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A study was made of the effect of autopsy brain extracts from persons with dementias of different origin (Alzheimer's disease and senile dementia) on nervous tissue culture of human fetuses. Light microscopy showed a tendency towards an increase of the astrocyte count and expressivity of their immunocytochemical response to glial fibrillar acid protein after administration of brain extract from persons with Alzheimer's disease. Electron microscopy revealed a substantial rise of the frequency of occurrence of altered microtubules in the processes of ectodermal cells, particularly marked due to the effect of extracts from persons with senile dementia. It was also shown that cytoplasm of hypertrophied astrocytes was loaded with regulated bundles of +glial filaments (primarily in experimental culture series). Brain extracts from persons with Alzheimer's disease induced as well the formation of typical complexes in the synaptic structures.

Monospecific polyclonal antibodies to acid fibrillar astroglial protein allowed to reveal the sites of the filaments accumulation within the cells and perform the characterization of the tissue culture in terms of its cellular composition ectodermal and mesenchymal. The data suggest that in distinct terms of explanation of the human embryonic nervous tissue in the culture identical epitopes (antigen determinants) could be formed by intracellular fibrillar structures even in the cells of different origin.

Biological fluids (blood serum, cerebrospinal fluid) and brain extract obtained from patients with Alzheimer's disease (6 cases), simple senile dementia (5 cases), and other atrophic processes (1 case) were administered into the nutrient media of human fetal brain tissue culture. It was found that brain tissue extract obtained from patients with Alzheimer's disease stimulated accumulation of filamentous material in neurons while the CSF induced the formation of orderly filamentous rings. The effect of blood serum was characterized by nonspecific manifestations in the form of accumulation of structurally heterogeneous lamellar corpuscles.

The author studied the influence on the adaptation of the nervous tissue explantations from 25 fetuses of schizophrenic mothers and a similar amount of fetuses from normal women (embryonal development--7-12 weeks) during the initial period of explantation in vitro (5-6 days) with 10 psychopharmacological preparations (aminasine, majeptile, stelasine, triphtasine, tesercin, theralen, haloperidol, eglonyl, mellipramin, seduxen). Their final concentration in a nourishing medium was approximately the same as in the blood of schizophrenic patients, treated by phenothiasine preparations. The adaptation of the fetus pervous tissue from schizophrenic mothers differed from the corresponding reaction of fetus brain explantation from normal women. There was a tendency to a higher stability of experimental cultures. However, there were differences depending upon the character of introduced drugs.

The authors convened an electron microscopic study of the interaction of lymphocytes in the peripheral blood of schizophrenic patients with the brain cells of the embryo after a 24-hour joint cell incubation. It was found that in comparison with the lymphocytes of the normals, the lymphocytes of schizophrenic patients much more frequently come into contact with the cells of the brain culture. The lymphocytes of the patients are characterized by an increased amount of cytoplasmatic processes. A maximum amount of lymphocytes which came into contact was seen in experiments on population enriched in activized cells of the lymphocyte in schizophrenic patients. It is particularly the activized lymphocytes of schizophrenic patients that coming into contact called forth degenerative changes in the cells of brain culture in the area of contacts.

Upon cultivation of the brain tissue and skin-muscle tissues of human embryos, a polyimide film was used as a lining. The optimal conditions of the preliminary processing of the lining (sterilization, washing) are described. An easy separation of the polyimide film from the media (in the process of tissue treatment for electron microscope studies) facilitates the use of the material for light and electron microscopy without damaging the culture.

After a 5-min heating of isolated Tradescantia leaves at 49 degrees C the granular component in the nucleoli of parenchyma cells disappears and the nucleoli grow more compact and exclusively fibrillar in structure. Simultaneously, the ability of chloroplasts of these cells for phototaxis is completely inhibited. In leaves placed in a moist chamber at room temperature 48 h after heating a normal ultrastructure of nucleoli and the ability of chloroplasts to respond by phototaxis to change in illuminations are restored almost synchronously.

The action of leponex (clozapine) on cultures of human embryonal nervous tissue was studied by the methods of optic and electron microscopy. The blood serum of schizophereniacs who received leponex in a daily dose of 200 to 500 mg was added to the culture medium. It was found that leponex (or its metabolites) increased the number of cells containing giant "monolithic" forms of mitochondria. This differentiates leponex substantially from phenothiazine, diazepine and lithium drugs, and its effects from those produced by the serum of patients suffering from other diseases (control). The ultrastructure of the monolithic mitochondria was fully preserved, and did not differ from that of the discrete forms of those organelles typical for the nervous tissue. It is supposed that the described proliferative reactions of the mitochondria may reflect a rise of the bioenergy potential of the nervous tissue under the action of leponex.

Using the method of quantitative spectrophotometry, the activity of succinate dehydrogenase (SDH) was studied. A tendency toward increased SDH activity in the whole culture (including all elements) was established. No significant differences in SDH activity between astrocyte-like cells with discrete and monolithic mitochondria were detected.

Using the method of quantitative spectrophotometry the activity of lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) was determined in a culture of the brain tissue of a 8- to 10- week-old human embryo. To the culture medium the blood serum of schizophrenic patients treated with leponex was added. In the control experiments the sera of healthy subjects, non-treated schizophrenics, and schizophrenics treated with phenothiazines and benzodiazepines were added. Leponex caused a statistically significant lowering of the LDH activity in the culture cells irrespectively of the prevalence of discrete or monolithic forms of the mitochondria in them. This effect of leponex distinguished this drug from other psychopharmacological agents tested by the author. A connection between mitochondria transition from the descrete to the monolithic form on the one hand, and the LDH activity, i.e. transition of the cells to the glycolytic pathway of respiration on the other, has not been confirmed.

Using the Coons direct and indirect fluorescent antibody method, cryostatic sections and cultured neuroblasts of embryonic human brain were examined for the presence of intracellular antigens. The embryonic brain tissue was obtained from mentally healthy and schizophrenic women undergoing medically indicated, induced abortion during the first four months of pregnancy. As early as four weeks after the onset of embryonal development, positive cytoplasmatic and nuclear fluorescence were seen, with one exception, after incubation with gamma -- chain specific, anti-human IgG, and antirabbit immune globulin serum. More rarely, positive fluorescence was seen following incubation with alpha-chain specific anti-human IgA. Tests with anti-human IgM were persistently negative. The serum of two acutely ill, schizophrenic women contained a factor which --a) could easily be related to the cytoplasm of embryonic brain cells; b) could be absorbed out with whole thymocytes obtained post mortem from human newborn and c) produced positive cellular fluorescence when incubated with chain-specific antihuman IgG and IgA.