The association between blood cell development and progressive cell death in the brain of Parkinson's patients should be further investigated as a potential dynamic biomarker and indicator of disease progression.

In our study, complications of oligohydramnios were examined. In medical records of all 5,210 deliveries of our department between 1987 and 1990 181 cases of oligohydramnios were identified. The diagnosis was confirmed by ultrasound and based on the method described by Mannings and Platt: amniotic fluid depots of less than 1 cm were defined as oligohydramnios. All 181 cases met the above definition, which results in an incidence of 3.5% pregnancies with reduced amniotic fluid. We examined the records of mother and foetus, the delivery and perinatal complications and follow-up of the newborn. In more than 60%, foetal asphyxia, breech position and other anomalies during delivery were followed by Cesarean section or vaginal operative delivery by forceps or vacuum extraction. In 30 cases, oligohydramnios was caused by premature rupture of membranes. In the other cases, the diagnosis based on maternal or foetal complications such as gestosis (n = 7), abruptio placentae (n = 10), foetal growth retardation (n = 47) and malformations or chromosomal anomalies. 89 newborn were transferred to a paediatric hospital immediately after delivery. Potter's syndrome was the main anticipated diagnosed malformation (n = 20). The lack of amniotic fluid was furthermore followed by a higher rate of pulmonary complications such as RDS and hypoplasia of the neonatal lung (n = 21). In conclusion, our study underlines the fact, that oligohydramnios must be regarded as an important reason of high risk pregnancy followed by many complications for foetus and newborn. The incidence of perinatal mortality in our examination was 7.2%. This rate is 10 fold higher than in the total number of deliveries of our department.

Background/Aims: Wounds, especially non-healing wounds are characterized by elevated tissue lactate concentrations. Lactate is known for being able to stimulate collagen synthesis and vessel growth. Lately it has been shown that lactate, in vivo, plays an important role in homing of stem cells. With this work we aimed to show the influence of lactate on the gene expressionprofile of human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSC). Materials and Methods: hMSCs were obtained from bone marrow and characterized with fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS) analysis. Subsequently the hMSCs were treated with either 0, 5, 10 and 15 mM lactate (pH 7,4) for 24 hours. RNA Isolation from stimulated hMSCs and controls was performed. The Microarray analysis was performed using AffymetrixHuGene 1.0 ST Gene Chip. Selected targets were subsequently analysed using quantitative real time PCR (RTq-PCR). Results: We were able to show that lactate in moderate concentrations of 5 respectively 10 mM leads to an anti-inflammatory, anti-apoptotic but growth and proliferation promoting gene expression after 24 h. In contrast, high lactate concentrations of 15 mM leads to the opposed effect, namely promoting inflammation and apoptosis. Hypoxia induced genes did not show any significant regulation. Contrary to expectation, we were not able to show any significant regulation of candidates associated with glycolysis. Conclusion: We were able to show that lactate alters gene expression but does not change the cell phenotype, which might be helpful for further investigations of new treatment strategies for chronic non-healing wounds as well as tumor-therapy and neuronal plasticity.

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No abstract