Experiments on rehabilitation of radioactive metallic waste (RMW) of reactor stainless steels of Siberian chemical plant

Stainless steel pipes, used to cool a reactor plant, have a high cost, and aftertaking a reactor out of service they must be buried together with other radioactivewaste. Therefore, the relevant problem is the rinse of pipes from contamination,followed by returning to operation

The activity of matrix metalloproteinases and the concentration of their tissue inhibitors in the blood serum of patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus, depending on the stage of compensation of the disease

The aim of the study was to test the hypothesis on the possible reason for the decrease in the activity of matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) as a consequence of the high concentration of their tissue inhibitors (TIMPs) in the blood serum of patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM). Material and methods. In the experimental part of the article, we used the blood serum of patients under observation in the clinic of the Federal Research Center of Fundamental and Translational Medicine. According to the content of glycated hemoglobin (HbA1С) in blood serum, the patients were divided into 3 groups: at the stage of compensation (6.0–6.5 % HbA1С), at the stage of subcompensation (6.6–7.0 % HbA 1С) and decompensation (> 7.0 % HbA1С). The activity of MMPs 2 and 7 in blood serum samples was measured by a fluorimetric method using a fluorescent substrate specific for these MMPs. The concentration of TIMP-1 (inhibitor of all non-membrane-bound MMPs) and TIMP-2 (active against MMP-2 and -7) in blood serum were determined by enzyme immunoassay. Results and discussion. In patients with T2DM, the MMP-2 and -7 activities decreased, more pronouncedly at the stage of decompensation. An increase in the concentration of TIMP-1 was observed in the serum of all patients, while no significant changes in the content of TIMP-2 were found. At the stage of decompensation, a decrease in MMP activity was accompanied by a decrease in the content of insulin, C-peptide and a corresponding increase in the level of proinsulin. An inverse correlation was found between the concentrations of TIMP-1 and insulin in patients at the stage of decompensation of T2DM. It is assumed that the activity of MMP-2 and -7, in comparison with their inhibitors, forms stronger correlations with the parameters of carbohydrate metabolism

Characterization of bacillus cereus dissociants

The autoregulation of the phenotypic (populational) variability of the Bacillus cereus strain 504 was studied. The isolated colonial morphotypes of this bacterium were found to differ in their growth characteristics and the synthesis of extracellular proteases. The phenotypic variabilities of vegetative proliferating cells and those germinated from endospores and cystlike refractory cells were different. Bacterial variants also differed in the production of the dt and d2 factors (the autoinducers of dormancy and autolysis, respectively) and sensitivity to them. The possible role of these factors in the dissociation of microorganisms is discussed

Binase penetration into alveolar epithelial cells does not induce cell death

Microbial ribonucleases possess a broad spectrum of biological activities, which demonstrate stimulating properties at low concentrations and cytotoxicity and genotoxicity at high concentrations. Mechanisms of their penetration into the cells still remain unclear. In this study penetration of Bacillus intermedius RNase (binase) in alveolar lung epithelial cells, type II (ATII) pneumocytes, has been investigated. Using immunofluorescence analysis we have shown for the first time internalization of binase by primary non-differentiated pneumocytes ATII. The enzyme did not penetrate in MLE-12 (Murine Lung Epithelial-12 cells). However, binase was cytotoxic towards tumor MLE-12 cells, but not ATII cells. These results clearly indicate higher sensitivity of tumor cells to binase compared to normal cells; they also demonstrate that penetration of the enzyme into alveolar epithelial cells is not directly associated with their death. © 2012 Pleiades Publishing, Ltd

The role of microbial dormancy autoinducers in metabolism blockade

Alkyl-substituted hydroxybenzenes (AHBs), which are autoinducers of microbial dormancy (d1 factors), were found to stabilize the structure of protein macromolecules and modify the catalytic activity of enzymes. In vitro experiments showed that C6-AHB at concentrations from 10-4 to 10-2 M, at which it occurs in the medium as a true solution and a micellar colioid, respectively, nonspecifically inhibited the activity of chymotrypsin, RNase, invertase, and glucose oxidase. C6-AHB-induced conformational alterations in protein macromolecules were due to the formation of complexes, as evidenced by differences in the fluorescence spectra of individual RNase and C6-AHB and their mixtures and in the surface tension isotherms of C6-AHB and trypsin solutions. Data on the involvement of dormancy autoinducers in the posttranslational modification of enzymes and their inhibition will provide further insight into the mechanisms of development and maintenance of dormant microbial forms. © 2000 MAIK "Nauka/Interperiodica"

Resonant X-ray Scattering in Manganites - Study of Orbital Degree of Freedom -

Orbital degree of freedom of electrons and its interplay with spin, charge and lattice degrees of freedom are one of the central issues in colossal magnetoresistive manganites. The orbital degree of freedom has until recently remained hidden, since it does not couple directly to most of experimental probes. Development of synchrotron light sources has changed the situation; by the resonant x-ray scattering (RXS) technique the orbital ordering has successfully been observed . In this article, we review progress in the recent studies of RXS in manganites. We start with a detailed review of the RXS experiments applied to the orbital ordered manganites and other correlated electron systems. We derive the scattering cross section of RXS where the tensor character of the atomic scattering factor (ASF) with respect to the x-ray polarization is stressed. Microscopic mechanisms of the anisotropic tensor character of ASF is introduced and numerical results of ASF and the scattering intensity are presented. The azimuthal angle scan is a unique experimental method to identify RXS from the orbital degree of freedom. A theory of the azimuthal angle and polarization dependence of the RXS intensity is presented. The theoretical results show good agreement with the experiments in manganites. Apart from the microscopic description of ASF, a theoretical framework of RXS to relate directly to the 3d orbital is presented. The scattering cross section is represented by the correlation function of the pseudo-spin operator for the orbital degree of freedom. A theory is extended to the resonant inelastic x-ray scattering and methods to observe excitations of the orbital degree of freedom are proposed.Comment: 47 pages, 24 figures, submitted to Rep. Prog. Phy

Challenges in the harmonisation of global integrated assessment models: a comprehensive methodology to reduce model response heterogeneity

Harmonisation sets the ground to a solid inter-comparison of integrated assessment models. A clear and transparent harmonisation process promotes a consistent interpretation of the modelling outcomes divergences and, reducing the model variance, is instrumental to the use of integrated assessment models to support policy decision-making. Despite its crucial role for climate economic policies, the definition of a comprehensive harmonisation methodology for integrated assessment modelling remains an open challenge for the scientific community. This paper proposes a framework for a harmonisation methodology with the definition of indispensable steps and recommendations to overcome stumbling blocks in order to reduce the variance of the outcomes which depends on controllable modelling assumptions. The harmonisation approach of the PARIS REINFORCE project is presented here to layout such a framework. A decomposition analysis of the harmonisation process is shown through 6 integrated assessment models (GCAM, ICES-XPS, MUSE, E3ME, GEMINI-E3, and TIAM). Results prove the potentials of the proposed framework to reduce the model variance and present a powerful diagnostic tool to feedback on the quality of the harmonisation itself

Longest Common Prefixes with kk-Errors and Applications

Although real-world text datasets, such as DNA sequences, are far from being uniformly random, average-case string searching algorithms perform significantly better than worst-case ones in most applications of interest. In this paper, we study the problem of computing the longest prefix of each suffix of a given string of length $n$ over a constant-sized alphabet that occurs elsewhere in the string with $k$-errors. This problem has already been studied under the Hamming distance model. Our first result is an improvement upon the state-of-the-art average-case time complexity for non-constant $k$ and using only linear space under the Hamming distance model. Notably, we show that our technique can be extended to the edit distance model with the same time and space complexities. Specifically, our algorithms run in $\mathcal{O}(n \log^k n \log \log n)$ time on average using $\mathcal{O}(n)$ space. We show that our technique is applicable to several algorithmic problems in computational biology and elsewhere

Epidemiological situation of a new coronavirus infection (COVID-19) in the Rostov region: analysis and forecast

Objective: monitoring, analysis and forecast of the spread of new coronavirus infection (COVID-19) in the Rostov region.Materials and methods: analysis of data on the incidence of COVID-19 in the Rostov region, obtained on the basis of agencies: Department of the Federal service for supervision of consumer protection and human welfare in the Rostov region, Center of hygiene and epidemiology in Rostov region, Rostov research Institute of Microbiology and Parasitology, as well as the monitoring of information on the Internet sites of the Government of the Rostov region and the regional headquarters for the fight against the spread of COVID-19. Application of the SEIR analytical platform to build a mathematical model for predicting the spread of infection in the Rostov region.Results: the article presents an analysis of the epidemiological situation for the incidence of COVID-19 in the Rostov region, analyzes the effectiveness of preventive and anti-epidemic measures with the ability to predict the development of the epidemiological process in the region

Patterns of calcium oxalate monohydrate crystallization in complex biological systems

The paper presents the features of calcium oxalate crystallization in the presence of additives revealed through experimental modeling. The patterns of phase formation are shown for the Ca{2+} – C[2]O[4]{ 2–} – H[2]O and Ca{2+} – C[2]O[4]{2–} – PO[4]{3–} – H[2]O systems with the components and pH of the saline varying over a wide concentrations range. The effect of additives on crystallization of calcium oxalate monohydrate was investigated. It was found that the ionic strength and magnesium ions are inhibitors, and calcium oxalate and hydroxyapatite crystals are catalysts of calcium oxalate monohydrate crystallization. The basic calcium phosphate (apatite) was found to be most thermodynamically stable, which indicates its special role in kidney stone formation since it is found in virtually all stones