[Aging of the brain reward system].

This minireview is the first attempt to summarize the scarce data on the physiological changes that occur with aging in opioid, serotonergic, dopaminergic and other systems of the brain associated with the reward reactions.

[Age-related involution of organs and tissues]. / Vozrastnaia involiutsiia organov i tkanei.

Contemporary civilization confronts the humankind with the challenge of rapid ageing, which becomes especially relevant for developed countries. This necessitates the elaboration of optimal approaches to the management of ageing, which would enable a radical prolongation of active, full-value, working period of human life and, thus, would reduce the percentage of age-related disability. An essential role in the successful accomplishment of these objectives consists in the search for the mechanisms of age-related involution of organs and tissues. This overview presents and analysis of the modern concepts of these mechanisms.

[Thymus and aging]. / Timus i starenie.

This review is devoted to the analysis of current knowledge on the structure-functional organization of thymus, its role in homeostasis regulation and in mechanisms of ageing.

[Coupled thermoregulatory and hemodynamic effects in the central administration of bombesin]. / Sopriazhennye termoreguliatsionnye i gemodinamicheskie éffekty pri tsentral'nom vvedenii bombezina.

C-terminal nonapeptide of bombesin introduced into the rabbit brain lateral ventricle increased the arterial pressure by 21.5 mm Hg while decreasing the heart rate by 89.5 min-1. Comparison of these findings with earlier data on the effect of bombesin on peripheral blood flow and gastrointestinal functions suggested a reciprocal effect of bombesin on the tone of vegetative (mainly sympathetic) spinal neurons.

[Bombesin reduces body temperature chiefly by increasing peripheral blood flow]. / Bombezin snizhaet temperaturu tela glavnym obrazom putem uvelicheniia perifericheskogo krovotoka.

Bombesin, some of its fragments and analogues, being injected intracerebroventricularly, induce rapid decline in body temperature. The active fragment of bombesin--C-terminal nonapeptide--induced a 25% depression of oxygen consumption in cold-exposed rabbits, no changes in the shivering thermogenesis, and a 3.5--5.0-fold increase of ear blood vessels section area accompanied by a gain in linear velocity of blood flow. The peripheral blood flow seems to be the main effector of the bombesin-induced hypothermia.

[Physiological effects of bombesin]. / Fiziologicheskie éffekty bombezina.

Central or peripheral administration of bombesin--tetradecapeptide obtained from amphibian skin, acted upon the nervous system, behaviour, thermoregulation and gastro-intestinal tract. New experimental data on synthesis, immunohistochemistry and physiological effects of bombesin and related peptides are presented.

[Effect of bombesin, its various fragments and their analogs on thermoregulation in rabbits]. / Vliianie bombezina, nekotorykh ego fragmentov i ikh analogov na termoreguliatsiiu krolika.

Out of synthetic tetradecapeptide bombesin, its fragments C-terminal nonapeptide and N-terminal pentapeptide and their analogues ( Val7 , D- Ala11 ), ( Ala7 , D- Ala11 ), (Leu7, D- Ala11 ) and ( Pro6 , Gly7 , D- Ala11 ), the first two, being injected into the lateral ventricle of the brain in rabbits, affected the body temperature in cold environment (+ 10 degrees C). The analogues exerted a lesser effect on the body temperature. N-terminal pentapeptide was ineffective both in cold (+ 10 degrees C) and warm (+ 30 degrees C) environment.