Characterization of Bangor virus proteins by using monoclonal antibodies

A new virus was isolated from a finch in quarantine in Northern Ireland in 1973. The virus had the morphological characteristics of a paramyxovirus, and was named Bangor virus (BaV). In order to identify the structural proteins of BaV and to investigate the biological characterization of the virus, 28 monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) directed against BaV were prepared. Eight of these mAbs reacted with the nucleocapsid protein (NP), 10 with hemagglutinin-neuraminidase (HN) protein, and 10 with fusion (F) protein. With the aid of these mAbs, the structural proteins of BaV were determined, namely, p52, gp74, gp63, and gp51 were identified as the NP, HN, F0, and F1 proteins, respectively. The biological activities of the mAbs directed against the envelope glycoproteins of BaV were examined. Intriguingly, it was found in the neutralization assay that four mAbs directed against the HN protein of BaV can enhance the fusion of HeLa cells infected with BaV, showing the presence of a potential third function of the HN protein that affects the fusion activity of the F protein. Furthermore, all of the anti-F protein mAbs showed neutralizing activity.     

Computers in medicine

A growing group of institutions and individuals use Internet connections to reach information sources. Large health care organizations now see electronic records as essential to providing cost-effective health care. The Visible Human Project represents the entire three-dimensional anatomy of a cadaver.     

Thrombomodulin in internal medicine

PURPOSE: Analysis of the results of medical examination and treatment of infants with squint and undeveloped fixation reflex, and with nystagmus. MATERIAL AND METHODS: 215 babies with these distempers were classified to the treatment. The children were included into five prophylactic groups: group 1-66 babies with eccentric fixation and without squint or with periodic squint; group 2-60 babies with acentric fixation and with manifested convergent squint at a visual angle from 25 degrees to 45 degrees (average 35 degrees); group 3-55 babies with correct fixation and with manifested convergent squint at a visual angle from 25 degrees to 45 degrees (average 35 degrees), and with divergent squint at a visual angle from 5 degrees to 20 degrees (average 12.5 degrees); group 4-12 babies with correct fixation and with periodic squint; group 5-22 babies with nystagmus. The treatment consisted in wearing spherical and prismatic glasses strictly compensating the squint angle, and in the treatment of eccentric fixation with euthyscope irradiations. The babies with nystagmus were treated conservatively by prisms correcting head arrangement. RESULTS: Eventually the squint angle reduced and fixation reflex in part of all tested groups. In our opinion, the treatment of very small children by localisation method prisms is very useful.     

Controversies in perioperative medicine

Twenty patients (14 women and 6 men) (23 feet) had a single oblique osteotomy operation of the 2nd, 3rd, or 4th metatarsal without fixation during an 8-year period. The mean age was 46 years (range, 21-64 years). Each patient had a painful intractable plantar keratosis preoperatively. The average follow-up was 10 years (range, 3-14 years). Postoperatively, reoperation was performed in four feet because of painful callosities. For 13 of the 19 feet that did not have reoperation, patients were limited in footwear or required a shoe insert. Overall results were good for 10 feet, fair for 7 feet, and poor for 6 feet. The only complication was a deep infection that occurred in one foot (good result). Nonunion occurred in one foot and delayed union in one. The average decrease in metatarsal length after osteotomy was 6+/-6 mm. The single oblique lesser metatarsal osteotomy may be successful, but one half of the patients continued to have some degree of pain and most patients had limitations in footwear. Overall results were disappointing, and patients who are offered this procedure should be advised of its limitations.     

Preventive medicine in geriatrics

The reasons for abandoning prophylactic vaccination against highly contagious animal diseases in the European Union on principle are illustrated. The practical implementation of control measures under the current framework are explained with respect to an outbreak of classical swine fever, emphasizing the role of the local crisis center, the veterinary diagnostic laboratories and the need for an overall control and coordination of the campaign at the regional level. In view of the continuous risk of introducing CSF virus into the domestic pig holdings different precautionary aspects under consideration are pointed out: controlled reduction of the pig unit density with the aim of establishing self-contained pig production areas versus improvement of protecting the existing individual pig holdings against introduction of infectious diseases.     

Bioethics in contemporary medicine

Bioethics arose in a delicate social and political moment in the United States of America. With time, it has become a social and perhaps political movement. Its scope is wider and different than that of medical ethics. Bioethics appeared in the second half of the twentieth century, in the middle of a spectacular advance in biological knowledge and technology. Meanwhile, medical ethics was formulated in the fifth century B.C. in relation to medical care. This defines the main focus of their respective interests. Anglo-Saxon philosophers, deriving from moral philosophy, applied the principles of beneficence, no maleficence, justice and autonomy to medicine. The Hippocratic oath refers specifically to the first three and to a number of other ethical principles. Nothing in its contents, contradicts the principle of autonomy. The emphasis in the principle of autonomy that some specialists in bioethics pose, even over the principle of beneficence, is determined, according to our judgment, by inherent factors of the North American culture. We believe that medical ethics should be distinguished even though not separated from bioethics. Physicians should go back to the Hippocratic oath as the fundamental guide for their professional activity.     

Antibiotics in emergency medicine

The paper is focused on prediction of loss of consciousness and grey-out during short (up to 5 s) impulses of longitudinal head-to-tail accelerations with high buildup gradients (more than 50 m/s3). This is a poorly explored region of exposure on the borderline between impulsive and maneuvering accelerations of the modern aircraft. On the basis of comparing the prediction with available experimental data, prognostic potentials of various modifications of criterion which includes the maximum allowable values of velocity in this range of exposure are demonstrated.     

Trend in genetic medicine

The assembly of newly synthesized MHC class I molecules within the endoplasmic reticulum and their association with the transporter associated with antigen processing (TAP) is a process involving the chaperones calnexin and calreticulin. Using peptide mapping by matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization (MALDI) mass spectrometry to identify a new component, we now introduce a third molecular chaperone, the thiol-dependent reductase ER-60 (ERp57/GRP58/ERp61/HIP-70/Q2), into this process. ER-60 is found in MHC class I heavy chain complexes with calnexin that are generated early during the MHC class I assembly pathway. The thiol reductase activity of ER-60 raises the possibility that ER-60 is involved in the disulfide bond formation within heavy chains. In addition, ER-60 is part of the late assembly complexes consisting of MHC class I, tapasin, TAP, calreticulin and calnexin. In a beta2-microglobulin (beta2m)-negative mouse cell line, S3, ER-60-calnexin-heavy chain complexes are shown to bind to TAP, suggesting that beta2m is not required for the association of MHC class I heavy chains with TAP.     

Hypnosis in general medicine

Organic pathologies with psychoaffective aetiology are numerous, and in all diseases, mental and rational elements are concomitant with the organic situation. Aware of the psycho-dynamic mechanisms he sets in motion by his actions and appreciating those underlying the symptomatology he has to deal with, the hypnologist transcends the overspecialisation of medical science to restore the patient's psycho-physical unitary reality. This explains both the possibilities of hypnositherapy in general medicine and its impassable limits. The hypnositherapy that the general practitioner can (and most implement must be perfected by a qualified psychotherapeutist when symptomatology cannot be eradicated without tackling the aetiological factor with a serious analysis of the profound. Hypnosis is, therefore, an extra therapeutic possibility for the physician and this is why it can only be used with science, awareness and on the basis of ethics.