Immunoadjuvant activity of synthetic N-acetyl muramyl dipeptide

Summary The administration of phosphatidyl choline/cholesterol liposomes with entrapped N-acetyl muramyl dipeptide induced in guinea-pigs the development of delayed hypersensitivity to ovalbumin.     

F#-Time, Functions and Processes: Towards Sustainable Investment Risk Benchmarks

‘I made a mistake’: Alan Greenspan (Financial Times: Alan Beattie and James Politi: Washington, 23rd October 2008). Such are the words of great men, for even in troubled times their self-effacing manner provides useful guidance. Whilst Mr Greenspan may feel this way, he is a product of his environment, one that has seen the cumulative development of financial instruments and strategies that have not been thought through as to their impact on a complex economy. Mainly this is because risk is thought to be discrete and the methods used to price it are flawed. To an engineer the control of a machine is built-in. Although the economy is not a machine, but an intensely connected complex of ever emerging businesses, the process of control needs to be structured in a similar manner. Pricing investment risk in this environment should never have been left to opaque institutions, or processes that do not recognise the co-dependencies of business and systemic functionality. To do so is to ignore the correlation of events in a highly connected world. These events are dynamic and conditional, whose outturns are unknowable. This does not mean unmanageable, but that the control process be built-in to businesses and government in a consistent manner, transparent yet using different parameters. Transparent means that data, assumptions and processes need to be monitored and published in timely manner. As far as accounting for results is concerned it should be recognised that budgeting and reporting to investors is founded on dynamic processes that are therefore changeable; usually out of date; and co-dependent upon others within a complex dynamic network that is both internal and external to the business. The works of Stafford Beer (Brain of the Firm, Heart of the Enterprise, Diagnosing the System) Fredrick Vestor (The Art of Interconnected Thinking) and others are examples of how to manage the internal dynamics of a business and point to a methodology that synthesises the approaches of investors such as Warren Buffett so that extreme outcomes such as the Credit-Crunch 2008 can be reduced in frequency but investors are free to ‘take their risks’. This research aims to compare two extreme events in the financial arena, the ‘Reinsurance Spiral of the late 1980s’ and the ‘2008 Credit-Crunch’, show their commonalities and propose methods that supply liquidity in all but gross systemic failure and allow investment risk to be more ably assessed and priced. It is not meant to be an exhaustive analysis but one focused on how ignoring the proper relationship of time, functions and processes brought about the current problem in both insurance and the capital markets and how a solution may be found. This research note offers an overview on the ongoing PhD research on the topic.

Reinigung mikrobiologischer Objekte zur Vorbereitung elektronenmikroskopischer Präparate durch Ultrafiltration

Summary A method for preparation of electron microscopic specimens by ultrafiltration can be used for bacteriophages, mycoplasma, and fragile biological particles, especially from solutions containing low concentrations of these particles and when it is necessary to remove also macromolecules up to a certain size.     

35S-Sulphate incorporation into myelin sulphated mucopolysaccharides during rat brain development

Summary Rat brain myelin acid mucopolysaccharides (AMPS) incorporate 15%, 8%, 5.5% and 4% of tojtal associated³⁵S-sulphate, 14, 21, 30 and 75 days after birth, respectively. The course of³⁵S-sulphate incorporation into total rat brain mucopolysaccharides, as well in those from myelin, had a similar feature with peak on the 2nd week and a significant decrease on the 3rd and 4th week postnatally.     

Die biosynthetische Inkorporation von externem S35O2 in Glucobrassicin

Summary In plants of theBrassica oleracea species contaminated with S³⁶O₂, incorporation of radioactive sulphur into glucosinolate glucobrassicin has been found. The label is present also in the isothiocyanate group of glucobrassicin, which by decomposition under the action of myrosinase liberates labelled thiocyanate.     

Effect of human serum oxytocinase on the antidiuretic action of lysine vasopressin and oxytocin in the rat

Zusammenfassung Nach i.v. Dauerinfusion von Lysin-Vasopressin oder Oxytocin wird bei der experimentellen Analyse der Wirkung menschlicher Oxytocinase eine Erniedrigung des antidiuretischen Effekts gefunden; diese rührt vom Absinken der Peptidkonzentration sowohl im Blutplasma als auch am Wirkort her.     

Radiation-induced changes in gentamicin pharmacokinetics

Summary Decreased clearance of i.v. or intratracheally administered gentamicin was observed in rats following single whole-body irradiation, 6 Gy⁶⁰Co, reaching its lowest rate on the 7th post-irradiation day. Simultaneously the absorption rate of gentamicin from the lungs was found to be increased.     

Glucan-induced enhancement of hemopoietic recovery in gamma-irradiated mice

Summary A single pre- or postirradiation application of -(13)-D-glucan, a potent reticuloendothelial stimulant, enhances hemopoietic recovery in sublethally gamma-irradiated mice. Pretreatment of mice with glucan significantly reduces lethal radiation effects.     

Reaching-related potentials in caudate nucleus and cerebellum of rats

Summary Electrical correlates of the lateralized reaching reaction were studied in rats with implanted electrodes. Averaged event-related potentials (ERPs) in the cerebellar dentate nucleus consisted of a negative wave coinciding with reach onset and followed 70 msec later by a positive deflection. The most prominent component of the more variable caudate ERPs was a negative wave culminating 60–120 msec after reach onset. The positive and negative ERP deflections corresponded to inhibitory and excitatory reactions respectively, at the single neuron level.