Mushrooms have been used since centuries in many ancient cultures as source of food and medicine. However, until now the therapeutic values of mushrooms position this group of macrofungi as one of the major component in traditional medicine practice especially in South East Asia and China. Of different species of known mushrooms, Pleurotus spp. is widely known as part of food chain based on its high nutritional value. However, of the more than 70 species known, only few species are cultivated in mass production and used such as P. ostreatus, P. florida, and P. ajor-caju. However, P. ostreatus (widely known as oyster mushroom) received more attention in food industries based on its high growth rate and ease of cultivation using different substrates. This mushroom is rich of wide range of bioactive molecules of proven medicinal values with many therapeutic activities as anticancer, immunomodulatory, antiapoptotic, anti hypocholesterolemic, anti hyperglycemic, antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, anti-osteoporetic, and many others. This work focuses on reviewing on the different classes of oyster mushroom bioactive compounds of antioxidant activities such as phenolics, beta carotene, lycopene, ascorbic acid, tocopherols, and ergosterols. This review provides also comprehensive information on the recent research to enhance the antioxidant properties through alteration of the cultivation strategy and addition of some compounds during the cultivation of P. ostreatus.
The purpose of dehydration process is to reduce moisture content to prolong shelf life, to promote convenience and at the same time to assist transportation of delicate and perishable products across long distances. Freeze drying is known as one of the best methods to retain quality compared to other dehydration processes. This is due to lower instances of rupture of the structure and minimal loss of nutrient. These parameters are important to consumers and also for the food industry. This mini-review compares methods of dehydration processes, as well as their advantages and disadvantages when used in combination with other technologies. Data compilation on nutritional properties and mineral components of tropical fruits, namely guava, pineapple, papaya and jackfruits which had underwent freeze drying technologies are also reviewed.
Mushrooms health benefit was recognized in the Orient from several thousand years ago as globally consumption and has third largest commercially production. The genus Pleurotus (oyster mushroom) is an organoleptic fast growing fungus which belongs to basidiomycota group. Although 70 species is discovered until now for this genus, but only few of them are available in market such as Pleurotus florida, P. sajor-caju and P. ostreatus. They have been used in human diet throughout the world due to their rich nutrients such as protein, fiber carbohydrate, minerals, vitamins and lipid. It should be noted that low amount calories, Sodium, fat and cholesterol is reported in this genus. Many pharmaceutical companies in the Far East and China are viewing the medicinal mushrooms as a rich source of innovative biomedical molecules. These molecules can be extracted from different part of oyster mushroom such as fruiting body, mycelia and culture broth. Mainly they are biopolymers including polysaccharides, proteins and nucleic acids as they are more variable to carry biological information. The medicinal properties of Pleurotus spp studied by several authors, as a result antitumor, immunomodulating, antiviral, antibacterial, antigenotoxic, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, hypocholesterolamic, antihypertensive, antiinociceptive, anti-hyperglycaemic, anti-platelet-aggregating, antihepatoma, anti poliferative and antiatherosclerotic. In this chapter, biodivertsity of genus Pleurotus will be discussed regarding nutritional and bioactive compounds. Furthermore the prospective of oyster mushroom for therapeutic application and concept will be highlighted.
Phosphorus is one of the most important nutrients for plant growth and development. This study aimed to survey the optimum condition for phosphatase enzyme production, purified and studied its properties. Phosphatase enzyme activity was determined by end point method. Phosphatase enzyme was obtained from Bacillus cereus EME 66 isolate. The enzyme was purified and characterized, using a three-step purification procedure with 12.3-fold. The phosphatase enzyme was partially purified using ammonium sulfate fractionation followed by ultrafiltration. The acid phosphatase is a monomer protein purified gel filtration to 5.6 fold. Results showed that the optimum temperature for the purified enzyme activity was 60 °C and it was stable at temperatures below 60 °C. This enzyme was stable between pH 4.0-6.0, and the optimal pH activity was found to 5.0. The activity of the enzyme enhanced by heavy metals (Fe 3+ , Cu 2+ , Ca 2+ , Mg 2+ and K + ). The enzyme activity was strongly inhibited by heavy metals Zn 2+ . The present article reveals on enzymatic characterization of acid phosphatase enzyme.Â
The silicone polymers containing a silanol residue were synthesized from silica gel, while the polyurethanes (PUs) bearing a carboxyl moiety were prepared using 2,2-bis(hydroxymethyl)propionic acid (BHMPA) as one of the diol components. The fabrication of the PU films was carried out using these two polymers, then the tensile and thermal properties were investigated. Both the amounts of the carboxyl side groups of the PU chain and the residual silanol of the silicone polymer significantly affected the mechanical property of the film, in addition, the incorporation of 3-aminopropyltrimethoxysilane (APTMS) was quite effective for enhancing the elastic modulus ( E ). As a result, the film prepared from the polyurethane containing the BHMPA unit with a combination of APTMS and the silicone polymer, having a proper amount of silanol groups, showed the highest effect ( E = 5.36 N/mm 2 ), while that observed for the film prepared without using BHMPA and a silicone polymer was 2.10 N/mm 2 . An acid-base interaction between the carboxyl moiety of the PU and amino group of APTMS occurred, while the formation of the siloxane linkage through the silylation reaction between the trimethoxysilyl group of APTMS and silanol also took place.
The polysaccharides chitin and chitosan are made up of monomer units of the amino sugars D-glucosamine and N -acetyl-D-glucosamine. The ratio of these two monomers dictates whether the polysaccharide is considered chitin or chitosan. Both polymers have unique properties and have uses in several diverse applications. In nature, chitin and chitosan primarily play a structural role. When purified from their producing organism, these polymers exhibit useful structural, chemical and biological properties. Chitin and chitosan have been used in several applications including biomedicine, food additives, cosmetics, and more. The charged chitosan polymer is especially effective in biomedical applications, as it has been demonstrated to possess antimicrobial properties. This review explores the properties of chitin and chitosan and how these biopolymers are used in a variety of healthcare and other applications.
Inter professional education (IPE) is the core concept of healthcare department in most of the developed countries on both student and professional level. There is no objection on its necessity. Top ranking universities of the world, especially of developed countries are working on IPE. But some of developing countries like Pakistan are almost unaware of this concept. No one is having the basic concept of IPE, except few, and they are not practicing in IPE so far. Talking about Punjab, there is no awareness for the concept of IPE. It is the need of our healthcare department that we must introduce IPE to improve healthcare quality. This survey was conducted to check the readiness for IPE among pharm D and MBBS students in different institutes of medicine and pharmacy of Lahore. Team went to different pharmacy and medical colleges and asked the students to fill in a questionnaire having 19 items, which was rated by the students on Likert scale. The result shows a conflict in the opinion of pharmacy and medical students. Team also interviewed the respondents shortly. This interview showed many reasons explained by medical students for their response but the most prominent one was the superiority complex. The need of the hour is to introduce IPE in universities for changing the attitude of medical students towards IPE.
The paper deals with some topics of important aspects of food safety and application of principles of food physics in the sector of agriculture, food technology, biotechnology, including questions of well balanced nutrition, as well. One of the most important and widely applied field of biotechnology is the food technology. Food production and processing of quality food and safe food are today of primary importance. Food production is based on the principles of GAP, GMP and GHP. Recently the industrial food processing is focused dominantly on the quality, and one of the basic requirements of the quality is the safety. There are various methods and techniques to produce safe food. The modern food technologies and quality measurements (quality control, quality assurance) involve the application of different physical methods – e.g. high pressure, pulsing electrical field, nondestructive techniques (e.g. NMR, NIR-NIT, PAS, INAA) for chemical composition determination, radiation techniques, nanofiltration and reverse osmosis (RO) – as well. Using e.g. ionizing radiation (nuclear methods) and non-ionizing radiation technologies it is possible to fulfil a lot of important expectations: decrease of microbial contamination, improve of sensory properties, increase of storability, etc. The paper deals with questions of up-to-date, with sport motion combined diet, helping in keeping the health, as well. In the last decades a lot of information were distributed concerning several viewpoints of bodyweight reduction and optimation of bodymaa. How should we know that it is useful and not unhealthy? A suitable Nutrition software (AOPNEI, Analysing and Optimation Program for Nourishment and Energy Intake) – developed at the Department of Food Chemistry and Nutrition of the Faculty of Food Science, Corvinus University – can help.
Protoplast fusion and enzyme immobilization techniques were applied to increase calcitriol production from vitamin D 3 using Actinomyces hyovaginalis , a local isolate recovered from Egyptian soil, that has a potential bioconversion activity of vitamin D 3 into calcitriol. A total of sixteen protoplast hybrids, formed between Actinomyces hyovaginalis isolate and two Bacillus species ( B. thuringiensis and B. weihenstephanensis ) were screened for vitamin D 3 bioconversion activity. Compared to wild type isolate, four hybrids (formed between Actinomyces hyovaginalis isolate and B. thuringiensis ) were found to preserve the bioconversion activity; out of which, three hybrids coded V2B, V3B and V8A exhibited higher calcitriol production. The hybrids coded V2B and V8A produced, per 1 L culture medium, about 0.5 and 0.4 mg calcitriol corresponding to 350% and 280%, respectively, increase compared to the wild type isolate. Among different alginate concentrations applied, immobilization of cell lysate of Actinomyces hyovaginalis isolate using 2% alginate showed 140% increase in calcitriol production from vitamin D 3 compared to the free cell lysate. Activity of the immobilized form was preserved for five repetitive uses over a period of 15 days but with a 50% decline in production occurring at the fifth use.
In this study, two Lactobacillus (LAB) strains namely, Lactobacillus rhamnosus EMCC 1105 ( L. rhamnosus ) and Lactobacillus gasseri EMCC 1930 ( L. gasseri) were tested for their antagonistic activities against Pseudomonas aeruginosa ( P. aeruginosa ), Escherichia coli ( E. coli ) and Staphylococcus aureus ( S. aureus ) which are known to be frequently implicated in biofilm infections. The acidic cell free culture supernatant (CFS) of 24 h and 48 h cultures of both LAB stains showed antimicrobial effects against the three pathogens in radial diffusion assay. These effects were abolished upon neutralization of CFS indicating that this effect was due to acids only. Both LAB strains could effectively inhibit the biofilm formation of the three test pathogens and largely replaced them on polystyrene surfaces as demonstrated by crystal violet staining, viable count and scanning electron microscopy. Both of the tested LAB strains could inhibit the protease productivity of S. aureus in 24 h and 48 h dual species-biofilms. The supernatant of 24 h-dual biofilms of P. aeruginosa with L. gasseri also showed a significantly lower protease activity compared to that of P. aeruginosa individual biofilm. Neither LAB strains affected phospholipase C production by the test pathogens when they co-exist during biofilm formation. The different preparations of LAB strains caused no significant change in the levels of gamma interferon expressed by peripheral blood mononuclear cells in response to stimulation by the test pathogens in vitro . In conclusion, L. gasseri and L. rhamnosus can be considered as promising tools for combating biofilm infections.
A large amount of oil hydrocarbons and heavy metals have been discharged into the environment and caused soil polluted. Petroleum and cadmium in soil accumulated in crops and lead to threaten human healthy through the food chain. In this experiment, seeds of sorghum and rape were germinated in deferent concentrations of petroleum and cadmium, and the effect of Peptococcus activus sp. SH3-3-9 on the germination was studied. The results showed that petroleum and cadmium inhibited seeds germination, and the effects were stronger as their concentrations increased. Peptococcus activus sp.SH3-3-9 had the role of enhancing seed germination, which indicates it has high potential in plant-microbial remediation of petroleum and cadmium in soil.
The antimicrobial activity of three varieties of Vigna unguiculata L. Walp seed oil (LBS-1, LBS-2 and LBS-3) were investigated against five Gram positive bacteria ( Bacillus megaterium, Bacillus subtilis, Sarcina lutea, Salmonella typhi and Staphylococcus aureus ) and four Gram negative ( Escherichia coli, Shigella dysenteriae, Shigella sonnei, Shigella shiga ) and four fungi ( Penicilium spp., Mucor spp., Candida albicans and Aspergillus fumigatius ). The LBS-1 oil at the concentration of 400 I¼g/ disc showed the highest activity against Sarcina lutea (19±0.1 mm) than that of LBS-2 (14±0.3 mm) and LBS-3 (12±0.3 mm) oil whereas LBS-3 oil showed highest activity against Staphylococcus aureus (16±0.1 mm) than that of LBS-1 (10±0.6 mm) and LBS-2 (13±0.4 mm) oil. All the three oils are active against the three tested fungi namely Penicilium spp., Mucor spp. and Candida albicans but showed no sensitivity against Aspergillus fumigatius .
Bioactive natural products are economically important as drugs, fragrances, pigments, food additives and pesticides.The biotechnological tools are important to select, multiply, improve and analyze medicinal plants for production of such products.The utilization of medicinal plant cells for the production of natural or recombinant compounds of commercial interest has gained increasing attention over the past decades.Plant tissue culture systems are possible source of valuable medicinal compounds, fragrances and colorants, which cannot be produced by microbial cells or chemical synthesis.In vitro production of bioactive natural products in plant cell suspension culture has been reported from various medicinal plants and bioreactors are the key step towards commercial production.Genetic transformation is a powerful tool for enhancing the productivity of novel products; especially by Agrobacterium tumefacians.Combinatorial biosynthesis is another approach in the generation of novel natural products and for the production of rare and expensive natural products.Recent advances in the molecular biology, enzymology and bioreactor technology of plant cell culture suggest that these systems may become a viable source of important secondary metabolites.Genetic fingerprinting could be a powerful tool in the field of medicinal plants to be used for correct germplasm identification.In addition, when linked to emerging tools such as metabolomics and proteomics, providing fingerprints of the plant's metabolites or protein composition, it gives data on phenotypic variation, caused by growth conditions or environmental factors, and also yield data on the genes involved in the biosynthesis.DNA profiling techniques like DNA microarrays serve as suitable high throughput tools for the simultaneous analysis of multiple genes and analysis of gene expression that becomes necessary for providing clues about regulatory mechanisms, biochemical pathways and broader cellular functions.New and powerful tools in functional genomics can be used in combination with metabolomics to elucidate biosynthetic pathways of natural products.
Biocements and biogrouts are developing extensively as new materials alternative to cement and toxic chemical grouts. The most popular type of biocement is a mixture of urease-producing bacteria, urea and calcium salt. Thus, development of biotechnology to produce biomass of urease-active bacteria for large-scale biocementation is an important biotechnological task. Two strains of urease-producing bacteria, Yaniella sp. VS8 and Bacillus sp. VS1 that synthesized inducible and constitutive urease, respectively, were used in the present study. It was shown that low cost biomass of urease-active bacteria can be produced from the hydrolyzed excessive activated sludge of municipal wastewater treatment plant. The biomass of Yaniella sp. VS8 grown in this medium diminished the hydraulic conductivity of sand from 4.8A—10 -4 m/s to 5∙10 -8 m/s after several biotreatments with solution of 1.5 M urea and 0.75M ÐiаCl 2 .
The antimicrobial capability of oil containing medium-chain fatty acids and their corresponding monoglycerides, known as Enhanced Virgin Coconut Oil (EVCO) against microorganisms isolated from bovine mastitis milk was studied. EVCO contains an effective amount of medium-chain free fatty acids (caprylic, capric and lauric acid) and their corresponding derivatives (monocaprylin, monocaprin and monolaurin) can act as antimicrobial agent with broad spectrum of antimicrobial properties. An in vitro assessment of EVCO against bovine mastitis microorganisms isolated from locally collected mastitis milk samples was conducted to determine its minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC >99 ). In general, EVCO exhibited its great antimicrobial capability to kill all mastitis microorganisms isolated from the mastitis milk sample at different concentrations of MBC >99 value. In fact, EVCO was found more effective to kill Mycoplasma sp. and gram positive microbes rather than gram negative microbes, especially in Mycoplasma bovis, Acholeplasma oculi , Enterococcus sp. , Streptococcus sp. and Staphylococcus aureus with lower MBC >99 values in comparison with the synthetic antibiotic, Mastivet. A further investigation of the antimicrobial activities of EVCO against Staphylococcus aureus and Mycoplasma bovis against time revealed that EVCO was more efficient in killing these two microorganisms in a shorter time at a lower concentration as opposed to Mastivet. These findings indicated that EVCO has great potential application in postmilking teat germicide, which can be used as a preventive measure to control mastitis cases, especially against environmental mastitis pathogens.
This study was aimed at selecting novel strains of Lactobacillus from crop of Algerian poultry. One hundred forty (140) lactobacilli strains were isolated and examined for their potentiality probiotic properties. From these isolated strains, nine appear to possess a probiotic value and highlighted a noticeable heterogeneity. The isolate L. plantarum G 1 showed the best inhibitory activity against several indicator strains. Furthermore, the results showed that culture and neutralized supernatants exhibited varying degrees of inhibitory activity against strains of enterobacteria from poultry origin. The tested strains were acid resistant and were also bile tolerant. Antibiotic resistance, co-aggregation activity and hydrophobicity percentage were strain-dependent. Moreover, six strains were able to adhere to epithelial cells. Finally, six Lactobacillus strains, such as strain L. plantarum G 1, L. plantarum PC 2 , L. viridesencs G 3 , L. helveticus PC 6 , L. delbrueckii ssp delbrueckii G 7 and L. fermentum PC 8 , showed essential probiotic properties. The identity of the best strain L. plantarum G1 was confirmed by 16S rRNA gene sequence using PCR.
Bioremediation of hexavalent chromium, Cr(VI) by Botrytis aclada fres and Chrysonilia sitophila was studied.The organisms were isolated from decaying onion bulb and apple fruit respectively, purified in Potato Dextrose Agar, and grown for 144 hours in solutions of potassium dichromate of concentrations ranging from 5-20 mg/l at 40 0 C. Effective reduction of Cr(VI) was observed at 5-20 mg/l compared to 25 mg/l dichromate treatments in both organisms.The results showed significant decrease (P < 0.05) in biomass concentration in the two fungi used with increasing concentration of the dichromate treatment (5-25 mg/l).Significant increase (P < 0.05) in residual glucose concentration was also observed in the culture media with increase in concentration of the dichromate treatment.However, at 20 mg/l dichromate treatment, Cr(IV) concentration, 1.36 ± 0.02 and 1.71 ± 0.03 (P < 0.05) were revealed in the culture media of B. aclada fres and C. sitophila respectively.Also, 0.71 ± 0.03 and 0.94 ± 0.03 Cr(IV) concentration (P < 0.05) were observed in the fungal mycelia at 20 mg/l dichromate treatment in B. aclada fres and C. sitophila respectively.After 144 hours of growth, Cr(VI) reduction of 89.65% in B. aclada fres and 86.75% in C. sitophila at 20 mg/l dichromate treatment were revealed.This investigation suggests that the two fungi adopted a process of reduction to tolerate the toxicity of hexavalent chromium.The results indicate the potentials of the fungi in bioremediation particularly in the treatment of waste water containing hexavalent chromium.
Fern is a seedless vascular plant that reproduces via spores and has various usefulness.This study was carried out to optimize the conditions of leaf protein concentrate extraction using ultrasound from defatted fern type Diplazium esculentum.The extraction of defatted fern protein was conducted using ultrasound.Rotatable central composite design (RCCD) of response surface methodology was used for identification of the best condition and extraction yield optimization.An attempt with genetic algorithm optimization was also carried out and revealed that optimized results were of highest desirability as compared to response surface methodology.The final optimum results, by using genetic algorithm was observed to be 21.12 min of sonication time, 56.88 °C temperature, 7.59 pH and 66.2 ml of solvent for an optimum protein yield of 33.79% where desirability value was 1.00.UHPLC analysis of the sample revealed the presence of all the essential amino acids, except tryptophan.
Ischemic cerebrovascular disease is one of the three deadly diseases.It is characterised by high mortality and high morbidity.Because of no effective treatments of recombinant tissue plasminogen activator (rt-PA) and neuroprotectant, there are more and more research focus on neurovascular unit (NVU), which is composed of brain microvascular endothelial cells (BMECs), neuron, astrocyte(AS) and so on.Cell-cell signaling and coupling between these different compartments form the basis for normal function and repair of brain injury.In this mini-review, we will describe the relationship of CMECs, neuron and AS.
Phytochemical screening (saponins, tannins, steroids, alkaloids, flavonoids, phenols and glycosides) of four medicinal plant seeds ( Jatropha curcas, Simmondsia chinensis (Jojoba), Moringa oleifera and Datura metel ) extracted by aqueous, ethanol and Folch solvents, were examined for their antimicrobial activity against three types of plant pathogenic fungi namely; Botrytis cinerea, Fusarium oxysporum and Rhizoctonia solani, in addition to four types of bacteria, namely; Bacillus cereus, Staphylococcus aureus, Ralstonia solanacearum and Pesudomonas aeruginosa using disc diffusion paper. Results revealed that different concentrations of aqueous extracts were more effective against bacterial activity compared to fungal activity, except for D. metel aqueous extract which showed no antifungal effect and very weak effect on only two of the tested bacteria. B. cereus was more sensitive to J. curcas aqueous extract, while P. aeruginosa was more sensitive to S. chinensis and M. oleifera aqueous extracts . On the other hand, results showed that J. curcas and M. oleifera ethanol extracts were more effective on Staph. aureus growth, while S. chinensis and D. metel did not have any effect on any of the fungi or bacteria under study. The evaluation of the antifungal and antibacterial effect did not confirm the broad spectrum of S. chinensis Folch extract, while M. oleifera and D. metel were more effective on reducing R. solani growth. Also F. oxysporum was affected by J. curcas Folch extract only at high concentrations. These findings support that the traditional use of the plant extracts in the treatment of different infections caused by pathogenic microbes is valuable and should be taken in consideration.
