PPAR: a Key Nuclear Factor in Nutrient / Gene Interactions?
Retinoids as well as steroid and thyroid hormones are small lipophilic molecules that exert an intricate array of combinatorial effects during embryogenesis, cellular differentiation, and homeostasis in the adult organism. Complexity in the signalling pathway of these hormones results from the functional association of low affinity cytoplasmic hormone binding proteins and high affinity nuclear hormone receptors. The latter interact with polymorphic response elements linked to target genes and mediate the hormonal response at the transcriptional level.
Two hundred and ninety-two patients with pneumonia evidenced by clinical, X-ray and laboratory findings were examined for the purpose of studying the etiological significance of Mycoplasma pneumoniae and Chlamydophila pneumoniae--atypical pathogens; the patients, members of closed bodies, were admitted to the hospital for as long as one year. PCR was used to examine the sputum of patients who were at exacerbation. It was established that the mentioned pathogens prevailed in autumn and winter. It can be concluded, on the basis of a PCR-based monitoring of the atypical pathogens, that the significance of the atypical pathogens within the etiological structure of pneumonia acquired in isolated collective by young persons has been on the rise.