The volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and oxidation markers of walnut oils from different varieties have rarely been investigated. In this study, changes in peroxide value (PV), p-anisidine value (P-AV), and VOCs were analyzed in three varieties of walnut oils (Xiangling, Luguang, and Hickory) during accelerated oxidation. PV and P-AV showed positive correlations in all three oils. Headspace solid-phase microextraction coupled with gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (HS-SPME–GC–MS) analysis identified 50, 59, and 61 VOCs in Xiangling, Luguang, and Hickory walnut oils, respectively. Principal component analysis (PCA) differentiated the VOCs of the three walnut oil varieties across all oxidation stages. Cluster heatmap and correlation coefficient analyses revealed that 1-octen-3-ol and (E)-2-heptenal were common oxidation markers. Additional variety-specific oxidation markers were also identified. Kinetic modeling demonstrated that all oxidation markers followed first-order reaction kinetics. This study provides a theoretical basis for the quality control and shelf-life prediction of walnut oil.

Hypertension, closely linked to angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE), is a globally concerned condition. In this study, three novel ACE-inhibitory peptides (KFPLW, FRWPQ, and FPWLQ) were identified from apricot kernel protein hydrolysates, with IC₅₀ values of 5.88 μg/mL, 0.25 mg/mL, 0.29 mg/mL, respectively. The synergism between these peptides and four polyphenols (chlorogenic acid, tannic acid, quercetin, apigenin) were evaluated by combination index (CI). Only FPWLQ showed significant synergism with all four polyphenols (CI < 1). Lineweaver-Burk analysis confirmed the FPWLQ-chlorogenic acid complex exerted mixed-type inhibition on ACE, with Kₘ increasing and Vₘₐₓ decreasing. Molecular docking and dynamics simulations revealed FPWLQ occupied ACE’s active center to hinder substrate binding, while chlorogenic acid at inactive sites altered conformation. Isothermal titration calorimetry results showed the FPWLQ-chlorogenic acid-ACE binding was a spontaneous exothermic process (ΔG < 0, ΔH < 0) driven by entropy (ΔS > 0). These findings guide the development of blood pressure-lowering nutritional formulas.

Cognitive impairment (CI) poses a significant public health challenge, where oxidative stress plays a crucial role in its initiation and advancement. Previous research has emphasized that walnut oil (WO) and nervonic acid (NA) are potential therapeutic foods for CI. This study aimed to investigate the synergistic effects of WO and NA on antioxidant activity and CI improvement. Compared to WO (1.63 g/kg) and NA (1.59 mg/kg) individually, the co-administration of WO and NA (WONA) exhibited superior 2,2-Diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) radical scavenging activity, significantly enhanced cell viability, decreased malondialdehyde (MDA) content, and increased superoxide dismutase (SOD) and glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px) activities in H2O2-induced PC12 cells. Furthermore, WONA (1.63 g/kg) outperformed WO and NA in alleviating brain injury in CI mice. CI mice are those in which a cognitive impairment model is established by subcutaneously injecting D-galactose (900 mg/kg) daily for eight weeks, which induces neuronal damage, enhances oxidative stress, disrupts neurotransmitters balance, and elevates inflammatory factors. The results demonstrated that WONA CI and can be utilized as an innovative functional food ingredient or dietary supplement to effectively improve cognitive impairment.

The functional exploration of natural foods, coupled with the increasing prevalence of gastrointestinal motility disorders and the associated therapeutic challenges, has generated significant interest in this field. This study aims to investigate the ameliorative effects of the extract from Pugionium cornutum (L.) Gaertn (EAEPC), a traditional edible vegetable in northwest China’s desert region, on atropine-induced gastroparesis in mice, as well as to elucidate its mechanism in terms of the gut microbiota and major metabolites. The findings indicate that EAEPC effectively reduces the rate of pigment residual in the stomach while shortening the gastrointestinal transit time and alleviating other symptoms associated with atropine-induced gastroparesis. These effects may be mediated through modulation of the expression levels of major intestinal metabolites, such as short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs), bile acids (BAs), and L-tryptophan, alongside remodeling of both the diversity and relative abundance of the gut microbiota. Furthermore, correlation analyses were conducted on significantly altered strains and metabolites to clarify their interactions. Moreover, the chemical constituents of EAEPC were identified by UPLC-Q-TOF-MS/MS, and the key active components responsible for improving gastroparesis were predicted through network pharmacology approaches and validated experimentally. These results provide a foundation for further research into the functions of Pugionium and offer scientific support for developing natural plant-based strategies aimed at treating gastrointestinal motility disorders.

This work investigated the antioxidant peptide EPEVLR, focusing on its atomic-level active sites via integrated experimental and computational approaches. In vitro, EPEVLR exhibited dose-dependent ABTS and DPPH scavenging and protected PC12 cells from H2O2-induced oxidative damage by activating Keap1/Nrf2 pathway. Molecular docking identified L and R residues as key binding sites for ABTS and Keap1, primarily through hydrogen bonds and hydrophobic interactions. DFT calculations pinpointed key active sites at the O42 and N43 atoms of R residue, and the N51 atom within the L-R motif. Charge distribution analysis further highlighted the N51-H106 and N51-H105 as high-reactivity sites. Egap values and ABTS radical scavenging assay of modified peptides confirmed that the R-L motif positioned at the N-terminus confers superior antioxidant efficacy. This study provides a framework for antioxidant peptide screening and design by mapping atomic-level active sites.

This study explored the synergistic effects of walnut-derived peptide (Glu-Pro-Glu-Val-Leu-Arg, EPEVLR) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) on ameliorating D-galactose (D-gal) induced cognitive dysfunction in mice. EPEVLR and DHA were integrated using ultrasonic mixing at a 2:1 molar ratio, resulting in a stable water-in-oil (W/O) emulsion labeled DHA@EP. DHA@EP was more effective than DHA or EPEVLR alone in alleviating D-gal-induced mice cognitive deficits. The underlying mechanisms included reducing oxidative stress, mitigating neuroinflammation, and stabilizing the cholinergic system. Structural characterization and theoretical calculations confirmed that EPEVLR and DHA formed a stable emulsion with droplet diameters below 10 μm, driven by hydrogen bonding between the nitrogen (N) and oxygen (O) atoms of EPEVLR and the hydrogen (H) atoms of DHA. In vitro digestion simulation experiments indicated that the W/O emulsion structure of DHA@EP significantly enhanced the intestinal stability of EPEVLR, likely due to the protective effect of the oil phase against enzymatic degradation in the gastrointestinal tract. These findings highlight the potential of DHA@EP as a functional food ingredient for cognitive improvement and provide insights into the synergistic use of bioactive peptides and fatty acids.

The purpose of this article is to investigate the effects of walnut (Juglans regia L.) kernel pellicle on the composition and properties of enzymatic hydrolysis products of walnut meal using peptidomics and bioinformatics. In this study, a total of 3423 peptide sequences were identified in peeled walnut protein hydrolysates (PWPH) and unpeeled walnut protein hydrolysates (UWPH). Due to the presence of the walnut kernel pellicle, the enzyme cleavage sites of alkaline proteases on walnut precursor proteins were altered, resulting in differences in the number and length of the peptides obtained. Principal component analysis indicates significant differences between PWPH and UWPH. Combined with bioinformatics analysis, it was shown that walnut kernel peeling improved the release of peptides, formed more bioactive peptides, reduced allergenicity, and improved water solubility. Seven peptides with acetylcholinesterase (AChE) inhibitory activity were identified, and the peptide Val-Gly-Ala-Pro-Phe-Asp-Gly-Ala (VGAPFDGA) has the strongest inhibitory activity with an IC50 of 0.38 ± 0.01 mg/mL. These results confirmed that walnut kernel peeling could greatly change the composition of the walnut protein hydrolysates, and seven novel peptides were reported that showed significant AChE inhibitory activity.

Modulation of pore structure and heteroatom doping are very important strategies to improve the electrochemical properties of carbon electrode materials. This report investigates the use of biomass-derived nitrogen-doped porous carbon materials to address the challenge of the specific capacitance and energy density in supercapacitors. Nitrogen-doped three-dimensional hierarchical porous carbon materials were prepared using a polyacrylonitrile/sodium lignosulfonate composite monolith as a precursor by thermally induced phase separation and subsequent carbonization/activation. This method precisely controls the structure and surface properties of porous carbon materials by regulating the structure of the precursor and situ doping of nitrogen, which is a valuable strategy for the controllable regulation of the pore structure for nitrogen-doped porous carbon materials. The resulting carbon material displayed excellent capacitance performance, exhibiting a high specific capacitance of 325.7F g -1 at a current density of 0.5 A/g, maintaining initial capacitance retention of 90.1 % at a current density of 5 A/g after 10,000 cycles. When investigated for practical applications, the assembled supercapacitor device had a higher energy density (9.88 W h kg- 1), which is higher than commercial carbon-based supercapacitors.

Background: The fabrication technique of capillary column is the key to the development and application of capillary liquid chromatography (cLC) to improve separation efficiency for analytes. The capillary monolithic column possessed three -dimensionally connected porous or channel structures. Unique porous structure endows excellent permeability and high performance in diverse fields, especially in separation. Thereinto, organic monolithic columns have attracted widespread attention due to their advantages of simple preparation and excellent biocompatibility. However, their separation selectivity needs to be further developed and regulated to apply the separation of more diverse samples. Results: A novel polymeric monolithic column was prepared via thermally initiated in situ copolymerization of 2methyladamantan-2-yl acrylate (MADA) with ditrimethylolpropane tetraacrylate (DTTA) in fused silica. The prepared poly(MADA- co -DTTA) monolith showed adjustable permeability, developed porous structure and high thermal stability. Consequently, it exhibited excellent separation capability of small molecules (alkylbenzenes and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons). Especially, when acetonitrile/water (60/40, v/v) was used as the mobile phase, the theoretical plate numbers reached 84,000 plates m -1 for butylbenzene at a linear velocity of 0.5 mm s -1 . Most importantly, the hydrophobicity of the poly(MADA- co -DTTA) monolithic column was regulated via host -guest interaction between adamantyl group and cucurbit [7]uril (CB[7]). Additionally, the poly(MADA- co - DTTA) monolith was further adopted for the analysis of the tryptic digest of proteins from HeLa by cLC-MS/MS. The 33,783 unique peptides and 5,299 proteins were identified on the monolith, which exhibited great separation ability for complex samples. Significance and novelty: Due to abundant pore structure and good chemical properties, the poly(MADA- co -DTTA) monolithic column exhibited high performance for the separations of small molecules and biological sample. Meanwhile, owing to the existence of adamantyl-group, CB[7] was immobilized on the poly(MADA- co -DTTA) monolithic column to fabricate poly(MADA- co -DTTA)-CB[7] by host -guest interaction. It is possible to adjust the surface chemistry of the monolithic materials to accommodate more complex analytes.

To develop Amygdalus pedunculata Pall seed protein for high-value,the water soluble protein was extracted from Amygdalus pedunculata Pall seed after defatting,then hydrolyzed by protease to prepare Amygdalus pedunculata Pall peptides.The effects of five proteases on the hydrolysis degree of the water soluble protein of Amygdalus pedunculata Pall seed and antioxidant activity of hydrolysate were studied,and the suitable hydrolytic enzyme was selected.Then the preparation process of Amygdalus pedunculata peptides was optimized by single factor experiment and response surface methodology.The results showed that the alcalase was more suitable for hydrolysis of Amygdalus pedunculata Pall protein with higher hydrolysis degree(16.03％)and DPPH free radical scavenging activity(59.49％).The optimal hydrolysis conditions of Amygdalus pedunculata Pall protein were obtained as follows:enzymatic hydrolysis temperature 57 ℃,enzymatic hydrolysis time 4 h,dosage of alcalase 1 192 U/g,pH 8.4.Under the optimal conditions,the hydrolysis degree of Amygdalus pedunculata Pall protein was 18.12％.It is feasible to prepare polypeptides by enzymatic hydrolysis of Amygdalus pedunculata Pall seed protein.It can improve the added value of Amygdalus pedanculata Pall seed,and can provide high-quality raw materials for functional peptide products.

Roasting walnut kernel significantly improves the oxidative stability and sensory properties of its oil. However, the effect of roasting temperatures on the molecular change of main components and micronutrients in walnut oil is still unclear. Herein, lipidomics and metabolomics were integrated to comprehensively profile the walnut oil obtained at different roasting temperatures (30 °C, 120 °C, 140 °C, 160 °C, and 180 °C). Lipidomics showed that the content of glycerolipids, sphingolipids, and glycerophospholipids decreased with roasting temperatures, while the oxidized fatty acids and triglycerides increased. Ratios of linoleic acid and linolenic acid varied with roasting temperatures and were most close to 4-6:1 at 140 °C, 160 °C, and 180 °C. Major classes of micronutrients showed a tendency to increase at the roasting temperature of 120 °C and 140 °C, then decrease at 160 °C and 180 °C. Liposoluble amino acids identified for the first time in walnut oil varied with roasting temperatures. Correlation analysis demonstrated that the higher contents of liposoluble amino acids and phenolics are positively associated with enhanced oxidative stability of walnut oil obtained at 140 °C. Furthermore, glutamine and 5-oxo-D-proline were expected to be potential biomarkers to differentiate the fresh and roasted walnut oil. The study is expected to provide new insight into the change mechanism of both major lipids and micronutrients in walnut oil during the roasting process.

In this report, a hierarchical porous activated carbon material with interconnected micro-meso-macro pores was prepared and studied with biomass waste as the starting point and transformation into high-value materials as the destination. Based on biomass hazelnut shell, a porous carbon material with a large specific surface area (3374 m(2) g(-1)), rich pore structure, and suitable nitrogen content is constructed with polypyrrole as nitrogen source and KOH as the activator. Because of its unique pore structure, large specific surface area, and suitable nitrogen content, the prepared material as supercapacitor electrodes showed excellent capacitive performance (334 F g(-1) at 0.5 A g(-1)), good rate capacity, and cycle stability. The experimental results show that the introduced nitrogen-containing functional groups endow the material with large pseudo-capacitance, which is conducive to increasing the specific capacitance. In addition, the symmetrical supercapacitor devices assembled on the basis of the material also showed excellent performance with an energy density of 11.4 W h kg(-1) at a power density of 300.4 W kg(-1). This synthetic strategy shows that the preparation of high-value electrode materials from biomass waste is promising.

In this work, hierarchically ZIF-8@Cellulose acetate composite monolithic carbon (ZCMC) was fabricated for the first time by combining a template -free thermally induced phase separation (TIPS) method with in -situ ZIF-8 crystals doping followed by KOH activation. By altering ZIF-8 content and activation temperature, a series of ZCMC samples were prepared in order to analyze the effect of pore structure and surface chemical characteristics on CO 2 adsorption. The optimal sample of 20-ZCMC-800 exhibited the largest CO 2 uptake of 7.30 (0 degrees C) and 4.26 mmol/g (25 degrees C) at 1 bar, which was competitive with the majority of the reported porous carbons. Additionally, the CO 2 adsorption capacity after 10 cycles still remained at 96 % of its initial value and the ideal adsorption solution theory (IAST) CO 2 /N 2 selectivity was 21.31 at 25 degrees C, indicating excellent recyclability and good selectivity. Furthermore, it was found that the CO 2 adsorption capacity was considered to be linear relationship with micropore but independent on BET specific surface area. The contributions of N -containing functional groups and ZnO crystals created from ZIF-8 pyrolysis at high temperature for CO 2 adsorption were thoroughly discussed under density functional theory (DFT) and grand canonical Monte Carlo (GCMC). The results showed that pyrrole-N group contributed significantly to CO 2 adsorption by hydrogen bonding and Lewis acid -base interactions, while the ZnO crystals displayed the strong interaction with CO 2 by the chemisorption process. The CO 2 adsorption performance of ZCMC was mostly determined by the joint effect of micropore structure and surface chemical compositions. The thermodynamic parameters of Q st ranged from 23.03 to 33.23 kJ/mol, revealing the CO 2 adsorption still belonged to the scope of physisorption process. More importantly, the novel and feasible strategy presented herein is expected to provide an innovative approach for the design and discovery of ZIFs-based composite carbon materials for efficiently CO 2 adsorption.

BackgroundAs a potential natural active substance, natural biologically active peptides (NBAPs) are recently attracting increasing attention. The traditional proteolysis methods of obtaining effective NBAPs are considerably vexing, especially since multiple proteases can be used, which blocks the exploration of available NBAPs. Although the development of virtual digesting brings some degree of convenience, the activity of the obtained peptides remains unclear, which would still not allow efficient access to the NBAPs. It is necessary to develop an efficient and accurate strategy for acquiring NBAPs.ResultsA new in silico scheme named SSA-LSTM-VD, which combines a sparrow search algorithm-long short-term memory (SSA-LSTM) deep learning and virtually digested, was presented to optimize the proteolysis acquisition of NBAPs. Therein, SSA-LSTM reached the highest Efficiency value reached 98.00 % compared to traditional machine learning algorithms, and basic LSTM algorithm. SSA-LSTM was trained to predict the activity of peptides in the proteins virtually digested results, obtain the percentage of target active peptide, and select the appropriate protease for the actual experiment. As an application, SSA-LSTM was employed to predict the percentage of neuroprotective peptides in the virtual digested result of walnut protein, and trypsin was ultimately found to possess the highest value (85.29 %). The walnut protein was digested by trypsin (WPTrH) and the peptide sequence obtained was analyzed closely matches the theoretical neuroprotective peptide. More importantly, the neuroprotective effects of WPTrH had been demonstrated in nerve damage mouse models.SignificanceThe proposed SSA-LSTM-VD in this paper makes the acquisition of NBAPs efficient and accurate. The approach combines deep learning and virtually digested skillfully. Utilizing the SSA-LSTM-VD based strategy holds promise for discovering and developing peptides with neuroprotective properties or other desired biological activities.

Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) of walnut oil (WO) samples obtained from 5 ripening stages were analyzed by headspace-gas chromatography-ion mobility spectrometry (HS-GC-IMS) and HS-solid phase microextraction-GC-mass spectrometry (HS-SPME-GC-MS). A total of 75 VOCs were identified in WO, of which 24 VOCs were found to be the key aroma-active compounds for WO by using odor activity values (OAVs) analysis. Based on chemometrics methods, flavor of WO samples can be characterized into three categories, i.e., early, mid-, and late stages. WO from early ripening stage had stronger green and sweet odor due to 1,8-cineole (OAV 280) and ethanol (OAV 134.5). While nonanal (OAV 181.82), (E)-2-octenol (OAV 160), and hexanal (OAV 103.78) were sources of intense fatty and oily odor in mid-ripening stage. For WO of later ripening stage, the flavor was affected by nonanal (OAV 192.28), 1-heptanol (OAV 150), heptanal (OAV 71.11) and some organic acids.

Background: Camellia (Camellia oleifera Abel.) oil is a multifunctional woody oil known as the "Oriental olive oil". It is rich in oleic acid, sasanquasaponin and polyphenols and many other biological active substances with health-promoting properties, and has broad application prospects in the field of food, cosmetics and pharma-ceuticals. As the increase of population health needs, the development and utilization of the nutritional and health care value of camellia oil has gradually become a hot spot for current research. Scope and approach: This review comprehensively summarized the recent research progress on camellia oil, including the innovative extraction methods, novel analysis advances of bioactive components, and the recent pharmacological activities. Additionally, we also summarized the current research bottlenecks and possible so-lutions for developing and exploiting the health value of camellia oil.Key findings and conclusions: Various studies have reported that the content and composition of bioactive com-pounds in camellia oil are mainly influenced by extraction method and cultivation region, respectively. As an excellent resource of food and medicine, camellia oil has shown promising biological activities in both in vitro and animal studies. However, there are few clinical studies on the pharmacological activities of camellia oil. In the future, based on the large number of clinical studies, the mechanism of camellia oil for its health benefits can be further investigated in conjunction with lipidomics, proteomics, metabolomics and nutrigenomics research.

The regulation and modification of carbon aerogel are essential for the construction of supercapacitors electrode with high energy density. Heteroatom doping has also been used in the modification of carbon aerogels to further improve the properties of materials. In this work, nitrogen and sulfur co-doped porous biomass carbon aerogels (NSPCs) for high-performance supercapacitors were innovatively synthesized by a straightforward and highly efficient one-step gel and synchronous activation strategy. Such a covalently interconnected hierarchical porous structure with co-doped nitrogen and sulfur greatly improves the pore structure and wettability of the materials and forms functional groups to provide additional pseudocapacitance. Owing to these structural advantages and the component synergy, the NSPCs exhibit high electrolyte ion storage ability, unhindered ion channels, and excellent electrochemical performance, and display a specific capacitance of 344.3 F g-1, and a capacitance retention rate of 91.5 % after 10,000 cycles. Additionally, the NSPCs-based symmetric supercapacitor showed a high energy density of 12.82 Wh kg-1.

Quantification of liposoluble micronutrients in large-scale vegetable oil samples is urgently needed, because their health benefits are increasingly emphasized. However, current analytical methods are limited to either labor-intensive preparation processes or time-consuming chromatography separation. In this work, an online oil matrix separation strategy for direct, rapid, and simultaneous determination of squalene, tocopherols, and phytosterols in walnut oil (WO) was developed on the basis of the lipid class separation mode of supercritical fluid chromatography. A single run was completed in 13 min containing 6 min of column cleaning and balancing. Satisfactory limit of detections (0.05-0.20 ng/mL), limit of quantifications (0.15-0.45 ng/mL), recoveries (70.61-101.44%), and matrix effects (78.43-91.62%) were achieved, indicating the reliability of this method. In addition, eight sterol esters were identified in WO, which have not previously been reported. The proposed method was applied to characterize the liposoluble micronutrient profile of WO samples obtained from different walnut cultivars, geographical origins, and processes.

High-performance reusable materials from renewable resources are rare and urgently required in bioseparation. Herein, a series of tannic acid-chitosan composite membranes for the enrichment of phosphopeptides were fabricated by the freeze casting method. First, a tannic acid-chitosan composite membrane was acquired via the multiple hydrogen bonds between tannic acid and chitosan, which had a long-range aligned three-dimensional microstructure. Second, a covalent-hydrogen bond hybrid composite was also fabricated, with stable and aligned honeycomb-like microstructures that formed by the synergy of covalence and hydrogen bonding. Besides, a ternary composite membrane was "one-pot" synthesized by the copolymerization of tannic acid, chitosan, and Ti4+ ions, indicating the feasibility of involving metal ions in the composition of the polymer skeleton in place of additional modification steps. The as-prepared chitosan composite membranes exhibited excellent performance in the enrichment of phosphopeptides from beta-casein tryptic digest and human serum. Benefitting from the long-range aligned honeycomb-like structure coordinated by hydrogen bonds and covalent bonds, and a large number of pyrogallol functional groups provided by tannic acid, the covalent-hydrogen bond hybrid membrane showed excellent reusability and could be reused up to 16 times in phosphopeptide enrichment, as far as we know, which is the best reported result to date.

Biomass is an ideal source for the preparation of electrode materials due to its abundant distribution, renewability, and low price. Carbon materials constructed by nitrogen doping can greatly improve the performance of electrode materials, provide additional pseudocapacitance, and expand the application of supercapacitors in practice. Nitrogen-doped walnut shell (WS) carbon materials were prepared by chemical cross-linking and KOH activation using WS and gamma-polyglutamic acid as raw materials. The effects of the ratio for carbon and nitrogen source compounds and activation temperature on the morphology, pore structure, graphitization of the carbon materials, and their electrochemical properties were systematically investigated. Nitrogen-doped WS carbon materials possessed a unique 2D lamellar structure and a high specific surface area (1932 m(2) g(-1)). The addition of heteroatoms increased the polarizability and conductivity of the carbon material and introduced additional pseudocapacitance as a result of the good electrochemical performance. At a current density of 0.5 A g(-1), the specific capacitance of materials can reach 342.0 F g(-1) with a capacitance retention rate of 73% (20 A g(-1)). After 8000 cycles, the capacitance loss is only 8%, providing excellent electrochemical performance.