Neurological disorders in patients with acute thallium poisoning

The largest study on neurological disorders in patients with laboratory-confirmed acute thallium poisoning was conducted in State Budgetary Healthcare Institution N.V.Sklifosovsky Research Institute of Emergency Medicine of Moscow Department of Health Care. For the first time affected patients were matched by route of poison exposure, time and severity of poisoning, and age. Neurological disorders as well as other symptoms typical for acute thallium poisoning are presented. Incidence of all symptoms and their severity depending on toxic agent concentration in biological liquids are presented. Thallium poisoning should be suspected if such symptoms as alopecia, myalgia of different localization (predominantly in chest and proximal leg muscles), peripheral paraparesis or tetraparesis, sensory polyneuropathy presenting with paresthesia accompanied by pain and/or hypesthesia transforming to mononeuropathy, coordination impairment presented by static or dynamic ataxia, and postural tremor coexist. Thallium determination in blood and urine is an informative diagnostic test. Pain, motor and coordination disturbances are first to regress, and tremor, sensory, cognitive and emotional disturbances preserve for a longer time. Polyneuropathies transform to mononeuropathies in time. Tremor can get worse despite thallium concentration in biological liquids decrease. Patents have cognitive and severe emotional impairment. Patients affected with thallium poisoning require long-term neurologist follow-up as well as rehabilitation

Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon-Degrading Bacteria in Three Different Functional Zones of the Cities of Moscow and Murmansk

We performed a comparative study of the total bacterial communities and communities of cultivable polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH)-degrading bacteria in different functional zones of Moscow and Murmansk that were formed under the influence of the PAH composition in road and leaf dust. The PAHs were determined by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC); the bacterial communities’ diversity was assessed by metabarcoding. The degraders were isolated by their direct plating on a medium with the PAHs. The PAH total quantity declined in the leaf dust from the traffic to the recreational zone. For the road dust, a negative gradient with pollution was observed for Rhodococcus and Acinetobacter degraders and for their relative abundance in the microbiome for the functional zones of Moscow. The opposite effect was observed in the Murmansk leaf dust for the Rothia and Pseudomonas degraders and in the Moscow road dust for Microbacterium. The PCA and linear regression analyses showed that the Micrococcus degraders in the dust were sensitive to anthropogenic pollution, so they can be used as a tool for monitoring anthropogenic changes in the biosphere. The data on the degraders’ and microbial communities’ diversity suggest that minor degrading strains can play a key role in PAH degradation

Plant cholesterol biosynthetic pathway overlaps with phytosterol metabolism

The amount of cholesterol made by many plants is not negligible. Whereas cholesterogenesis in animals was elucidated decades ago, the plant pathway has remained enigmatic. Among other roles, cholesterol is a key precursor for thousands of bioactive plant metabolites, including the well-known Solanum steroidal glycoalkaloids. Integrating tomato transcript and protein co-expression data revealed candidate genes putatively associated with cholesterol biosynthesis. A combination of functional assays including gene silencing, examination of recombinant enzyme activity and yeast mutant complementation suggests the cholesterol pathway comprises 12 enzymes acting in 10 steps. It appears that half of the cholesterogenesis-specific enzymes evolved through gene duplication and divergence from phytosterol biosynthetic enzymes, whereas others act reciprocally in both cholesterol and phytosterol metabolism. Our findings provide a unique example of nature's capacity to exploit existing protein folds and catalytic machineries from primary metabolism to assemble a new, multi-step metabolic pathway. Finally, the engineering of a 'high-cholesterol' model plant underscores the future value of our gene toolbox to produce high-value steroidal compounds via synthetic biology