Significance of the presence of antibiotics on the microbial consortium in wastewater - The case of nitrofurantoin and furazolidone.

Antibiotics in wastewater leads to migration of pollutants and disrupts natural processes of mineralization of organic matter. In order to understand the mechanism of this, research was undertaken on the influence of nitrofurantoin (NFT) and furazolidone (FZD), on the behaviour of a consortium of microorganisms present in a model wastewater in a bioreactor. Our study confirmed biodegradation of the antibiotics by the microbial consortium, with the degradation efficiency within 10 days of 65% for FZD, but only 20% for NFT. The kinetic study proved that the presence of analysed antibiotics had no adverse effect on the microbes, but the consortium behaviour differ significantly with the NFT reducing the consumption of organic carbon in wastewater and increasing the production of extracellular biopolymeric and volatile organic compounds, and the FZD reducing assimilation of other carbon sources to a less extent, at the expense of cellular focus on biodegradation of this antibiotic

The influence of the time-of-day administration of the drug on the pharmacokinetics of sunitinib in rabbits

OBJECTIVES: At present it is known that the adjustment of the anticancer therapy to the circadian rhythms in tissues reduces the toxicity of the treatment. Chronotherapy also increases the efficacy of the anticancer treatment, which has been proved for many drugs. Sunitinib is a tyrosine kinase inhibitor, which is broadly used for the treatment of numerous cancers. The aim of the study was a comparison of the concentrations and pharmacokinetics of sunitinib after a single administration to rabbits at 08:00 (control group) and 20:00. Additionally, the effect of sunitinib on glucose levels was investigated. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The research was carried out on two groups of rabbits: I08:00, a group with the drug administered at 08:00 (n=8) and II20:00, a group with the drug administered at 20:00 (n=8). The rabbits were treated with sunitinib at an oral dose of 25 mg. Plasma concentrations of sunitinib and its metabolite (SU12662) were measured with a validated HPLC method with UV detection. RESULTS: The comparison of the sunitinib Cmax and AUC0-t in the group with sunitinib administered at 20:00 with the control group gave the ratios of 2.20 (90% confidence interval (CI) (2.17; 2.22) and 1.64 (1.61; 1.68), respectively. Statistically significant differences between the groups under analysis were revealed for Cmax (p \u3c 0.0001), AUC0-t (p = 0.0079), AUC0-∞ (p = 0.0149), and tmax (p = 0.0085). The mean glycemia drop was higher in group I08:00. than in group II20:00 (22.7% vs. 14.3%; p = 0.0622). The glycemia values returned to the initial values in 24 h after the administration of the drug in both groups. CONCLUSIONS: The research proved a significant influence of the time-of-day administration on the pharmacokinetics of sunitinib

Analysis of the impact of sex and age on the variation in the prevalence of antinuclear autoantibodies in Polish population: a nationwide observational, cross-sectional study

The detection of antinuclear autoantibody (ANA) is dependent on many factors and varies between the populations. The aim of the study was first to assess the prevalence of ANA in the Polish adult population depending on age, sex and the cutoff threshold used for the results obtained. Second, we estimated the occurrence of individual types of ANA-staining patterns. We tested 1731 patient samples using commercially available IIFA using two cutoff thresholds of 1:100 and 1:160. We found ANA in 260 participants (15.0%), but the percentage of positive results strongly depended on the cutoff level. For a cutoff threshold 1:100, the positive population was 19.5% and for the 1:160 cutoff threshold, it was 11.7%. The most prevalent ANA-staining pattern was AC-2 Dense Fine speckled (50%), followed by AC-21 Reticular/AMA (14.38%) ANA more common in women (72%); 64% of ANA-positive patients were over 50 years of age. ANA prevalence in the Polish population is at a level observed in other highly developed countries and is more prevalent in women and elderly individuals. To reduce the number of positive results released, we suggest that Polish laboratories should set 1:160 as the cutoff threshold

Adsorption Chromatography in the Examination of Heavy Oil Residues — Comparison of Standard Methods

The relative content of aliphatic/aromatic hydrocarbons, polar species and asphaltene fractions determines the utility of asphalts and is the basis for the selection of the oxidation conditions for heavy oil fractions (distillation residues). The use of different separation methods leads to different types of asphalt (heavy residue) compositions. Three different separation methods were studied and the asphalt or heavy residue compositions arising from these methods were compared