Vol 67, No 8 (2012)

The article represents the results of neurocognitive development study in progress. Clinical methods of investigation are supplemented with examination of children with Russian computer psychophysiological complex “Psichomat”, which allows to examine a number of cognitive functions — perception, attention, memory, visual-motor coordination, processes of analysis and synthesis — in mathematical function expression: milliseconds and percentage of mistakes. A child’s intrauterine and postnatal development is determined by various factors. Cognitive processes, which are ascending accordingly to a child’s age, play significant role in social development. The standard charts of children psychoneurological development, worked out by the authors, must become key factors both for pediatricians of different subspecialities and for parents and psychologists, in order not to miss the beginning of some pathology condition — from development delay to retardation. During the analysis of cognitive status of a child, speech development, behavior and emotions should be assessed. The deficiency of cognitive functions causes difficulties in education and contact with a child, which in some cases leads to formation of syndromal pathological conditions and disease entities (from mild development delays to different stages of oligophrenia). It is necessary to educate pediatricians of various subspecialities and pediatric neurologists the methods of children examination in order to determine the “cognitive profile” according to the age, health condition, presence of somatic and/or psychoneurological diseases and influence of the drug therapy both on a child’s organism and cognitive processes.

The mechanisms of early embryonic pathology of the brain in man and animals were studied. Analysis of the biomechanical properties of development of nervous tissue and embryonal experiments demonstrated that tangential neuroepithelial intention is the major source of positional information. Experimental changes in the neuroepithelial intention system resulted in various types of embryonal anomalies of the nervous system. Mechanical-dependent ion channels that have marked periods of sensitivity and determine the histogenetic direction of neuroblast cell differentiation were found to underline the mechanosensitivity of the neuroepithelium. Experimental findings were compared with unique autopsy data on early development of the human brain. Human embryos were examined from neurulation to month 6 of development. Different types of human embryonal brain anomalies were shown to occur with 3 types of neurulation disordes: 1) an open preneuropore is responsible for anomalies of the forebrain and etmoidal area; 2) arrested neurulation in the postneuropore leads to anomalies of the diencephalons, midbrain, and occipital region; 3) impaired neurulatuion in the caudal region is a cause of spinal cord anomalies. The above anomalies resulted from local compensatory responses of the neuroepithelium due to the lack of intentions that are characteristic of normal development of the neural tube.

The results of fundamental and applied studies of blood-brain barrier had been conducted by authors during the last 10 years are summarized in the publication. The molecular anatomy of barrier microvessels, as well as promising markers of BBB and other proteins involved in barrier functions are discussed. Via in vitro experiments with endothelial cells of cerebral microvessels we characterized the basic conditions required for adequate BBB modeling. The in vivo data of BBB permeability for macromolecules in normal and different pathological processis including radiation injury, hyperosmotic shock, and nervous tissue ischemia are properly described. A particular attention was focused upon the experimental studies of the permeability and functional reorganization of barrier endothelium during tumor neoangiogenesis. We detected a dramatically increased permeability of neoplastic microvessels both for horseradish peroxidase/serum albumin and labeled monoclonal antibodies. The increased tumor permeability for IgG and the overexpression of target antigens in tumor tissue and peritumoral zone make possible the targeted delivery of diagnostics and therapeutic agents into the tumor by means of monoclonal antibodies.