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Biomedical subjects

W Schmidt

Publications and source records attributed to W Schmidt.

At least 775 records · Page 43Linked to original sources

Skid row alcoholism. A distinct sociomedical entity.

The physical-disease charcteristics of 125 skid row and 736 non-skid row male alcoholics were compared in detail to determine whether skid row alcoholism is characterized by a distinct medical, as well as a social, profile. Trauma, tuberculosis, venereal disease, and malnutrition were more common in the skid row alcoholics. Epilepsy, peripheral neuritis, acute brain syndromes, chronic brain disease, and lifetime recordings of all nervous system illnesses also occurred more frequently in the skid row group, as did gastritis, gastrointestinal hemorrhage, ulcer surgery, and postgastrectomy syndrome. Fatty liver, hypertension, ischemic heart disease, cardiomyopathy, and cardiovascular illnesses of all kinds, however, were less common. The skid row medical profile is, in part, the product of a unique sociologic environment. Thus, skid row alcoholism may be viewed as a distinct sociomedical entity.

Adult↗

[The influencing of blastogenesis and embryogenesis in rats through aminoacetonitrile].

The study was designed to determine the influence of the lathyrogenic substance aminoacetonitrile on blastogenesis and embryogenesis of the Wistar rat. 91 female Wistar rats, weighing from 190 through 380 g, received a single injection of 300 mg aminoacetonitrile (AAN)/kg body weight. Substance was given intraperitoneally on days 5, 7, 9, 11 or 13 of pregnancy. The detection of sperms in the vaginal smears was counted as day 1 post coitum. Animals were sacrificed on day 21 of pregnancy. The following parameters served as a base of interpretation: fetal body weight, numbers of implantations, resorptions, dead and living fetuses. Malformations were detected by outer inspection for gross anomalies, by the razor blade technique for internal malformations, and by skeletal preparations. All results were evaluated by statistical means. AAN influences pregnancy and fetal development. The rates of fetal resorptions are enhanced after application of AAN beyond the 7th day p. c. The maximum of fetal death is reached on day 11 p. c. There is no influence on the mean implantation number. With the exception of the 5th day of development AAN reduces the number of living fetuses. After application of AAN on day 13 p.c. the mean body weight decreases significantly. All over the investigated range malformations can be observed. Abnormalities of internal organs are frequent: Hydrocephalus, hydronephrosis, situs inversus. Malformations of the skeletal system are only observable on days 5, 7 and 9: sternal fissure, supernumerary ribs, destruction of the lumbar spine. AAN does not induce gross anomalies of the fetus.

Abnormalities, Drug-Induced↗

Bence Jones proteins and light chains of immunoglobulins. XIII. Effect of elastase-like and chymotrypsin-like neutral proteases derived from human granulocytes on Bence Jones proteins.

Bence Jones proteins can be cleaved specifically by several types of endopeptidases into fragments corresponding to the amino-terminal, variant (VL) portion and to the carboxyl-terminal, constant (CL) portion of the light polypeptide chain. Two types of neutral proteases, designated elastase-like (ELP) and chymotrypsin-like (CLP), have been isolated and purified from human polymorphonuclear leukocytes. Because these proteases have defined proteolytic activity under physiologic conditions for several types of human proteins, we investigated their effect on human Bence Jones proteins. Incubation of kappa-type or lambda-type Bence Jones proteins with ELP or CLP under appropriate conditions resulted in cleavage of both types of light chains as evident by immunochemical and electrophoretic analyses. Treatment with ELP or CLP of one kappa Bence Jones protein resulted in the formation of a single component that had antigenic and electrophoretic properties similar to the VL fragment derived from pepsin digestion of the native protein. No component corresponding to the CL could be detected immunochemically or electrophoretically. Studies of isolated pepsin-labile (37 degrees C) and pepsin-stable (55 degrees C) CL fragments demonstrated the marked susceptibility of the carboxyl-terminal half of the light chain to proteolysis by the leukocyte-derived neutral proteases. Incubation with ELP of three other kappa Bence Jones proteins and three reduced-alkylated lambda Bence Jones proteins resulted, in each case, in the formation of a homogeneous component which was electrophoretically and immunochemically distinct from the pepsin-derived VL fragment. An identical component could also be formed by incubating a pepsin-derived VL fragment with ELP. In the ELP-treated samples, no CL-related material was detected electrophoretically or immunochemically with antisera possessing specificity for CL antigenic determinants present on the unfolded light polypeptide chain or on the isolated CL. The component formed by ELP or CLP treatment of certain Bence Jones proteins thus appears to be VL-related, but lacks the idiotypic antigenic determinant present on the native protein. In this respect, these neutral protease-derived light chain components are similar to the amyloid-like VL fragments generated in vitro from certain endopeptidase-treated Bence Jones proteins.

Bence Jones Protein↗

[Studies for a mathematical model of the proliferation kinetics of mammary carcinomas by means of electronic data processing (author's transl)].

Continuing an earlier publication in which the growth of spontaneous mammary carcinomas in female mice of a C3H inbred strain was described, in the present paper the growth rate is expressed by a mathematical function, and is adapted by electronic data processing to the experimental values of 60 tumors classified into seven "growth types". For mathematical description the tumors were conveniently assumed to have a spherical shape, and the main reason for the reduction in volume increase with increasing tumor size was thought to be insufficient supply with oxygen and the essential nutrients S. Including the experimental data of all carcinomas investigated, the minimum concentration of S necessary for mitotic activity of the tumor cells was calculated to be 65% of the normal level. As the average for all the tumors investigated, a time of at least 33 hrs is required for the tumor volume to double.

Animals↗