Tubin L.A., Belyaev A.N., Kiryanova V.V.

Saint-Petersburg State Technological Institute (Technical Univercity), Saint-Petersburg Medical Academy of postgraduate studies, Saint-Petersburg, Russia

letubi@yandex.ru

Studying of the mechanism of peloids (medical muds) influence on human organism is important task for balneology. Knowledge on this topic has general nature and only empirically allows to distinguish medical mud from the ordinary one, as well as to predict medical mud effects and to range different peloids by efficiency of their influence at various diseases. While working on any hypotheses about mechanisms of peloids action it should be considered as the basic fact that natural substances with completely different chemical composition have almost the same list of therapeutical indications and contra-indications, i.e. similar biological activity which reveals itself on the contact with the skin. That leads to two questions: a) whether all peloids contain identical biologically active substances? b) whether those substances penetrate through the skin? Big volume of medical muds composition researches allows giving the negative answer to the first question — if we base our conclusions on traditional understanding of chemical substance as a set of identical molecules. At the same time, we have all reasons to assume that similar supermolecular structures are present in medical muds with different molecular composition, and those supermolecular structures define similar biological activity of peloids. The answer to the second question will be, presumably, also negative, but electrons and/or ions transfer inherent to supermolecular systems has to take place. According to the existing information nano-particles with size of less than 7 nm can penetrate to deep layers of skin where receptors of external influences located, and that allows us to consider small enough size of particles as a necessary condition for medical muds properties display. All muds contain iron, copper, manganese and other transitive metals in the form of complicated polinuclear complexes of supermolecular structure incorporated in the silicate skeleton particles. Such structures possess high biological activity as catalysts of biochemical reactions and electrons carriers. According to modern conceptions one of the most significant signal systems in the organism is formed by mutual transitions between tiol and disulfide groups. It is possible to assume, that at contact with signal tiol-containing skin peptides transitive metals catalyze tiols oxidation to disulfide, carring out redox-regulation. There are the experimental data about the influence of redox-transformations of signal molecules on the most important cell functions, such as neurotransmission, immunity, proliferation etc. The way of signal transition from extra- to intracellular space is tiol-disulfide exchange between tiol remnants of transport proteins penetrating through citoplasmatic membrane. The organism response depends on localisation, intension, queue and other signals characteristics.

So, according to this model the medical mud should contain transitive metals complex compounds, which are activated by supramolecular environment, incorporated in the small enough silicate skeleton particles and catalyze signal molecules tiols oxidation in the skin. The signals are transmitted by redox-regulation process. Medical action of the peloids could be considered as the organism response on signals received.