Ecological-and-economic aspects of city-planning

The purpose of this research is to consider ecological-and-aspects of the land use during arrangement and planning of the urban areas on the basis of the assessment of city-planning components of various districts of the city. The authors offer some measures for the improvement of nature protection activity in the structure of the urban area management. The factors, determining planning of the city structures, key indicators of information support for the adoption of the city-planning decision, the principles of engineering-and-ecological zoning were revealed in the articles. The authors offered to carry out management of the territory and granting the land plots step by step, for the purpose of their effective ecological-and-economic use. The provisions, offered by the authors in this article, can be applied for ecological-and-economic justification of projects of the use of city lands as well as for the development of methodical recommendations on the effective arrangement of the built-up territories.

A Recombinant Multivalent Vaccine (rCpa1) Induces Protection for C57BL/6 and HLA Transgenic Mice Against Pulmonary Infection with Both Species of Coccidioides

Coccidioidomycosis is caused by Coccidioides posadasii (Cp) and Coccidioides immitis (Ci) that have 4-5% differences in their genomic sequences. There is an urgent need to develop a human vaccine against both species. A previously created recombinant antigen (rCpa1) that contains multiple peptides derived from Cp isolate C735 is protective against the autologous isolate. The focus of this study is to evaluate cross-protective efficacy and immune correlates by the rCpa1-based vaccine against both species of Coccidioides. DNA sequence analyses of the homologous genes for the rCpa1 antigen were conducted for 39 and 17 clinical isolates of Cp and Ci, respectively. Protective efficacy and vaccine-induced immunity were evaluated for both C57BL/6 and human HLA-DR4 transgenic mice against 5 highly virulent isolates of Cp and Ci. There are a total of 7 amino acid substitutions in the rCpa1 antigen between Cp and Ci. Both C57BL/6 and HLA-DR4 mice that were vaccinated with a rCpa1 vaccine resulted in a significant reduction of fungal burden and increased numbers of IFN-γ- and IL-17-producing CD4+ T cells in the first 2 weeks post-challenge. These data support that rCpa1 has cross-protection activity against Cp and Ci pulmonary infection through activation of early Th1 and Th17 responses.

Protein-based RBD-C-tag COVID-19 Vaccination Candidate Elicits Protection Activity against SARS-COV-2 Variant Infection

ABSTRACTThe identification of a vaccination candidate against COVID-19 providing protecting activity against emerging SARS-COV-2 variants remains challenging. Here, we report protection activity against a spectrum of SARS-COV-2 and variants by immunization with protein-based recombinant RBD-C-tag administered with aluminum-phosphate adjuvant intramuscularly. Immunization of C57BL/6 mice with RBD-C-tag resulted in the in vivo production of IgG antibodies recognizing the immune-critical spike protein of the SARS-COV-2 virus as well as the SARS-COV-2 variants alpha (“United Kingdom”), beta (“South Africa”), gamma (“Brazil/Japan”), and delta (“India”) as well as wt-spike protein. RBD-C-tag immunization led to a desired Th1 polarization of CD4 T cells producing IFNγ. Importantly, RBD-C-tag immunization educated IgG production delivers antibodies that exert neutralizing activity against the highly transmissible SARS-COV-2 virus strains “Washington”, “South Africa” (beta), and “India” (delta) as determined by conservative infection protection experiments in vitro. Hence, the protein-based recombinant RBD-C-tag is considered a promising vaccination candidate against COVID-19 and a broad range of emerging SARS-COV-2 virus variants.

Discovery of SARS-CoV-2-E channel inhibitors as antiviral candidates

Lack of efficiency has been a major problem shared by all currently developed anti-SARS-CoV-2 therapies. Our previous study shows that SARS-CoV-2 structural envelope (2-E) protein forms a type of cation channel, and heterogeneously expression of 2-E channels causes host cell death. In this study we developed a cell-based high throughput screening (HTS) assay and used it to discover inhibitors against 2-E channels. Among 4376 compounds tested, 34 hits with cell protection activity were found. Followed by an anti-viral analysis, 15 compounds which could inhibit SARS-CoV-2 replication were identified. In electrophysiological experiments, three representatives showing inhibitory effect on 2-E channels were chosen for further characterization. Among them, proanthocyanidins directly bound to 2-E channel with binding affinity (KD) of 22.14 μM in surface plasmon resonance assay. Molecular modeling and docking analysis revealed that proanthocyanidins inserted into the pore of 2-E N-terminal vestibule acting as a channel blocker. Consistently, mutations of Glu 8 and Asn 15, two residues lining the proposed binding pocket, abolished the inhibitory effects of proanthocyanidins. The natural product proanthocyanidins are widely used as cosmetic, suggesting a potential of proanthocyanidins as disinfectant for external use. This study further demonstrates that 2-E channel is an effective antiviral drug target and provides a potential antiviral candidate against SARS-CoV-2.

Ultraviolet Protection Activity of Selected Herbal and Biopolymer for Textile Application

The textile protection of human skin against ultraviolet radiation is very important problem and over recent years researches have shown increasing interests in this area. This research work deals with the causing harm effects of ultraviolet rays and protection against them through the woven materials by using Opuntia littoralis herbal extract and Chitosan biopolymer extract with nano encapsulation method. Finishing of fabric with an eco friendly manner is getting very advanced nowadays. So, this research work is fully based on ecofriendly and skin friendly. The samples were imparted with herb and biopolymer nanocapsules which showed best results for ultraviolet protection even after 30 washes.The finished sample was analyzed for its morphology using FESEM and FT-IR.

Ultraviolet Protection Activity of Selected Herbal and Biopolymer for Textile Application

The textile protection of human skin against ultraviolet radiation is very important problem and over recent years researches have shown increasing interests in this area. This research work deals with the causing harm effects of ultraviolet rays and protection against them through the woven materials by using Opuntia littoralis herbal extract and Chitosan biopolymer extract with nano encapsulation method. Finishing of fabric with an eco friendly manner is getting very advanced nowadays. So, this research work is fully based on ecofriendly and skin friendly. The samples were imparted with herb and biopolymer nanocapsules which showed best results for ultraviolet protection even after 30 washes.The finished sample was analyzed for its morphology using FESEM and FT-IR.

Neutralization heterogeneity of United Kingdom and South-African SARS CoV-2 variants in BNT162b2-vaccinated or convalescent COVID-19 healthcare workers

There are concerns about neutralizing antibodies (NAb) potency against the newly emerged VOC202012/01 (UK) and 501Y.V2 (SA) SARS-CoV-2 variants in mRNA-vaccinated subjects and in recovered COVID-19 patients. We used a viral neutralization test with a strict 100% neutralizing criterion on UK and SA clinical isolates in comparison with a globally distributed D614G SARS-CoV-2 strain. In two doses BNT162b2-vaccinated healthcare workers (HCW), despite heterogeneity in neutralizing capacity against the three SARS-CoV-2 strains, all sera harbored at least a NAb titer ≥ 1:10 suggesting a certain humoral protection activity either on UK or SA variants. However, six months after mild forms of COVID-19, an important proportion of HCW displayed no neutralizing activity against SA strain. This result supports strong recommendations for vaccination of previously infected subjects.