https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736(08)60074-4.pdf

Epidemiology and causes of preterm birth

https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736(13)60937-X.pdf

Maternal and child undernutrition and overweight in low-income and middle-income countries

The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics A Textbook of Pharmacology, Toxicology and Therapeutics for Physicians and Medical Students. By Prof. Louis Goodman and Prof. Alfred Gilman. Pp. xiii + 1383. (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1941.) 50s. net.

The Pharmacological Basis of Therapeutics

■ Abstract Apoptosis is a genetically programmed, morphologically distinct form of cell death that can be triggered by a variety of physiological and pathological stimuli. Studies performed over the past 10 years have demonstrated that proteases play critical roles in initiation and execution of this process. The caspases, a family of cysteine-dependent aspartate-directed proteases, are prominent among the death proteases. Caspases are synthesized as relatively inactive zymogens that become activated by scaffold-mediated transactivation or by cleavage via upstream proteases in an intracellular cascade. Regulation of caspase activation and activity occurs at several different levels: ( a) Zymogen gene transcription is regulated; ( b) antiapoptotic members of the Bcl-2 family and other cellular polypeptides block proximity-induced activation of certain procaspases; and ( c) certain cellular inhibitor of apoptosis proteins (cIAPs) can bind to and inhibit active caspases. Once activated, caspases cleave a variety of intracellular polypeptides, including major structural elements of the cytoplasm and nucleus, components of the DNA repair machinery, and a number of protein kinases. Collectively, these scissions disrupt survival pathways and disassemble important architectural components of the cell, contributing to the stereotypic morphological and biochemical changes that characterize apoptotic cell death.

Mammalian caspases: structure ,a ctivation ,s ubstrates, and functions during apoptosis

Preterm delivery is the chief problem in obstetrics today, accounting for 70 percent of perinatal mortality and nearly half of long-term neurologic morbidity.1,2 Approximately 10 percent of all births are preterm, but most of the serious illness and death is concentrated in the 1 to 2 percent of infants who are born at less than 32 weeks of gestation and who weigh less than 1500 g. Approximately 20 percent of preterm births are the result of a physician's decision to bring about delivery for maternal or fetal indications, and the remainder follow the spontaneous onset of labor or rupture . . .

Moshe Mazor

Papers

The preterm parturition syndrome

The fetal inflammatory response syndrome.

Infection and preterm labor.

Infection and labor V. Prevalence, microbiology, and clinical significance of intraamniotic infection in women with preterm labor and intact membranes

Infection and labor. III. Interleukin-1: a signal for the onset of parturition.