Toxicity of anthelmintic drugs (fenbendazole and flubendazole) to aquatic organisms

Flubendazole (FLU) and fenbendazole (FEN) belong to benzimidazoles—pharmaceuticals widely used in veterinary and human medicine for the treatment of intestinal parasites as well as for the treatment of systemic worm infections. In recent years, usage of these drugs increased, which resulted in a larger contamination of the environment and possible negative effects on biota. Hence, in our research, we investigated an aquatic ecotoxicity of these pharmaceuticals towards: marine bacteria (Vibrio fischeri), green algae (Scenedesmus vacuolatus), duckweed (Lemna minor) and crustacean (Daphnia magna). Ecotoxicity tests were combined with chemical analysis in order to investigate the actual exposure concentration of the compounds used in the experiment as well as to stability and adsorption studies. As a result, study evaluating sensitivity of different aquatic organisms to these compounds and new ecotoxicological data is presented. The strongest negative impact of FLU and FEN was observed to D. magna

Zróżnicowanie kulturowe wsi w Bełchatowskiem

W niniejszej pracy przedstawiono badania nad dezintegracją kulturową wsi w okolicach Bełchatowa. Były one punktem wyjścia do dyspozycji badawczych, które umożliwiły zebranie materiałów związanych z wybranymi zagadnieniami i sformułowanie o wniosków uogólniających. Na czoło wysunięto problem kulturowego zróżnicowania badanego obszaru tak w zakresie kultury tradycyjnej jak i w historycznie uwarunkowanej sytuacji ekonomicznej z uwzględnieniem podstawowych przyczyn tegoż zróżnicowania i w nawiązaniu do ogólnych przemian kulturowych wsi współczesnej. W pracy przede wszystkim wykorzystano materiały zebrane w terenie. Materiały zebrane podczas badaŃ terenowych, znajdują się w Archiwum Zakładu Etnografii Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego /nr inw.AZ3/B1-907/

Polish-Jewish Relations in the Folk Culture of Podlasie. Part I - Customs

500 lat osadnictwa żydowskiego na Podlasiu. Materiały z konferencji międzynarodowej, Białystok, 14 - 17 września 1987 r.500 Years of the Jewish Settlement in Podlasie. Popers From the International Conference, Białystok, September 14 - 17, 1987.It is considered that the term „shtetl" (town) functioning in scholarly considerations, understood as compact Jewish community of any size, living its own internal life and hermetically isolated from non-Jewish communities, is not precise enough as a model construticon. It seems that the extension of research methods to the problem of cultural style will contribute to an increase in thoroughness in the study of the traditional Jewish culture in Eastern Europe. Jews in Podlasie lived mostly in towns; only individual families lived in villages. Rural Jews maintained close cultural and organizational links with Jewish communities in small towns. The relations between Jewish and non-Jewish urban communities were usually limited to occasional meetings and professional contacts. Neighbourly ties tended to develop inside the groups of both communities. In villages these relations were more frequent, closer and direct. Neighbourly bonds occurred here between Jews and their non-Jewish neighbours. Partial or full knowledge of both languages was more common. One of the examples may be mutual participation in wedding ceremonies. Invitations extended to Jewish neighbours had the form applied to strangers in the village. Non-Jewish participants of wedding ceremonies in Jewish families usually took part in the proceedings outside the house; usually they did not participate in the wedding feast. A frequent eustom was stopping by the Jewish inn after church ceremonies of baptism or marriage. Jewish inn-keepers wife welcomed the young with honey and ritual sweet bread (korowaj), sometimes giving a gift to onsure happy, „sweet" life together. Jewish baker sometimes prepared wedding „korowaj" and she brought it to the wedding feast. Such situations, as well as being paid in kind, prove that she was not considered a stranger. In folk rituals connected with Christmas celebrations, in the group of so called herods, dressed-up performers wandering through villages there used to be a figure of Biblical King Hernd, a rabbi or Jewish peddler. This figure usually serves as an intermezzo in the religious mystery. During Orthodox Easter ritual celebrated near Siemiatycze the effigy of the Jew Zelman takes part: a key to the church should be taken away from him in order to celebrate the service. On the other hand, during the Jewish holiday of Purim, an important figure of Haman, symbol of evil forces, an alien and non-Jew was performed by a non-Jewish actor. In some parts of the Białystok region Haman pranced on a wooden horse, contrary to the legend, thus referring to a local, non-Jewish tradition. Mutual knowledge was extended by contacts of craftsmen with their customers. It was caused at least by the necessity to adjust some produtcs to Jewish religious observances. Hence there existed the plane of mutual relations between the two cultures. On this plane both essentials of life and symbols were trasmitted. Also the stereotypes were shaped. The stereotypes did not always contribute to the extension of the factual knowledge concerning the neighbours; always, however, they strengthened the awareness of their existence.148-15

Biological activity of 3-(2-benzoxazol-5-yl)alanine derivatives

AbstractSearching for new drugs is still a challenge for science, mainly because of civilization development and globalization which promote the rapid spread of diseases, which is particularly dangerous in the case of infectious ones. Moreover, readily available already known antibiotics are often overused or misused, possibly contributing to the increase in the number of multidrug-resistant microorganisms. A consequence of this is the need for new structures of potential drugs. One of them is a benzoxazole moiety, a basic skeleton of a group of fluorescent heterocyclic compounds already widely used in chemistry, industry, and medicine, which is also present in naturally occurring biologically active compounds. Moreover, synthetic benzoxazoles are also biologically active. Considering all of that, a large group of non-proteinogenic amino acids based on 3-(2-benzoxazol-5-yl)alanine skeleton was studied in search for new antimicrobial and anticancer agents. Screening tests revealed that antibacterial potential of 41 compounds studied is not very high; however, they are selective acting only against Gram-positive bacteria (B. subtilis). Moreover, almost half of the studied compounds have antifungal properties, also against pathogens (C. albicans). Most of studied compounds are toxic to both normal and cancer cells. However, in a few cases, toxicity to normal cells is much lower than for cancer cells indicating these compounds as future anticancer agents. The research carried out on such a large group of compounds allowed to establish a structure–activity relationship which enables to select candidates for further modifications, necessary to improve their biological activity and obtain a new lead structure with potential for therapeutic use.</jats:p

Application of gas chromatography for separation and determination of selected estrogenic compounds in the environmental samples

Estrogeny to związki hormonalne, których obecność w środowisku - nawet w bardzo niskich stężeniach (poniżej 1 ng/L) - może wywierać negatywny wpływ na reprodukcje i rozwój organizmów żywych. Opracowywanie odpowiednio czułych metodyk przygotowania próbki, rozdzielania i oznaczania tych związków w próbkach środowiskowych stało się zatem jednym z ważniejszych zadań z zakresu chemii analitycznej oraz ochrony środowiska. W pracy przedstawiono przegląd metodyk przygotowania próbki, rozdzielania i oznaczania wybranych substancji estrogenowych (estronu, 17β-estradiolu, estriolu, 17α-etynyloestradiolu, dietylostilbe-strolu) w różnych komponentach środowiska techniką GC-MS (ang. gas chromatography co-upled with mass spectrometry).Estrogens are hormonal active compounds, which presence in the environment - also in very low concentrations (less than 1 ng/L) – could have a negative influence on reproduction and growth of the living organisms. Development of the sensitive methods for determination of these compounds in the environmental samples has been found as one of the most important tasks of analytical chemistry and environmental protection. In this work, a review of methods for determination of selected estrogenic compounds (estrone, 17β-estradiol, estriol, 17α-ethinyle-stradiol and diethylstilbestrol) in environmental compartments using GC-MS (ang. gas chroma-tography coupled with mass spectrometry) technique is presented

Integrated use of biomarkers in flounder Platichthys flesus from the Polish coastal area of the Baltic Sea

No abstracts are to be cited without prior reference to the author.Integrated use of biomarkers in flounder Platichthys flesus from the Polish coastal area of the Baltic Se