Rat duodenal motility in vitro: Prokinetic effects of DL-homocysteine thiolactone and modulation of nitric oxide mediated inhibition

Homocysteine is a significant but modifiable risk factor for vascular diseases. As gastrointestinal smooth musculature is similar to blood vessel muscles, we investigated how elevated homocysteine levels affect nitric oxide-mediated neurotransmission in the gut. There is accumulated evidence that a dysfunction of NO neurons in the myenteric plexus may cause various diseases in the gastrointestinal tract such as achalasia, diabetic gastroparesis and infantile hypertrophic pyloric stenosis. In the present study, we aimed to assess the effects of homocysteine on NO-mediated responses in vitro, and to examine the effects of DL-homocysteine thiolactone on the spontaneous motility of rat duodenum and nitrergic neurotransmission. DL-homocysteine thiolactone concentration of 10 μmol/L leads to the immediate increase in tone, amplitude and frequency of spontaneous movements in isolated rat duodenum. L-NAME (30 μmol/L) leads to an increase in basal tone, amplitude and frequency of spontaneous contractions. The relaxations induced by EFS were significantly reduced in duodenal segments incubated in DL-homocysteine thiolactone compared with the control group. EFS-induced relaxations were inhibited by L-NAME in both experimental and control groups. These results suggest that a high level of homocysteine causes an important impairment of non-adrenergic non-cholinergic innervation of the rat duodenum. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. 175043

The politics of performance: transnationalism and its limits in former Yugoslav popular music, 1999–2004

This paper examines transnational relations between the Yugoslav successor states from the point of view of popular music, and demonstrates how transnational musical figures (such as Djordje Balaševi?, Mom?ilo Bajagi?-Bajaga and Ceca Ražnatovi?) are interpreted as symbolic reference points in national ethnopolitical discourse in the process of identity construction. Another symbolic function is served by Serbian turbofolk artists, who in Croatia serve as a cultural resource to distance oneself from a musical genre associated by many urban Croats with the ruralization (and Herzegovinization) of Croatian city space. In addition, value judgements associated with both Serbian and Croatian newly composed folk music provide an insight into the transnational negotiation of conflicting identities in the ex-Yugoslav context. Ultimately the paper shows how the ethnonational boundaries established by nationalizing ideologies created separate cultural spaces which themselves have been transnationalized after Yugoslavia's disintegration

Myocardial oxygen consumption regulation in isolated mouse heart: assessment by intracoronary administration of exogenous nitric oxide

In our previous work we have shown that in mouse heart basal level of endothelial produced nitrite, as a marker of nitric oxide (NO) formation, was 9.7 nmol l-1. Bradykinin (10 mmol l-1) induced a 5-fold rise in nitrite release, the coronary venous effluent concentration being 58 nmol l-1, but there was no effect on myocardial oxygen consumption (MVO2). The aim of this study was to assess the levels of authentic nitric oxide solution, exogenously applied, on myocardial oxygen consumption. Isolated mouse hearts (n=36) were paced (500 imp./min) and perfused at constant flow (16.0±0.3 ml g-1 min-1). When coronary vasculature resistance was carefully controlled by adenosine (1 mmol l-1), authentic nitric oxide solution, in a concentration less than 5 mmol l-1 did not alter myocardial oxygen consumption. Only concentrations of nitric oxide higher than 5 mmol l-1 induced reduction in myocardial oxygen consumption. Thus in the saline perfused mouse heart, with carefully controlled vasodilatation, modulating myocardial nitric oxide levels using an arterial application of authentic nitric oxide, concentrations higher than 5 mmol l-1 of nitric oxide were required to induce a decrease in myocardial oxygen consumption

Fractional kinetic model for granular compaction

We present an approach to granular compaction based on subordination of stochastic processes. In order to imitate, in a very simplified way, the compaction dynamics of granular material under tapping, we impose that particles switch stochastically between the two possible orientational states characterizing the average volumes of the grain in the presence of other grains. The main physical idea of our approach is that the interaction of grains with their environment is taken into account with the aid of the temporal subordination. Accordingly, we assume that the time intervals between the consecutive grain’s reorientations are governed by a certain waiting-time distribution ψ(t). It is demonstrated how the presence of the trapping events leads to the macroscopic observation of slow compaction dynamics, described by an exact fractional kinetic equation. We also perform numerical simulations to examine our analytical result. In addition, we reproduce the memory effects numerically by considering the response of the system to the abrupt change in the external excitation

Comparison of the effects of different sulfur amino acids on cardiovascular system in male wistar rats

Joint meeting of national physiological societies : May 25-27, 2017, Subotica