Prioritizing environmental issues around the world: opinions from an international Central and Eastern European environmental health conference.

Background: As the next generation of scientists enters the field of environmental health, it is imperative that they view their contributions in the context of global environmental stewardship. In this commentary, a group of international graduate students facilitated by three experienced environmental health scientists present their views on what they consider to be the global environmental health concerns of today. This group convened initially in October 2004 at an international health conference in Prague, Czech Republic.

[Therapy of bronchopulmonary infection in smokers].

The efficacy and safety of Cifran OD, a new dosage form of ciprofloxacin with prolonged action were studied in the treatment of patients with bronchopulmonary infection (n=23). The drug was used orally in a dose of 1 g once a day. The patients were divided into 2 groups: group 1 included patients with aggravation of chronic bronchitis and group 2 included patients with bacterial pneumonia.

The expression of HIV-1 tat and nef genes induces cell-specific changes in growth properties and morphology of different types of rat cells.

Among the viral regulatory genes the tat and nef genes of HIV-1 encode the proteins playing a central role in viral replication and exerting pleiotropic effects on the survival and growth of the cells. These effects differ in various cell types, possibly due to the use of genes from different HIV-1 isolates. In this work, we studied the effects of the tat and nef genes on three types of cultured rat cells: primary embryo fibroblasts, pseudonormal Rat-2, and pheochromocytoma PC12.

Presynaptic alpha-latrotoxin receptor components interact with protein p65 of synaptic vesicle membranes.

Purified preparations of bovine brain alpha-latrotoxin receptor contain proteins of 39 kDa and 65 kDa. Sequence analysis shows that the 65 kDa protein corresponds to p65, a synaptic vesicle membrane protein previously identified in rat synaptic vesicles, and that the 39 kDa protein is a proteolytic fragment of the 65 kDa protein. The 39 kDa and 65 kDa proteins appear in receptor samples because of their specific interaction with components of the alpha-latrotoxin receptor.