فصلنامه علوم پزشکی دانشگاه آزاد اسلامی
سال شانزدهم شماره 4 (پیاپی 46، زمستان 1385)

Apoptosis or programmed cell death (PCD) is an important mechanism in both development and homeostasis in adult tissue for the removal of superfluous cells, while its induction is an effective therapeutic approach for cancer. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the effect of cloned gene-related protein Vp2 of infectious bursal disease virus in human lymphoma B cells. In present study after cloning the Vp2 gene in Pichia pastoris system, the Vp2 protein was expressed. Cellular vital capacity was determined by MTT. Then effect of Vp2 protein in human lymphoma B cells was examined by Hoechst staining and flowcytometry techniques, respectively. During MTT, human lymphoma B cell lines revealed to have a meaningful apoptosis at 1mg and 5mg protein concentrations when compared with controls (p<0.01). Apoptotic bodies appeared by Hoechst staining apoptosis was induced suitably after 48 hours by flowcytometry assay. The present study is the first study that has revealed the gene-related protein Vp2 induced apoptosis in human lymphoma B cells in vitro.

Antifungal property of Juglans regia has not been proved yet, therefore, the present study we designed to examine the effect of Juglans regia pericarp on the growth of different fungi, particularly dermatophytes. The extract has been prepared by methanol solution using percolation method according to NCCLS protocol. Then, the fractions have been examined on fungi inoculums. For MBC estimation, it has been cultured on PDA medium. Juglans regia extract completely prevented growth of Epidermophyton floccosum and Trichophyton mentagrophytes in fraction of 120 mg/ml, Microsporum canis in fraction of 450 mg/ml, and Candida albicans in fraction of 337 mg/ml, meanwhile, it reduced colony growth of Aspergillus niger compared with the control. We have demonstrated that the growth of three dermatophyes and Candida albicans was completely inhibited by Juglans regia pericarp extract.

Colour blindness is a frequent entity, mostly occurred among males. It is mainly genetically in origin, however, acquired cases have been described. The present study was designed to determine the prevalence of colour vision deficiency among male guidance school students. This descriptive study was performed on 500 randomly selected male guidance school students from different districts of Tehran. They were tested for congenital colour blindness using “Ishihara” pseudoisochromatic color plates. Totally, 26 students were found to have color deficiency (5.2%) among whom 18 had relative colour deficiency whereas 8 had complete deficiency. Twelve (2.4%) students showed deuteranomaly, 6 (1.2%) had protanomaly, 5 (1%) had protanopia and 3 (0.6%) had deuteranopia. Colour blindness is more frequent in males. Most of the cases are hereditary, meanwhile, they usually have problem in differentiating red and green colours.

Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) is an important cause of nosocomial infections while recently resistance to oxacillin and vancomycin have been noted in literature. We studied 100 isolates of S. aureus from Emam Khomeini hospital by two antimicrobial susceptibility tests (AST) disk diffusion test (DDT) and E-test to determine the resistance to oxacillin (according to NCCLS comment) and vancomycin. There were no resistant S. aureus to vancomycin neither in DDT nor in E-test, however, there were 42% oxacillin-resistance S. aureus in both techniques. The results showed high prevalence of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) in Emam Khomeini hospital. The highest S. aureus infection detected from internal wards (26%), heart surgery ward (23%), sampling sites in wound (26%), surgical incision (20%), blood culture (17%) and prosthetic sites (14%). We should pay further attention to high risk wards and sites to control hospital infections. According to our results, there was a high coincidence between two AST methods.

The ability to estimate the mortality risk, especially in costing setting like ICU, is of great importance in order to evaluate new treatments, resource consumption control and improve quality control. Acute physiology and chronic health evaluation system (APACHE) is developed to predict critical care outcomes. In this system, according to the setting, a score is considered for each patients. Then using an equation, predicted mortality risk for each patients could be estimated. In a prospective study, we observed 269 ICU patients over a 10-month period. We calculated APACHE III scores for each patient and predicted mortality risk. Accuracy of the results were checked with regression analysis. Totally, 51.7% of patients were female while the mean age was 61.2 years. APACHE III average score was 60.6. Predicted mortality risk was 25.6% while actual death rate was 27.1%, therefore, SMR (actual death rate to predicted mortality risk ratio) was 1.05. Results revealed an association between actual death rate and APACHE III score and patient's age (P =0.0001), however, sex and death rate were not statistically correlated. The obtained SMR represents direct linear association between predicted and actual death rate (P=0.0001).

Ophthalmia neonatorum is a form of conjunctivitis that occurs in infants younger than 4 weeks of age. It is the most common eye disease in newborns. It presents as the inflammation of mucous membrane lining posterior layer of eyelids and bulbar part of eyeball except cornea. It’s complications are corneal ulcer, corneal perforation and blindness. The aim of this randomised clinical trial was to investigate the effect of erythromycin ointment 0.5% to prevent the incidence of conjunctivitis in Icteric neonates who were under phototherapy with eye patches. A total of 200 cases of icteric newborns in Javaheri hospital who admitted for phototherapy were considered. Neonatal conjunctivitis was not correlated with gestational age, duration of admission, type of delivery, and weight. It was not associated with erythromycin use, however, there was a significant association between conjunctivitis and age of newborn. Results showed that erythromycin ointment is not useful for protecting conjunctivitis in neonates under phototherapy with eye patches.

Desferal or Desferrioxamine B mesylate is an iron chealator drug. This medicine decreases the iron overload in the thalassemia patients who have been blood transfused the excess of iron is excreted through bile or urine. Novartis is the sole company which produces desferrioxamine B mesylate in the world and our country is importer of such drug. Thus we tried to increase Desferal production by inducing mutation in Streptomyces griseoflavus. This is an applied research carried out at pilot level. The organism is a Gram-positive bacterium that was supplied in lyophilized by Persian Type culture Collection, Iranian Research Organization for Science and Technology (IROST), Tehran, Iran bearing the code no. PTCC1130, which was cultured on Des4 medium. The organism was mutated by UV irradiation hence selective techniques and markers were employed to distinguish marked strains from parent S. griseoflavus. When the mutated organisms were selected according to their characteristics and used to fuse their protoplasts in order to obtain high yield desferrioxamine producing recombinant Streptomyces griseoflavus. The varied parameters were bacterial growth rate and desferal concentration in the culture broth. Our study showed that the rate of desferal production in mutant's strains called C7031 and S7011 and fusants srains called FP10 and FP9 was higher than wiled type Streptomyces griseoflavus. The increment in production of desferrioxamine was found to be 68% in FP9 and 81% in FP10 fusants. The mutation and protoplasts fusion of Streptomyces griseoflavus caused increment in production of desferrioxamine. The infrared spectrum, thin layer chromatogram of desferrioxamine extracted from culture broth was similar to that of standard desferrioxamine (Novartis) from the point of molecular identity.

Acyclovir is a drug used to treat herpes virus infections including cold catch injuries, hot spots of genital organs, zona, AIDS, chicken pox and some other viral infections. The local cream of acyclovir is prepared in %5 packages, each gram containing 50mg of drug in a base of polyethylene glycol. Acyclovir cream (%5) in days 7, 8 and 9 of gestation was applied around their mouth (experimental group 1) and to the shared skin of other group (experimental group 2) twice a day in two hours intervals. Pregnant mice were sacrificed and dissected on day 15 of gestation and morphological and histological studies on the embryos and placenta were carried out. In the case of non-pregnant mice, the uteral born and ovaries were processed for histological investigations. Histological analyses showed significant decrease in embryogenesis and significant increase of abortion in experimental group 1 compared with control group. Significant increment was found in uterus diameter and thickness of endometrium when compared with control group. A pregnant woman should be very careful about applying acyclovir during the first trimester of pregnancy.

Trichophyton rubrum is one of the anthropophilic dermatophytes with worldwide distribution. This fungus is a common causative agents of tinea cruris, tinea corporis, tinea pedis and tinea manuum. Several properties of this fungus have been studied so far however few investigations were carried out in the field of molecular biology of this microorganism. The main goal of this survey was the evaluation of ATPase-subunit G gene expression of this fungus due to different amounts of griseofulvin. Serial dilutions of griseofulvin with fungal growth were prepared and compared with control. In this study, the control and griseofulvin-treated samples were microscopically investigated and the RNAs were then extracted. Consequently RT-PCR was performed simultaneously in order to evaluate griseofulvin influence on ATPase-subunit G gene expression. It was indicated that the rate of shortened and twisted mycelia in 10 μg/ml of griseofulvin was much higher than 5μg/ml. Meanwhile, in 5μg/ml of this drug there is an obvious up-regulation in ATPase-subunit G gene in comparison with 10 μg/ml. It can be concluded that in certain amounts of griseofulvin, a significant increment in ATPase-subunit G gene expression as well as mycelial abnormalities could be occurred.

Appendicitis is a very rare clinical condition in neonates. Preterm and male neonates are commonly affected. It is often seen in association with surgical conditions like Hirschprung and necrotizing enterocolitis. Non-specific clinical features result in delay in the diagnosis and predisposes to perforation. The risk of perforation is very high (85%) in neonatal appendicitis. Management includes pre-operative stabilization, appendectomy and peritoneal drainage in cases of perforation with peritonitis. Prognosis is uniformly poor with mortality rate is as high as 70%. Herewith reporting a 13-day-old male twin II with a tender mass in left inguinal canal and perforated appendicitis who was successfully managed.