Disease relevance of mercury

• Images in cardiovascular medicine. Metallic mercury embolism [1].
• SGI1-K, a Variant of the SGI1 Genomic Island Carrying a Mercury Resistance Region, in Salmonella enterica Serovar Kentucky [2].
• CONCLUSION: This is the first large, community-based study to examine risk of very preterm birth in relation to mercury levels among women with low to moderate exposure [3].
• Metallic mercury vapor poisoning simulating mucocutaneous lymph node syndrome [4].
• Metallic mercury leak from the esophageal bougy and postoperative chest pain [5].

Psychiatry related information on mercury

• (N = 736) with the BSID and the Bayley Infant Behavior Record. Mercury exposure determined by cold vapor atomic absorption analysis of maternal hair segments corresponding to pregnancy revealed a median exposure of 5.9 ppm (Range 0.5 - 26.7 ppm) [6].
• The Mercury group showed no behavioural abnormality outwardly; however, operant conditioning revealed a deficiency in performance [7].
• BACKGROUND: Mercury, or Hg, is a neurotoxin that has been speculated to play a role in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease, or AD [8].
• The mental health evaluation of the original Mercury astronauts was a prolonged, meticulous, research-oriented process involving testing and interviews to determine who was best qualified for space flight [9].
• However, the correlation for hair mercury level with 24 h urine level and blood level was not high enough to replace them in clinical decision-making of individual patient [10].

High impact information on mercury

• Most of what is currently known about multi-ring basins is based on remote studies of the Moon and, to a lesser extent, Mars and Mercury [11].
• Toxicology. Mercury report backs strict rules [12].
• The occurrence of a basalt-free, highly differentiated crust is in accord with recent models of the planet's thermal evolution and suggests that Mercury has retained a hot interior as a result of a combination of inefficient mantle convection and minimal volcanic heat loss [13].
• At neutral pH, mercury (II) ion shows a direct coordination at N1 while at low pH with N1 blocked by protonation, mercury (II) does not interact with the adenine moiety [14].
• CONCLUSIONS: Mercury exposure can induce oxidative DNA damage, whereas the antioxidative repair systems can be expected to minimize DNA lesions caused by mercury [15].

Chemical compound and disease context of mercury

• We applied the method to study the transfer of the IncP1 plasmid pRO103 between Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas putida strains. pRO103 encodes resistance to mercury and tetracycline and partial degradation of 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D) [16].
• Methods: Glutathione turnover was investigated in HeLa and hepatoma cell cultures with normal and low cysteine content in the presence of copper ions (1 and 10mumol/L) and two other glutathione-stimulating agents (lipoic acid and mercury ions) [17].

Biological context of mercury

• Mercury ion-sensitive T. ferrooxidans strains were electroporated with constructed plasmids, and one strain, Y4-3 (of 30 independent strains tested), was found to have a transformation efficiency of 120 to 200 mercury-resistant colonies per microgram of plasmid DNA [18].
• The Boston Public Health Commission's Environmental Health Office, with local and national partners, created the Boston Mercury Thermometer Exchange Program to address this hazard [19].
• Compared with women delivering at term, women who delivered before 35 weeks' gestation were more likely to have hair mercury levels at or above the 90th percentile (> or = 0.55 microg/g), even after adjusting for maternal characteristics and fish consumption (adjusted odds ratio = 3.0; 95% confidence interval, 1.3-6.7) [3].
• To determine whether the absence of the kappaB-dependent gene expression was due to compromised transcriptional regulation of NFKB, the functional activity of NFKB was examined in cells transiently transfected with Mercury Pathway constructs containing 4x NFKB binding sites associated either with the luciferase reporter system or a control vector [20].
• Phytoplankton concentrate mercury from their aqueous surroundings and represent the primary entry point for Hg in aquatic food webs [21].

Anatomical context of mercury

• Mercury vapor uptake and hydrogen peroxide detoxification in human and mouse red blood cells [22].
• (iv) Mercury ions did not affect the osmotic permeability in Xenopus oocytes but clearly inhibited, in a reversible way, the osmotic permeability in oocytes from B. arenarum [23].
• Conclusion: Mercury induces an early, transient, polyclonal B cell activation linked to the H-2A or H-2K locus in H-2s strains on the A background [24].
• Total mercury levels in hair, toenail, and urine among women free from occupational exposure and their relations to renal tubular function [25].
• Mercury excretion in feces increased with dose and duration of MeHg treatment [26].

Associations of mercury with other chemical compounds

• METHODS: Mercury concentrations and seafood consumption are grouped by supply region (Atlantic Ocean, Pacific Ocean, and foreign shores) [27].
• We used 203Hg to compare the uptake of inorganic mercury, Hg(II), and methylmercury, MeHg, in four phytoplankton species (a diatom, a chlorophyte, a cryptophyte, and a cyanobacterium) in two waters containing different concentrations of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) [21].
• Kinetics of the Adhesion of DMPC Liposomes on a Mercury Electrode. Effect of Lamellarity, Phase Composition, Size and Curvature of Liposomes, and Presence of the Pore Forming Peptide Mastoparan X [28].
• Pretreatment of animals with diethyl maleate resulted in depletion of GSH from brain (measured by high performance liquid chromatography), as well as decreased Mercury orange staining [29].
• The action of group IIb cations [Cadmium (Cd2+), Zinc (Zn2+), Mercury (Hg2+)] on the cardiac fast sodium current (INa) was investigated in calf Purkinje fibres and in ventricular cells isolated from guinea-pig hearts [30].

Gene context of mercury

• Results: Mercury-treated A.SW and SJL mice (H-2s) developed an increased expression of the proliferation marker CD71 on B cells, an increased number of B cells in the spleen, and an early, strong, but transient increase in serum Ig concentrations of Th1- as well as Th2-regulated Ig isotypes [24].
• Mercury vapor exposure had no significant effects on GSH levels or GPx activity in the three brain regions, however, statistically significant decreases in GSH and GPx activity were detected in the kidneys of rats exposed to 2 mg m(-3) [31].
• Seated systolic BP (SBP) and diastolic BP (DBP) were measured using a standard mercury sphygmomanometer [32].
• Information gained from the Global Mercury exercise and the SARS outbreak has shown that containing an outbreak at the start is more effective than reacting to it once it has spread and that containment should be treated both nationally and internationally [33].
• Moreover, we reported here for the first time in an in vivo model that at-RA reduced, to basal levels, the expression of VLA-4 (alpha4beta1) integrin induced by mercury on peripheral blood leukocytes (PBLs) [34].

Analytical, diagnostic and therapeutic context of mercury

• A novel approach for heavy metal poisoning treatment, a model. Mercury poisoning by means of chelating microspheres: hemoperfusion and oral administration [35].
• Mercury vapor contamination of infant incubators: a potential hazard [36].
• Metallic mercury plays a major role in ethnic folk medicine [37].
• After forearm circulation had been occluded for 5 minutes and starting immediately upon reperfusion, forearm blood flow was measured for 5 minutes using venous occlusion mercury-in-silastic strain gauge plethysmography [38].
• Morphology and porosity of the resulting monoliths were comprehensively studied by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), mercury intrusion porosimetry and inverse size-exclusion chromatography (ISEC) [39].

References