The growing global threat of antimicrobial resistance endangers both human and animal life, necessitating the urgent discovery of novel antimicrobial solutions. Medicinal plants hold promise as sources of potential antimicrobial compounds. In this study, we investigated the phytochemical constituents and microbicidal capabilities of the ethanolic extract from Nigella sativa (black seed). Gas chromatography analysis (GC) identified 11 compounds, among them thymoquinone, and thymol, contributing to antimicrobial and antioxidant properties. Antimicrobial assays demonstrated notable inhibition zones against broad spectra of bacteria, including Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Escherichia coli, Salmonella typhi, Staphylococcus aureus, Enterobacter, and Bacillus subtilis, along with potent antifungal activity against Aspergillus niger, Penicillium, and Candida albicans. Notably, when combined with antibiotics, the extract displayed exceptional synergistic antimicrobial efficacy. The black seed extract demonstrated membrane-damaging activity and disrupted virulence factors that protect microbes from antimicrobial agents, including the formation of bacterial biofilm and protease secretion. Thymoquinone, the primary active constituent of the extract, exhibited similar antimicrobial and ant virulence properties. In silico analysis targeting key regulators of quorum sensing and biofilm formation in P. aeruginosa, such as RhlG, LasR, and PqsR, showed a remarkable affinity of thymol and thymoquinone for these targets. Moreover, the N. sativa extract exhibited dose-dependent cytotoxicity against both the promastigote and amastigote forms of Leishmania tropica parasites, hinting at potential antiparasitic activity. In addition to its antimicrobial properties, the extract displayed potential antioxidant activity at a concentration of 400 μg/mL.

In the production of nanoparticles that utilizing biological products, bioinspired or green nanotechnology gained significance every single day owing to its ecofriendly and cost-effective nature. In the current study, zinc sulphate salt was used as a source for zinc oxide nanoparticles, ZnO-NPs were stabilized and reduced by bioactive molecules of Zingiber officinale. Further characterization of ZnO-NPs was carried out using UV-Vis spectroscopy, Scanning electron microscopy, Energy dispersive X-Ray spectroscopy, X-Ray diffraction, and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. It was found that zinc nanoparticles can be best synthesized at pH 11, temperature 60 degrees C, metal salt concentration of 2.0 mg, and reaction time of 60 min. From antibacterial bioassay, it was observed that ZnO-NPs enhanced the antimicrobial activity of the antibiotics such as Ciprofloxacin, Imipenem, Vancomycin and Amoxicillin-Clavulanic acid up to 35.3, 24.1, 10.5, and 11.2% against S. aureus, while 41.4, 31.8, 15.8, and 23.9% against E. coli respectively, comparing with the zones created by antibiotics alone. Furthermore, ZnO-NPs exhibited significant RBCs hemocompatibility and antioxidant activity, and no significant hemolysis were observed at high concentration of NPs. ZnO-NPs showed significant percent inhibition of alpha-amylase up to 51.12 +/- 0.71% at 400 mu g/mL, and thus showed antidiabetic potential. In Brine shrimp cytotoxic assay, ZnO-NPs were applied against Artemia salina and the maximum mortality rate of 61 +/- 1.6% was observed at concentration of 400 mu g/mL. In Anti-inflammatory assay ZnO-NPs inhibited Cyclooxygenase (COX-1 & COX-2) up to 53.11 +/- 1.12% and 51.14 +/- 1.16% at a concentration of 400 mu g/mL respectively. ZnO-NPs showed significant AntiAlzheimer potential at 400 mu g/mL by inhibiting Acetylcholinesterase (AChE) and Butyrylcholinesterase (BChE) up to 62.91 +/- 1.62% and 60.18 +/- 0.21% respectively. It was concluded that Zingiber officinale extract is useful for the reduction and capping of ZnO-NPs. The bioengineered nanoparticles were biocompatible and had the capability of inhibiting Alzheimer's, diabetes, inflammation, and to enhance the efficacy of existing antibiotics against pathogenic bacterial isolates, therefore by utilizing ZnO-NPs in combination with commercially available antibiotics provides an alternate therapy for the treatment of bacterial infections.

Increase of plastics accumulation in the environment cause ecological threats and has been one of the serious issue worldwide. In the current study, two bacterial isolated strains Bacillus safensis and Bacillus amyloliquefaciens were used for their plastic degradation capabilities. The biodegradation of low density polyethylene thermoplastic was assessed by weight reduction, Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) analysis and by culture media pH alteration. The results shows that Bacillus safensis was more efficient and degrade 18.6% LDPE than Bacillus amyloliquefaciens that degrade 18% of LDPE after incubation period of 30 days. Moreover, it was also noted that longer incubation periods results in higher biodegradation of low density polyethylene thermoplastic. It is concluded that the biodegrading ability of Bacillus safensis is more than Bacillus amyloliquefaciens as confirm from weight reduction of low density polyethylene thermoplastic.

The current study reports advanced, ecofriendly and biosynthesized silver NPs for diverse biomedical and environmental applications using Flammulina velutipes as biosource. In the study, a simple aqueous extract of F. velutipes was utilized to reduce the AgNO 3 into stable elemental silver (Ag 0 ) at a nanometric scale. The NPs had average size of 21.4 nm, spherical morphology, and were highly stable and pure. The characterized nanoparticles were exploited for a broad range of biomedical applications including bacteriocidal, fungicidal, leishmanicidal, in vitro antialzheimer’s, antioxidant, anti-diabetic and biocompatibility studies. Our findings showed that F. velutipes mediated AgNPs exhibited high activity against MDR bacterial strains and spore forming fungal strains. All the tested urinary tract infection bacterial isolates, were resistant to non-coated antibiotics but by applying 1% of the synthesized AgNPs, the bactericidal potential of the tested antibiotics enhanced manifolds. The NPs also exhibited dose-dependent cytotoxic potential against Leishmania tropica with significant LC 50 of 248 μ g ml −1 for promastigote and 251 μ g ml −1 for amastigote forms of the parasite. Furthermore, promising antialzheimer and antidiabetic activities were observed as significant inhibition of α -amylase, α -glucosidase, acetylcholinesterase (AChE) and butrylcholineterase (BChE) were noted. Moreover, remarkable biocompatible nature of the particles was found against human red blood cells. The biosynthesized AgNPs as photocatalyst, also resulted in 98.2% degradation of indigo carmine dye within 140 min. Owing to ecofriendly synthesis, biosafe nature and excellent physicochemical properties F. velutipes AgNPs can be exploited as novel candidates for multifaceted biomedical and environmental applications.

Antibiotics are drugs used for the treatment most of the bacterial infections. The rapid and irrational use of antibiotics presents a high risk of developing health complications and also leads to antibiotic resistance. The current study is designed to know about the ratio of irrational use of antibiotics and associated risks with it. Antibiotics remain an integral part of the prescriptions at DHQ Hospital Charsadda. Our study was based mainly on antibiotic prescriptions. A total of 500 prescriptions were examined in which 62% of the prescriptions were examined thoroughly and found rational whereas 38% were irrational. 26.98% of these irrational prescriptions were due to inaccurate doses. Additionally, 25.39% of them were prescribed for incorrect durations, indicating basic misconceptions in the prescriptions. Among the total irrational prescriptions, the frequency of antibiotics-drug interactions, drug-food interactions, and contraindications were 18.51%, 14.5%, and 14.81% respectively. Irrational use of antibiotics is a serious health threat and its consequences lead to the development of antibiotic resistance in different bacterial species. There is a need for intervention of studies in different hospitals of Pakistan to avoid irrational use and encourage rational use of antibiotics.

The novel coronavirus outbreak arose in Wuhan, China in Dec, 2019. It is declared the 6th public health emergency by the WHO and named as COVID-19. SARS-CoV-2 is nonsegmented positive sense ssRNA virus, belongs to the Coronaviridae under the Nidovirales and spread largely in human being and other mammals. Person to person, airborne and surface transmission is common, the virus get entered to host through nose, mouth, eyes, food, water and feces. An infected patients can transmit the virus to 2.2 healthy individuals. A patient in the US showed gastrointestinal symptoms vomiting, nausea and pass loose stools. Later the patient declared positive for SARS-CoV2 on the basis of viral detection in stools and respiratory samples. The gastrointestinal symptoms like diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, abdominal discomfort and detection of SARS-CoV-2 in stools of infected and recovered patients indicates potential oral fecal transmission route, it could be a potential risk for the spread of COVID-19. The flatus is gas produced by aerophagia or bacterial fermentation in intestine and expelled out through esophagus or anus. It comprises Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen, Carbon dioxide and Methane, their percentage composition is 99%. Previous study showed that bacteria can transmit through bare bottom farting. The gastrointestinal manifestation and possible oral-fecal transmission, the flatulence could be the risk of transmission for COVID-19. We must adapt personal hygiene to prevent the spread of disease.

The current study was aimed to observe the prevalence of Helicobacter pylori infection at District Mardan with respect to their gender and age groups. The blood samples were collected from all the subjects who attended the OPD at Mardan Medical Complex. All these samples were screened for the presence of antibodies against H. pylori through a rapid antibody assay. Positive and negative cases were recorded based on the test results and prevalence was measured keeping in mind the selected parameters in individuals of each group. A total of 4312 people was included in the study, out of which 2586 were males and 1726 were females. Majority of the patients were in the mature age group. Based on our results, there were 125 males demonstrating a prevalence of 4.83% which is slightly higher than 4.66% prevalence of 77 females infected. Comparisons were made based on gender and age groups and data presented in the form of figures and tables. Monthly wise prevalence has also been shown. Moreover, prevalence was higher in the people aged 19-44 and lowest in immature ones. However, the overall prevalence in the subjects was 4.68% for the span of 4 months.

The current study was performed to assess the serological aspects of dengue infected patients during 2018 at District Shangla, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. During 2018, a total of 1447 visited these hospitals. Blood samples from the patients at pathology laboratory. The data was taken from hospitals for the span of 5 months (August to December). A separate form was used to notice the gender and history of the individuals. The blood samples collected were screened for Dengue infection with the help of BIOLINE Dengue NS 1 Ag + Ab Combo Test. A total of 1447 blood samples were screened. Among them 554 were found positive for dengue fever whose acquired percentage was (38.28%), while 893 (61.71%) samples were determined with the negative outcome. With respects to patients age groups, there were 271 patients found positive with Dengue infection ages of 15 to 35 years with a percentage of (48.91%) which constitutes the majority of majority dengue infected patients. In the month wise estimation of the Dengue severity in the patients, a major outbreak was identified in September and October because of the rainy and post rainy season. It is concluded that approaches including biological, environmental, medicinal, as well as the educational awareness should be taken to overcome the infection. There is also a need of making teams for investigating the real cause and impacts of the dengue fever on the people of the district.

Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) infection can lead to cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma. It is still considered as one of the major health issue globally. HCV infected person experiences several biochemical abnormalities. In this study, we investigated to correlate the HCV infection with few other diseases like Helicobacter pylori and diabetes and determine the fluctuations in various biochemical markers i.e. ALT, PLT, Hb, and RA-factor. In this cross-sectional and observational study, 191 (139 male and 52 female) HCV-positive patients were included. The HCV-RNA was detected by qualitative-PCR. All the HCV-positive samples were subjected to various clinical diagnostic assays to determine the abnormalities in different biochemical markers occurred due to HCV infection. In the results, 45 (32.3%) of the male patients and 19 (36.5%) of the female patients showed a low level of Hb. 18 (12.9%) of male patients and 12 (23%) of the female patients showed a decrease in the count of the platelet. 59 (42.4%) of the male patients and 21 (40.3%) of the female patients were found positive for having an elevated level of ALT. 32 (23%) of the male patients and 32 (34.6%) of the female patients were found positive for H. pylori infection. 7 (5%) of the male patients and 3 (5.7%) of the female patients showed a decreased level of blood glucose. However, no significant association was found between HCV and diabetes. 16 (11.5%) of the male patients and 4 (7.6%) of the female patients were detected positive for RA-factor in their blood. These factors are strongly associated with disease progression and defining therapy response. However, they are less significant in case of detecting early HCV infection because they can also be increased or decreased in case of other liver diseases.