N-acetyltransferase 2 (NAT2) Gene Polymorphisms and the Effectiveness of Infertility Treatment in Patients with Peritoneal Endometriosis

Today, infertility has become a global issue. WHO ranks it the fifth among the major diseases of those below 60 years, after alcoholism, depression, injuries and eyesight disorders. Numerous studies conducted on the problems of infertility in endometriosis still do not offer clear answers regarding the pathogenesis and mechanisms of this disease and its influences on fertility. According to the survey results, point mutations of the NAT2 gene (NAT2*5 and NAT2*6) have been identified in 75.6% of the patients with infertility problems and the peritoneal form of endometriosis, that create “slow” allelic variants, which exceed the average index in the population. The peculiarities of the NAT2 gene polymorphisms have been proven to be associated with the effectiveness of the infertility treatment of female patients with peritoneal endometriosis. In the group of non-pregnant patients, the presence of с.341Т>C, c.481C>T, c.590G>A and c.803A>G heterozygous point mutations are 73.2, 73.2, 5.4, and 62.5%, respectively. The significant difference in the comparison of the allelic polymorphism during the various stages of the endometriosis was not identified. At stage III-IV endometriosis the frequency of three and more point substitutions was significantly higher. NAT2 gene polymorphisms can find use as an additional criterion for predicting the effectiveness of the infertility treatment of patients with peritoneal endometriosis

Wüstite: electric, thermodynamic and optical properties of FeO

We report on a systematic optical investigation of w\"ustite. In addition, the sample under consideration, Fe0.93O, has been characterized in detail by electrical transport, dielectric, magnetic and thermodynamic measurements. From infrared reflectivity experiments, phonon properties, Drude-like conductivity contributions and electronic transitions have been systematically investigated. The phonon modes reveal a clear splitting below the antiferromagnetic ordering temperature, similar to observations in other transition-metal monoxides and in spinel compounds which have been explained in terms of a spin-driven Jahn-Teller effect. The electronic transitions can best be described assuming a crystal-field parameter Dq = 750 cm-1 and a spin-orbit coupling constant \lambda = 95 cm-1. A well defined crystal field excitation at low temperatures reveals significant broadening on increasing temperature with an overall transfer of optical weight into dc conductivity contributions. This fact seems to indicate a melting of the on-site excitation into a Drude behavior of delocalized charge carriers. The optical band gap in w\"ustite is close to 1.0 eV at room temperature. With decreasing temperatures and passing the magnetic phase transition we have detected a strong blue shift of the correlation-induced band edge, which amounts more than 15% and has been rarely observed in antiferromagnets.Comment: 13 pages, 10 figure