitopes of influenza virus HAs using materials of different databases. The analysis showed that the core of the HA molecule, whose antibodies demonstrate pronounced heterosubtypic activity, can be used as a target for the search for and development of broad-spectrum antibodies to the influenza virus.

[An experimental study of the anti-inflammatory action of noopept and its effect on the level of cytokines].

The anti-inflammatory effects of noopept (dipeptide analog of piracetam) upon a single intraperitoneal (i.p.) administration at doses of 1, 5, and 10 mg/kg in comparison to the reference drug diclofenac (10 mg/kg, i.p.) have been studied on a model of acute exudative inflammation induced by carrageenan in outbred rats and concanavalin A (Con A) in CBA mice. The level of cytokines was studied on the lipopolysaccharide (LPS) model (single administration, 100 mg/kg, i.p.) with 5-day administration of noopept at a dose of 5 mg/kg (i.p., before endotoxin injection) in C57BL/6 mice. The administration of noopept led to a significant suppression of the inflammatory response to both carrageenan and Con A. The administration of Con A caused a 16-fold increase in the level of IL-6 interleukin in the blood serum of mice as compared to control. Noopept (5 mg/kg) reduced the level of IL-6 by a factor of 1.8 in the inflammatory response to Con A. The administration of LPS led to pronounced increase in the levels ofpro-inflammatory IL-6 and TNF-alpha in the blood serum of test mice as compared to intact animals. The course administration of noopept (5 mg/kg) significantly decreased the level of IL-6 and reduced by half the level of TNF-alpha.

[Preclinical safety investigation of GB-115 dipeptide].

Preclinical safety investigations of newly synthesized dipeptide compound GB-115 (amide N-phenylhexanoyl-glycyl-L-tryptophan), an antagonist of cholecystokinin receptors, were performed. No animals were lost after GB-115 acute oral administration at a maximum dose of 6000 mg/kg in mice and at 3500 mg/kg in rats. GB-115 administered per os during 6 months in rabbits and rats (both males and females) at the doses of 0.1 and 10 mg/kg induced no irreversible pathological changes in organs and systems studied. The tested dipeptide exhibited no allergenic, immunotoxic and mutagenic activity, and did not affect generative function and the antenatal and postnatal development of progeny. GB-115 at a dose of 10 mg/kg produced suppression of the inflammatory reaction to concanavalin A.

[Blood lipid spectrum in hypertensive patients and normotensive subjects living in the Khanty-Mansiysk region].

AIM: To evaluate basic parameters of lipid metabolism in patients with arterial hypertension (AH) stage I and II and normotensive subjects living in the far North of the Russian Federation (Khanty-Mansiysk Autonomic Region, Nyagan). MATERIAL AND METHODS: Lipid spectrum was studied in 70 males and females with AH stage I and II, 280 normotensive males and females matched for sex, age, time of residence in the North. RESULTS: Sex-related differences by concentrations of blood lipids become less pronounced with progression of AH while a concentration of atherogenic lipid fractions in AH patients rises. High prevalence of dyslipidemia, primarily hypercholesterolemia, in hypertensive and normotensive subjects is a prognostic factor of coronary atherosclerosis. Paired correlations indirectly confirm the effect of climatic factors on blood lipids. CONCLUSION: It is necessary to correct lipid spectrum and risk factors in hypertensive and normotensive subjects as a prophylactic measure.

[Structural and functional specificity of the Dichelobacter nodosus pili. Synthesis of the protein pilin of D. nodosus in various bacterial recombinant strains].

The ovine foot rot is a severe infectious disease of sheep. Dichelobacter nodosus is an essential pathogen of this disease. An obligatory anaerobic gram-negative rod-shaped microorganism has slow rate of accumulating bacterial density and fastidious growth requirements. This causes obstacles to vaccine production and makes it difficult to diagnose the disease. The diagnosis in this case is more expensive. Fimbriae (or pili) are one of the major factors of virulence of D. nodosus. Their antigenic and immunogenic properties make them good vaccine components for elevated immunogenicity. Since the nucleotide sequence of the fimA gene encoding fimbrial subunit was determined, attempts to produce recombinant pili were undertaken. The production of the genetic-engineering fimbriae would allow the price of the vaccines to be reduced and their manufacture to be simplified. The vaccine immunogenicity is increased in this case. At first, E. coli was selected as an expression system, but morphogenetic expression of the pili was not achieved on its surface because of some differences in the biogenesis and structure of fimbriae from D. nodosus. Successful morphogenesis of the pili was achieved in Pseudomonas aeruoginosa, which had closest similarity in the structure of pili. The level of the immunity obtained after immunization of the sheep with recombinant pili was similar to the level of the immunity after native pili or whole cells of D. nodosus had been used. This review contains information regarding the recombinant strains of Pseudomonas aeruoginosa obtained using fimbriae of D. nodosus and expression of pilin genes in different bacterial systems.

[Clinico-economical efficacy of angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitors in patients with arterial hypertension and ischemic heart disease].

We conducted comparative analysis of clinico-economical efficacy of angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitors as components of combination therapy of patients with arterial hypertension and ischemic heart disease. Clinical efficacy of fosinopril, moexipril, perindopril, and ramipril was comparable: in compared groups statistically significant lowering of arterial pressure was achieved by day 6 of treatment and this lowering persisted up to day 36 of therapy with ramipril. All studied drugs were well tolerated. Ramipril was notable for highest economical efficacy determined by the method of \"minimization of expenditures\". Technology of assessment of clinico-economical effectiveness of preparations from the same pharmacological group can be used in compilation of standards of drug therapy of various diseases, basing on which a physician administers a concrete drug to a concrete patient.

Immunopharmacological properties of noopept.

Noopept, a peptide analog of piracetam, enhanced phagocytic activity of mouse peritoneal macrophages, stimulated humoral and cellular immune response to various antigens, and markedly increased spontaneous proliferative activity of splenocytes. In animals with secondary immune deficiency caused by cyclophosphamide, noopept exhibited immunocorrector properties.

[Anti-inflammatory properties of noopept (dipeptide nootropic agent GVS-111)]. / Protivovospalitel'nye svoistva noopepta (dipeptidnogo nootropa GVS-111).

It is established that single intravenous (0.5 and 5 mg/kg, p.o.) or single peroral (10, 50, 100 mg/kg) and prolonged peroral (5 mg/kg, over 10 days) administration of noopept produces a dose-dependent inhibition of the model inflammatory response to concanavaline A in CBA mice. Intravenously injected (5 mg/kg) noopept suppressed the acute nonimmune carrageenan-induced foot inflammation in rats by 62.2% within 3 h. The most pronounced antiinflammatory effect of dipeptide was observed on the model of adjuvant arthritis in rats, where the drug administered over 25 days in a daily dose of 0.5 mg/kg (i.m.) or 5 mg/kg (p.o.) significantly reduced the chronic immune inflammation (on the 12th day, by 94.0 and 74.1%, respectively). The in vitro experiments with neutrophilic leukocytes of F1(CBA.C57BL/6) mice treated with noopept in a single dose of 5 mg/kg (i.v.) showed a 5- to 6-fold suppression of the hemiluminescence stimulated by opsoinized zymosan or phorbolmyristate acetate. It is suggested that the antiinflammatory activity of noopept is probably related to its antioxidant properties.

[Preclinical study of noopept toxicity]. / Doklinicheskoe izuchenie toksichnisti noopepta.

Within the framework of a preclinical investigation, the new nootrope drug noopept (N-phenyl-acetyl-L-propyl-glycine ethylate) was tested for chronic toxicity upon peroral administration in a dose of 10 or 100 mg/kg over 6 months in both male and female rabbits. The results of observations showed that noopept administered in this dose range induced no irreversible pathologic changes in the organs and systems studied and exhibited no allergenic, immunotoxic, and mutagen activity. The drug affected neither the generative function nor the antenatal or postnatal progeny development. Noopept produced a dose-dependent suppression of inflammation reaction to concanavalin A and stimulated the cellular and humoral immune response in mice.

[Hereditary pemphigus: the problems of classification, diagnosis and prevention]. / Nasledstvennaia puzyrchatka: voprosy klassifikatsii, diagnostiki i profilaktiki.

Basic principles of present-day classification of hereditary epidermolysis bullosa are outlined, and morphologic grounds for distinguishing common, borderline, and dystrophic e. bullosa are validated. Potentialities of prenatal diagnosis of grave forms of e. bullosa as one of the major means of prevention are discussed. Data of clinical follow-up of 25 patients with common, 5 with borderline, and 29 ones with dystrophic e. bullosa are presented, as are results of 8 cases of prenatal diagnosis. The authors emphasize the necessity of electron microscopic examination of the skin in every case.