CLOTHES RATIONING DURING WORLD WAR II AND ITS IMPACT ON FASHION

The article deals with rationing clothes during World War II. The hypothesis of the study: rationing is introduced to save resources and curb inflation and becomes a decisive factor shaping fashion along with shortage of goods. The subject of the study is fashion during World War II. The purpose of the study is to identify and compare the features of the rationing of clothing in different countries during the war. The objectives of the study are to consider how the normalized distribution influences the features of wartime fashion, which has been studied mainly on the example of the Soviet Union, Germany, Great Britain, the United States of America, and France. The authors utilize the socio-psychological approach that considers the features of human behavior in relation to apparel in specific historical conditionsAbstract: the article deals with rationing clothes during World War II. The hypothesis of the study: rationing is introduced to save resources and curb inflation and becomes a decisive factor in shaping fashion along with the shortage of goods. The subject of the study is fashion during World War II. The purpose of the study is to identify and compare the features of the rationing of clothing in different countries during the war. The objectives of the study are to consider how the normalized distribution influences the features of wartime fashion, which has been studied mainly in the example of the Soviet Union, Germany, Great Britain, the United States of America, and France. The authors utilize the socio-psychological approach that considers the features of human behavior concerning apparel in specific historical conditions. Keywords: Second World War, Fashion, Rationing, Normalized distribution of resources.   Resumo: O artigo trata do racionamento de roupas durante a Segunda Guerra Mundial. A hipótese do estudo: o racionamento é introduzido para economizar recursos e conter a inflação e se torna um fator decisivo que molda a moda junto com a escassez de bens. O tema do estudo é a moda durante a Segunda Guerra Mundial. O objetivo do estudo é identificar e comparar as características do racionamento de roupas em diferentes países durante a guerra. Os objetivos do estudo são considerar como a distribuição normalizada influencia as características da moda em tempo de guerra, que tem sido estudada principalmente a exemplo da União Soviética, Alemanha, Grã-Bretanha, Estados Unidos da América e França. Os autores utilizam a abordagem sociopsicológica que considera as características do comportamento humano em relação ao vestuário em condições históricas específicas. Palavras-chave: Segunda Guerra Mundial, Moda, Racionamento, Distribuição normalizada de recursos

Combining biological and chemical approaches in marine biodiscovery

Marine organisms are prolific producers of novel and structurally interesting metabolites. The identification of marine natural products contributes to many scientific areas including pharmacology, chemical ecology, chemical synthesis, and others. Today various methodologies are used to select marine organisms that potentially contain bioactive metabolites. In this thesis we used two different strategies to select promising marine organisms. The first strategy is the High Throughput Screening (HTS) of Irish marine organisms’ extracts against a cancer related target. With that purpose a library of 916 marine organisms’ extracts was composed, a colorectal cancer cell line resistant towards 5-fluorouracil was prepared and the HTS of the library was conducted on this target. Through this strategy, only one known structure was elucidated among the ‘hits’. Therefore, another methodology directed towards the construction of a marine chemical library was employed which was based on a selection of marine organisms using their taxonomy. The chemical investigation of species of the genus Haliclona yielded two new and six known compounds. Next, the taxonomy based selection was improved by addition of HPLC-DAD-ELSD chemical screening. The chemical screening of 27 sponges belonging to the order Haplosclerida from the Caribbean and Poecilosclerida order from Ireland, led to the selection of two sponges: Clathria strepsitoxa and Siphonodictyon coralliphagum. In total of 12 new compounds were isolated including interesting sesquiterpene (hydro)quinones together with four known compounds. In total, eight marine organisms were chemically investigated which led to the characterization of 14 new metabolites and 11 known. Methodologies towards selection of promising marine organisms for drug discovery are discussed

Combining biological and chemical approaches in marine biodiscovery

Marine organisms are prolific producers of novel and structurally interesting metabolites. The identification of marine natural products contributes to many scientific areas including pharmacology, chemical ecology, chemical synthesis, and others. Today various methodologies are used to select marine organisms that potentially contain bioactive metabolites. In this thesis we used two different strategies to select promising marine organisms. The first strategy is the High Throughput Screening (HTS) of Irish marine organisms’ extracts against a cancer related target. With that purpose a library of 916 marine organisms’ extracts was composed, a colorectal cancer cell line resistant towards 5-fluorouracil was prepared and the HTS of the library was conducted on this target. Through this strategy, only one known structure was elucidated among the ‘hits’. Therefore, another methodology directed towards the construction of a marine chemical library was employed which was based on a selection of marine organisms using their taxonomy. The chemical investigation of species of the genus Haliclona yielded two new and six known compounds. Next, the taxonomy based selection was improved by addition of HPLC-DAD-ELSD chemical screening. The chemical screening of 27 sponges belonging to the order Haplosclerida from the Caribbean and Poecilosclerida order from Ireland, led to the selection of two sponges: Clathria strepsitoxa and Siphonodictyon coralliphagum. In total of 12 new compounds were isolated including interesting sesquiterpene (hydro)quinones together with four known compounds. In total, eight marine organisms were chemically investigated which led to the characterization of 14 new metabolites and 11 known. Methodologies towards selection of promising marine organisms for drug discovery are discussed

Oxygenated Acyclic Diterpenes with Anticancer Activity from the Irish Brown Seaweed Bifurcaria bifurcata

Brown alga Bifurcaria bifurcata is a prolific source of bioactive acyclic (linear) diterpenes with high structural diversity. In the continuation of our investigations on Irish brown algae, we undertook an in-depth chemical study on the n-hexanes and chloroform subextracts of B. bifurcata that led to isolation of six new (1–6) and two known (7–8) acyclic diterpenes. Chemical structures of the compounds were elucidated by a combination of 1D and 2D NMR, HRMS, FT-IR, [α]D and vibrational circular dichroism (VCD) spectroscopy. Compounds 1–8, as well as three additional linear diterpenes (9–11), which we isolated from the same seaweed before, were tested against the human breast cancer cell line (MDA-MB-231). Several compounds moderately inhibited the growth of the MDA-MB-231 cell line with IC50 values ranging from 11.6 to 32.0 μg/mL. The present study carried out on the lipophilic extracts of the Irish B. bifurcata shows the enormous capacity of this seaweed to produce a large palette of acyclic diterpenes with diverse oxygenation and substitution patterns and promising bioactivities

Density Functional Theory (DFT)-Aided Structure Elucidation of Linear Diterpenes from the Irish Brown Seaweed Bifurcaria bifurcata

Brown alga Bifurcaria bifurcata is an extraordinarily rich source of linear (acylic) diterpenes with enormous structural diversity. As part of our interest into secondary metabolites of the Irish seaweeds, here we report four new acyclic diterpenes (1–4) and seven known terpenoids (5–11) from the CHCl3 extract B. bifurcata. The planar structures of the new metabolites were elucidated by means of 1D and 2D NMR, HRMS, and FT-IR spectroscopy. Since linear diterpenes are highly flexible compounds, the assignment of their stereochemistry by conventional methods, e.g., NOESY NMR, is difficult. Therefore, we employed extensive quantum-mechanical prediction of NMR chemical shifts and optical rotation analyses to identify the relative and absolute configurations of the new compounds 1–4. Several compounds moderately inhibited the human breast cancer cell line (MDA-MB-231) with IC50 values ranging from 10.0 to 33.5 μg/mL. This study not only demonstrates the vast capacity of the Irish B. bifurcata to produce highly oxygenated linear diterpenoids, but also highlights the potential of new methodologies for assignment of their stereogenic center

Presentation, presentation, presentation! Molecular-level insight into linker effects on glycan array screening data

Changes in cell-surface glycan patterns are markers of the presence of many different disease and cancer types, offering a relatively untapped niche for glycan-targeting reagents and therapeutics in diagnosis and treatment. Of paramount importance for the success of any glycan-targeting reagent is the ability to specifically recognize the target among the plethora of different glycans that exist in the human body. The preeminent technique for defining specificity is glycan array screening, in which a glycan-binding protein (GBP) can be simultaneously screened against multiple glycans. Glycan array screening has provided unparalleled insight into GBP specificity, but data interpretation suffers from difficulties in identifying false-negative binding arising from altered glycan presentation, associated with the linker used to conjugate the glycan to the surface. In this work, we model the structure and dynamics of the linkers employed in the glycan arrays developed by the Consortium for Functional Glycomics. The modeling takes into account the physical presence and surface polarity of the array, and provides a structure-based rationalization of false-negative results arising from the so-called “linker effect.” The results also serve as a guide for interpreting glycan array screening data in a biological context; in particular, we show that attempts to employ natural amino acids as linkers may be prone to unexpected artifacts compromising glycan recognition

Recovery of Donor Hematopoiesis after Graft Failure and Second Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation with Intraosseous Administration of Mesenchymal Stromal Cells

Multipotent mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs) participate in the formation of bone marrow niches for hematopoietic stem cells. Donor MSCs can serve as a source of recovery for niches in patients with graft failure (GF) after allogeneic bone marrow (BM) transplantation. Since only few MSCs reach the BM after intravenous injection, MSCs were implanted into the iliac spine. For 8 patients with GF after allo-BMT, another hematopoietic stem cell transplantation with simultaneous implantation of MSCs from their respective donors into cancellous bone was performed. BM was aspirated from the iliac crest of these patients at 1-2, 4-5, and 9 months after the intraosseous injection of donor MSCs. Patients’ MSCs were cultivated, and chimerism was determined. In 6 out of 8 patients, donor hematopoiesis was restored. Donor cells (9.4 ± 3.3%) were detected among MSCs. Thus, implanted MSCs remain localized at the site of administration and do not lose the ability to proliferate. These results suggest that MSCs could participate in the restoration of niches for donor hematopoietic cells or have an immunomodulatory effect, preventing repeated rejection of the graft. Perhaps, intraosseous implantation of MSCs contributes to the success of the second transplantation of hematopoietic stem cells and patient survival