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Biomedical subjects

B Most

Publications and source records attributed to B Most.

7 recordsLinked to original sources

The kinetics of intravenously administered methyl mercury in man.

We describe a compartmental pharmacokinetic model for methyl mercury and its metabolite mercuric mercury in humans. A tracer dose of 203Hg-labeled methyl mercury was administered iv to seven healthy young adult male volunteers. Blood samples were obtained periodically and urine and feces were collected throughout the 70 days of the study. The blood contained predominantly methyl mercury, while the excreta contained principally inorganic mercury. The behavior of both methyl mercury and inorganic mercury in the body was modeled with the simplest compartmental model which fit the data. This five-compartment model shows that inorganic mercury accumulates in the body and at longer times is the predominant form of mercury present. The biological half-life of methyl mercury in the body is 44 days and 1.6% of the body burden is lost each day by both metabolism and excretion. This rate of loss is 60% greater than that currently accepted (1.0% per day). Thus, the risk associated with dietary methyl mercury may have been overestimated.

Adult↗

A scheme for incorporating DC magnetic fields into epidemiological studies of EMF exposure.

Experimental data on calcium-ion release in chicken brain tissue suggest that biological effects of electric and magnetic fields (EMFs) are concentrated near certain "active combinations" of DC magnetic field strength and "effective" AC magnetic field frequencies. We hypothesize that active AC/DC combinations may exist and suggest that epidemiologic data, coupled with DC magnetic field measurement, may be used to identify critical exposure conditions. An empirical model is used to calculate these multiple active combinations at any given DC magnetic field strength and to define a rating system that incorporates the proximity of AC magnetic field frequencies generated by electric power lines to the new, computed effective frequencies. Such an exposure score may be useful in investigating correlations of EMF exposure with disease incidence. For 60 Hz and 50 Hz, the highest EMF exposure scores occurred at DC field strengths of 506 mG and 422 mG, respectively. The exposure score contains a factor which may be adjusted to reflect the importance of harmonics of the AC magnetic field as well as of the fundamental frequency. Using this factor, we consider two important special cases consistent with chick brain data: 1) we consider active pairs associated with all detectable harmonics (up to 660 Hz) without regard to relative intensity of the harmonics, and 2) we use the relative intensities of the AC field frequencies to adjust their contribution to the exposure score.

Animals↗

Chemical enhancement of SA7 virus transformation of hamster embryo cells: evaluation by interlaboratory testing of diverse chemicals.

Twelve chemicals from diverse structural classes were tested under code for their capacity to enhance the transformation of Syrian hamster embryo cells by simian adenovirus SA7 in two independent laboratories. Pretreatment of hamster cells with eight of those chemicals (reserpine, dichlorvos, methapyrilene hydrochloride, benzidine dihydrochloride, diphenylhydantoin, cinnamyl anthranilate, 11-aminoundecanoic acid, and 4,4'-oxydianiline) produced repeatable enhancement of SA7 transformation at two or more consecutive dose levels, which constitutes clear evidence of enhancing activity in this assay. Both toxic and nontoxic doses of each of these chemicals caused enhancement of virus transformation. Two chemicals (2,6-dichloro-p-phenylenediamine and cinnamaldehyde) produced some evidence of enhancing activity (repeatable transformation enhancement at one dose). Dose ranges for cytotoxicity and enhancement of SA7 transformation were similar in both laboratories for all chemicals producing activity. The final two chemicals, chloramphenicol sodium succinate and ethylene thiourea, failed to reproducibly demonstrate either significant cytotoxicity or enhancement of SA7 transformation at concentrations up to 10-20 mM. The test results for these 12 chemicals were combined with the test results for 9 known carcinogens and noncarcinogens in order to evaluate relationships between activity, dose response, and lowest effective enhancing concentration for these compounds, as well as to correlate them with rodent carcinogenesis classifications. The Syrian hamster embryo cell-SA7 system demonstrated reproducible test responses in both intra- and interlaboratory studies and detected 13 out of 15 known rodent carcinogens.

Adenoviridae↗

Dermal absorption of pesticides calculated by deconvolution.

Using published human data on skin-to-urine and blood-to-urine transfer of 12 pesticides and herbicides, the skin-to-blood transfer rates for each compound were estimated by two numerical deconvolution techniques. Regular constrained deconvolution produced an estimated upper limit on cumulative dermal absorption of the radiolabel, while minimized deconvolution produced an upper bound on cumulative dermal absorption of parent compound. Dermal absorption rate was largest within 8 h of dosing for all pesticides examined. Only carbaryl showed a lag (3.5 h) in penetration. This may indicate a prolonged transit time through skin or a chemical transformation in skin has occurred. After onset, absorption occurred rapidly with 45% of the 120 h cumulative absorption occurring in 8 h. For parathion and dieldrin, over 50% of the 120 h total absorption occurred in the first 4 h. The deconvolution technique described here permits the calculation of the temporal aspect of dermal absorption for linear systems.

Humans↗

Multilaboratory evaluation of an ultrafiltration procedure for high density lipoprotein cholesterol quantification in turbid heparin-manganese supernates.

High density lipoprotein (HDL) can be quantitated by measurement of cholesterol in supernates after precipitation of low and very low density lipoprotein (LDL and VLDL) with heparin and Mn(2+). Supernatant turbidity, often observed with hypertriglyceridemic specimens, indicates incomplete sedimentation of LDL/VLDL and precludes accurate quantitation of HDL. Ten Lipid Research Clinic Laboratories compared an ultrafiltration technique for clearing turbid heparin-Mn(2+) supernates to current methods involving repeat precipitation of either the original specimen after dilution or the d > 1.006 g/ml fraction after removal of VLDL from the initial specimen by ultracentrifugation. Results for ultrafiltration of 429 turbid supernates averaged only slightly higher (1.0-1.1 mg/dl) than results by the dilution or ultracentrifugation methods on the same specimens, but this difference was found to be significant (P < 0.005). The agreement of the ultrafiltration method with the other two methods is indicated by the following linear regression equations: a), ultrafiltration = (0.964 x ultracentrifugation) + 2.4 mg/dl, and correlation coefficient = 0.926; and b), ultrafiltration = (0.936 x dilution) + 3.3 mg/dl, and correlation coefficient = 0.933. We conclude that ultrafiltration of turbid heparin-Mn(2+) supernates is a convenient alternative to precipitation after either dilution or removal of VLDL.-Warnick, G. R., J. J. Albers, P. Bachorik, J. Turner, C. Garcia, C. Breckinridge, K. Kuba, S. McNeely, G. Hillerman, P. King, R. Muesing, B. Most, and K. Lippel. Multi-laboratory evaluation of an ultrafiltration procedure for high density lipoprotein cholesterol quantification in turbid heparin-manganese supernates.

Chemical Phenomena↗