Publications by authors named "Kazar J"

Background: Over-replication of periodontal pathogens in the periodontium induces production of proinflammatory cytokines and C-reactive protein that can stimulate systemic inflammatory status and can initiate atherosclerosis and its consequences. In our pilot study we examined whether periodontal status and serum levels of interleukin-6 and C-reactive protein are associated with the presence of Aggregatibacter actinomycetemcomitans in the periodontium of patients with cardiovascular diseases (CVD).

Material/methods: We randomly selected 38 of 166 outpatients with CVD, of which 21 patients had chronic ischemic heart disease (IHD) only and 17 had both IHD and essential hypertension (HT).

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No relation between the occurrence of antibodies to chlamydial agents and asthma in children was found. In asthmatic children, the antibodies to Chlamydia trachomatis occurred in 3.1% and to Chlamydophila pneumoniae in 22.

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Chlamydophila pneumoniae, one of the most prevalent human pathogens worldwide, is not only a significant cause of pneumonia, but may also be associated with cardiovascular diseases (CVD) as suggested by multiple studies. A total of 228 sera from CVD patients with hypertension, ischemic heart disease or previous reconstructive vascular surgery were screened for the presence of anti-C. pneumoniae IgG and IgA antibodies by ELISA.

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Pathogenic bacteria employ many strategies to overcome the host immune system for extended survival and propagation in their hosts. Components of the bacterial outer-membrane play an important role in this process. When invading the host, Gram-negative bacteria often use a strategy, known as phase variation, that involves a reversible change in antigenic determinants, frequently polysaccharides.

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Background: Chlamydia pneumoniae is suggested to be associated with cardiovascular diseases.

Objectives: To study the presence of IgG, IgA anti-C. pneumoniae antibodies, interleukin-6 (IL-6), and C-reactive protein (CRP) as markers of previous C.

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Coxiella burnetii infection.

Ann N Y Acad Sci

December 2005

Coxiella burnetii is an obligate intracellular bacterium that causes a worldwide zoonosis, Q fever, and can be misused as a biological warfare agent. Infection in animals (coxiellosis) is mostly persistent. Infection in humans is often asymptomatic, but it can manifest as an acute disease (usually a self-limited flu-like illness, pneumonia, or hepatitis) or as a chronic form (mainly endocarditis, but also hepatitis and chronic fatigue syndrome).

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Ticks are obligate haematophagous acarines that parasitise every class of vertebrate (including man) and have a worldwide distribution. An increasing awareness of tick-borne diseases among clinicians and scientific researchers has led to the recent description of a number of emerging tick-borne bacterial diseases. Since the identification of Borrelia burgdorferi as the agent of Lyme disease in 1982, 11 tick-borne human bacterial pathogens have been described in Europe.

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Coxiella burnetii (C.b.) is a strictly intracellular, Gram-negative bacterium.

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Aim Of The Study: Investigation of the relationships between the grade and stage of chronic liver diseases irrespective of their etiology using some novel serum markers of liver fibrogenesis, the "classical" serum markers of liver necro-inflammatory injury (such as transaminases), and the histomorphological evaluation of liver biopsies.

Methods: Markers of liver fibrogenesis: serum metalloproteinase 1 (MMP-1), tissue inhibitor of MMP-1 (TIMP-1), and N-terminal propeptide of the procollagen III (PIIINP); "liver function tests" (LFTs): bilirubin, transaminases ALT, AST; ALP, GMT; and liver morphology findings: necro-inflammatory activity, fibrosis; were studied in the series of 32, 'naive', i.e.

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Soluble antigen (SA) from chlamydial elementary bodies (EBs) was extracted with N-lauroylsarcosine. The extracted SA composed of lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and proteins was compared with EBs using an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Patient sera from natural chlamydial infections exhibited ELISA mean absorbance (A(492) and A(405/650)) values 2-5 times higher with SA than with EBs, resulting in a better discrimination between positive and negative human sera.

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In a previous study (Hajnická et al., Acta virol. 38, 55-57 (1994)), we described synthesis of a 23 K protein in high amounts in the PLC/PRF/5 human hepatoma cell line after stimulation with sera of patients suffering from liver cirrhosis.

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Examination of sera of patients with respiratory diseases did not reveal any substantial difference in detection of chlamydial antibodies by ELISA using two commercial kits (Chlamydia STAT and rRLISA) demonstrating IgG antibodies and two corpuscular antigens prepared from Chlamydia psittaci and Chlamydia pneumoniae in the Institute of Virology, SAS, in Bratislava detecting whole serum antibodies. However, higher sensitivity of rELISA diagnostic kit was found when analyzing immunoglobulin classes, namely in case of IgG antibodies. Results of ELISA were in a great majority of cases, confirmed by examination of sera by microimmunofluorescence test, corpuscular antigens from the Institute of Virology being somewhat more sensitive than the commercial Micro-IF test kit.

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A cross-reactivity among some strains of Coxiella burnetii and chlamydiae with immune rabbit and mouse sera in ELISA and immunoblot analysis was observed. In the latter, the cross-reactivity disappeared after a treatment of C. burnetii or C.

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In human sera collected in three regions of Slovakia during an epidemic of respiratory infections, both genus-specific chlamydial and species-specific anti-Chlamydia pneumoniae antibodies, as detected by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and microimmunofluorescence test, respectively, were found. Based on seroconversion or significant rise of antibody titers and detection of antibodies of IgM class, an acute C. pneumoniae infection was indicated in 21 of 298 (7.

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Rickettsial diseases (typhus and spotted fever group rickettsioses, scrub typhus and Q fever) may pose a serious public health problem, namely when they are non-diagnosed or misdiagnosed. Although rickettsiae can be isolated from or detected in clinical specimens, serological tests still remain an indispensable tool in the diagnosis of rickettsial diseases. The complement fixation test widely used in the past is being replaced by other tests which make differentiation of immunoglobulin classes possible.

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Comparison of four serological tests (complement fixation (CF) test, microagglutination (MA) test, microimmunofluorescence (MIF) test, and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA)) for detection of post-infection antibody response in human and animal sera revealed a low sensitivity of the CF test with acute Q fever human, goat and sheep sera but not with chronic Q fever human sera and sera of aborting cows. The remaining three tests gave similar results with human (both acute and chronic) and cow sera, but the ELISA was more sensitive than the MA and MIF tests with goat and sheep sera. A treatment of phase I Coxiella burnetii (C.

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As a result of dramatic political and economic changes in the beginning of the 1990s, Q-fever epidemiology in Bulgaria has changed. The number of goats almost tripled; contact between goat owners (and their families) and goats, as well as goats and other animals, increased; consumption of raw goat milk and its products increased; and goats replaced cattle and sheep as the main source of human Coxiella burnetii infections. Hundreds of overt, serologically confirmed human cases of acute Q fever have occurred.

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In the spring of 1993, an outbreak of respiratory infection affected 113 persons (103 males) in Jedl'ové Kostol'any, a village located in a hilly area of western Slovakia. Q fever, manifested as a flu-like illness with atypical pneumonia and hepatic involvement, was diagnosed using four serological tests (microimmunofluorescence, microagglutination, complement fixation, and enzyme immunoassay). Aborting goats were proven as a source of infection.

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Isolates of Coxiella burnetii from different geographic regions in Europe, USA, Japan and Africa were compared in their binding properties to the monoclonal antibody (MoAb) 1/4/H directed against the lipopolysaccharide (LPS) of C. burnetii strain Priscilla. Immunoblot analysis and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) revealed different binding patterns of C.

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An improved method of isolation of Coxiella burnetti proteins was developed. It consists of a combination of detergent (sodium dodecyl sulphate (SDS) or sodium deoxycholate (DOC) and hot phenol treatments. The resulting phenol phase (PP) contained either lipopolysaccharide-(LPS) free proteins (DOC extraction) or proteins contaminated with LPS (SDS extraction), while the water phase (WP) contained LPS.

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Forty samples each of human sera collected in Guinea Bissau, Cape Verde, El Salvador and Iran, and animal sera (goat and cattle from Sri Lanka and sheep from Tanzania) were examined for the presence of antibodies to typhus group (TG) rickettsiae, spotted fever group (SFG) rickettsiae and Coxiella burnetii by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and indirect fluorescent antibody (IFA) test. Of human sera tested, a higher proportion of positive sera were found with ELISA and IFA test for TG, SFG rickettsiae and C. burnetii in El Salvador (42.

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BALB/c mice immunized intraperitoneally (ip) with killed purified Coxiella burnetii phase I corpuscular vaccines or trichloroacetic acid (TCA) extracts from phase I corpuscles (soluble vaccines) were protected against ip challenge with both homologous and heterologous C. burnetii phase I strains. Though the degree of protection, namely the inhibition of C.

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The immunogenicity and protective efficacy of the phase I and phase II Coxiella burnetii whole cells (Cb I and Cb II) and their outer membrane components (OMC), i.e. phase I trichloroacetic acid extract (TCAE), phase I 29 K protein (PRO), phase I and II lipopolysaccharides (LPS I, LPS II), polysaccharides (PS I, PS II), and lipid A (LA I, LA II), were compared.

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Results are presented to show the binding properties of five monoclonal antibodies directed to Coxiella burnetii Priscilla with cross-reactions to the Nine Mile strain. The monoclonal antibodies preferentially recognize phase I epitopes by ELISA and recognize phase II epitopes by immunoblotting but do not allow differentiation between so-called chronic and acute strains of C. burnetii.

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