Activity

An inhibitory effect on α-amylase and α-glucosidase is postulated for polyphenols. Thus, ingestion of those secondary plant metabolites might reduce postprandial blood glucose level (hyperglycemia), which is a major risk factor for diabetes mellitus type II. In addition to a previous study investigating structure-effect relationships of different phenolic structures, the effect of anthocyanins is studied in detail here, by applying an α-amylase activity assay, on the basis of the conversion of 2-chloro-4-nitrophenyl-4-O-ß-galactopyranosyl maltoside (GalG2CNP) and detection of CNP release by UV/Vis spectroscopy and isothermal titration calorimetry (ITC). All anthocyanin-3-glucosides showed a mixed inhibition with a strong competitive proportion, Kic less then 134 µM and Kiu less then 270 µM; however, the impact of the B-ring substitution was not statistically significant. UV/Vis detection failed to examine the inhibitory effect of acylated cyanidins isolated from black carrot (Daucus carota ssp. Sativus var. Autrorubens Alef.). However, ITC measurements reveal a much stronger inhibitory effect compared to the cyanidin-3-glucoside. Our results support the hypothesis that anthocyanins are efficient α-amylase inhibitors and an additional acylation with a cinnamic acid boosts the observed effect. Therefore, an increased consumption of vegetables containing acylated anthocyanin derivatives might help to prevent hyperglycemia.Phospholipids belong to a significant class of lipids and comprise ~10% of total lipids in rice grains. Lysophospholipid (LPL) is derived from the hydrolysis of phospholipids and plays an important role in rice grain quality. Our previous study demonstrated that mutations in a phospholipase D gene (OsPLDα1) significantly altered lipid metabolites and reduced phytic acid content. In the present study, the effect of two ospldα1 mutations on LPL and other physicochemical prosperities of brown rice was further investigated, with the aim of assessing the overall importance of ospldα1 mutations in rice grain quality. Metabolite profiling revealed a ~15% increase in LPL level in both ospldα1 mutants as compared with their wild-type (WT) parent. Both ospldα1 mutations significantly lowered the apparent amylose content in brown rice flour (~1.9%) and altered viscosity profiles with significantly increased breakdown (+12.4%) and significantly reduced setback viscosity (-6.2%). Moreover, both ospldα1 mutations significantly lowered the gelatinization onset, peak temperature and retrogradation percentage of brown rice flour. This study demonstrated that OsPLDα1 plays a crucial role in rice grain quality and its mutation could, in general, improve the cooking and eating quality and nourishment of brown rice.Fusarium species are common pathogens on maize and reduce the product quality through contamination with mycotoxins thus jeopardizing safety of both animal feed and human food products. Monitoring of Fusarium infected maize ears and stalks was conducted in Germany to determine the range of Fusarium species present in the field and to assess the impact of tillage, crop rotation, and weather conditions on the frequency of Fusarium species. From 2016 till 2018, a total of 387 infected ears and 190 stalk segments from 58 locations in Germany were collected. For each sample location, site-specific agronomic data on tillage and previous crops as well as meteorological data on precipitation, air temperature, and relative humidity during the vegetation period were recorded. The most frequent Fusarium species detected in maize ears were Fusarium graminearum, F. verticillioides and F. temperatum, whereas, F. graminearum, F. equiseti, F. culmorum, and F. temperatum were the species prevailing on maize stalks. Differences in the local species composition were found to be primarily associated with weather variations between the years and the microclimate at the different locations. The results indicate that mean temperature and precipitation in July, during flowering, has the strongest impact on the local range of Fusarium spp. on ears, whereas the incidence of Fusarium species on stalks is mostly affected by weather conditions during September. Ploughing significantly reduced the infection with F. graminearum and F. temperatum, while crop rotation exerted only minor effects.Gypsum molds have been developed as an alternative for the Rapid tooling (RT) method used in injection molding. However, the poor capability of the heat delivery forces the gypsum mold to operate under a high-risk condition, and distortion of the molded part becomes apparent. The goal is to investigate the effect of a heat sink on the reduction of the gypsum mold temperature and to establish a methodology for the heat sink design. The methodology used the advantage of the electrical circuit concept to analyze the mold temperature. The heat transfer of a mold was modeled using an equivalent thermal circuit. After all the components on the circuit were determined, the heat transfer rate could then be calculated. Once the heat transfer rate was known, the mold temperature could be easily analyzed. A modified thermal circuit considering transverse heat conduction was also proposed, which estimated the mold temperature more accurately. The mold temperature was reduced by 16.8 °C when a gypsum mold was installed with a 40 mm thick heat sink in a parallel configuration. Moreover, the reduction of the mold temperature improved the deflection of the molded part from 0.78 mm to 0.54 mm. This work provides a quick approach to analyze the mold temperature based on the thermal circuit concept. As the cooling system of the mold was modularized analytically, important properties of the cooling system in the heat transfer process were revealed by analyzing the thermal circuit of the mold, for example, the heat transfer rate or the mold temperature.This paper presents an in-situ wireless sensor network (WSN) for building envelope thermal transmission analysis. The WSN is able to track heat flows in various weather conditions in real-time. The developed system focuses on long-term in-situ building material variation analysis, which cannot be readily achieved using current approaches, especially when the number of measurement hotspots is large. This paper describes the implementation of the proposed system using the heat flow method enabled through an adaptable and low-cost wireless network, validated via a laboratory experiment.The annulus fibrosus-one of the two tissues comprising the intervertebral disc-is susceptible to injury and disease, leading to chronic pain and rupture. A synthetic, biodegradable material could provide a suitable scaffold that alleviates this pain and supports repair through tissue regeneration. selleckchem The transfer of properties, particularly biomechanical, from scaffold to new tissue is essential and should occur at the same rate to prevent graft failure post-implantation. This study outlines the effect of hydrolytic degradation on the material properties of a novel blend of polycaprolactone and poly(lactic acid) electrospun nanofibers (5050) over a six-month period following storage in phosphate buffered saline solution at 37 °C. As expected, the molecular weight distribution for this blend decreased over the 180-day period. This was in line with significant changes to fiber morphology, which appeared swollen and merged following observation using Scanning Electron Microscopy. Similarly, hydrolysis resulted in considerable remodeling of the scaffolds’ polymer chains as demonstrated by sharp increases in percentage crystallinity and tensile properties becoming stiffer, stronger and more brittle over time. These mechanical data remained within the range reported for human annulus fibrosus tissue and their long-term efficacy further supports this novel blend as a potential scaffold to support tissue regeneration.Vascular plant one-zinc-finger (VOZ) transcription factor, a plant specific one-zinc-finger-type transcriptional activator, is involved in regulating numerous biological processes such as floral induction and development, defense against pathogens, and response to multiple types of abiotic stress. Six VOZ transcription factor-encoding genes (GmVOZs) have been reported to exist in the soybean (Glycine max) genome. In spite of this, little information is currently available regarding GmVOZs. In this study, GmVOZs were cloned and characterized. GmVOZ genes encode proteins possessing transcriptional activation activity in yeast cells. GmVOZ1E, GmVOZ2B, and GmVOZ2D gene products were widely dispersed in the cytosol, while GmVOZ1G was primarily located in the nucleus. GmVOZs displayed a differential expression profile under dehydration, salt, and salicylic acid (SA) stress conditions. Among them, GmVOZ1G showed a significantly induced expression in response to all stress treatments. Overexpression of GmVOZ1G in soybean hairy roots resulted in a greater tolerance to drought and salt stress. In contrast, RNA interference (RNAi) soybean hairy roots suppressing GmVOZ1G were more sensitive to both of these stresses. Under drought treatment, soybean composite plants with an overexpression of hairy roots had higher relative water content (RWC). In response to drought and salt stress, lower malondialdehyde (MDA) accumulation and higher peroxidase (POD) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) activities were observed in soybean composite seedlings with an overexpression of hairy roots. The opposite results for each physiological parameter were obtained in RNAi lines. In conclusion, GmVOZ1G positively regulates drought and salt stress tolerance in soybean hairy roots. Our results will be valuable for the functional characterization of soybean VOZ transcription factors under abiotic stress.Accompanied with an increase of revealed biomolecular structures owing to advancements in structural biology, the molecular dynamics (MD) approach, especially coarse-grained (CG) MD suitable for macromolecules, is becoming increasingly important for elucidating their dynamics and behavior. In fact, CG-MD simulation has succeeded in qualitatively reproducing numerous biological processes for various biomolecules such as conformational changes and protein folding with reasonable calculation costs. However, CG-MD simulations strongly depend on various parameters, and selecting an appropriate parameter set is necessary to reproduce a particular biological process. Because exhaustive examination of all candidate parameters is inefficient, it is important to identify successful parameters. Furthermore, the successful region, in which the desired process is reproducible, is essential for describing the detailed mechanics of functional processes and environmental sensitivity and robustness. We propose an efficient search method for identifying the successful region by using two machine learning techniques, Bayesian optimization and active learning. We evaluated its performance using F1-ATPase, a biological rotary motor, with CG-MD simulations. We successfully identified the successful region with lower computational costs (12.3% in the best case) without sacrificing accuracy compared to exhaustive search. This method can accelerate not only parameter search but also biological discussion of the detailed mechanics of functional processes and environmental sensitivity based on MD simulation studies.