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Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) Feb 2023Antarctica is the continent with the lowest local human impact; however, it is susceptible to pollution from external sources. Emerging pollutants such as perfluoroalkyl...
Antarctica is the continent with the lowest local human impact; however, it is susceptible to pollution from external sources. Emerging pollutants such as perfluoroalkyl substances pose an increasing threat to this environment and therefore require more in-depth investigations to understand their environmental fate and biological impacts. The present study focuses on expression analysis at the transcriptional level of genes coding for four antioxidant enzymes (, , , and ) in the liver and kidney of an Antarctic fish species, (, ). mRNA levels were also assessed in fish exposed to 1.5 μg/L of perfluoro-octanoic acid for 10 days. The kidney showed a higher level of expression than the liver in wildlife specimens. In the liver, the treatment induced an increase in gene expression for all the considered enzymes, whereas in the kidney, it induced a general decrease. The obtained results advance the scientific community's understanding of how the potential future presence of anthropogenic contaminants in the Southern Ocean can affect the antioxidant system of Antarctic fishes. The presence of pollutants belonging to the perfluoroalkyl substances in the Southern Ocean needs to be continuously monitored in parallel with this type of research.
PubMed: 36829911
DOI: 10.3390/antiox12020352 -
Nature Communications Feb 2023Antibiotics are a key control mechanism for synthetic biology and microbiology. Resistance genes are used to select desired cells and regulate bacterial populations,...
Antibiotics are a key control mechanism for synthetic biology and microbiology. Resistance genes are used to select desired cells and regulate bacterial populations, however their use to-date has been largely static. Precise spatiotemporal control of antibiotic resistance could enable a wide variety of applications that require dynamic control of susceptibility and survival. Here, we use light-inducible Cre recombinase to activate expression of drug resistance genes in Escherichia coli. We demonstrate light-activated resistance to four antibiotics: carbenicillin, kanamycin, chloramphenicol, and tetracycline. Cells exposed to blue light survive in the presence of lethal antibiotic concentrations, while those kept in the dark do not. To optimize resistance induction, we vary promoter, ribosome binding site, and enzyme variant strength using chromosome and plasmid-based constructs. We then link inducible resistance to expression of a heterologous fatty acid enzyme to increase production of octanoic acid. These optogenetic resistance tools pave the way for spatiotemporal control of cell survival.
Topics: Optogenetics; Anti-Bacterial Agents; Drug Resistance, Microbial; Tetracycline; Carbenicillin; Escherichia coli
PubMed: 36823420
DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-36670-2 -
Foods (Basel, Switzerland) Feb 2023The solid-state fermentation of Baijiu is complicated by the co-fermentation of many microorganisms. The instability of the composition and abundance of the...
The solid-state fermentation of Baijiu is complicated by the co-fermentation of many microorganisms. The instability of the composition and abundance of the microorganisms in the fermentation process leads to fluctuations of product quality, which is one of the bottleneck problems faced by the Strong-flavor Baijiu industry. In this study, we established a combination of functional microorganisms for the stable fermentation of the main flavor compounds of Baijiu, including medium and long-chain fatty acid ethyl esters such as hexanoic acid, ethyl ester; butanoic acid, ethyl ester; octanoic acid, ethyl ester; acetic acid, ethyl ester; 9,12-octadecadienoic acid, ethyl ester; and decanoic acid, ethyl ester in the fermented grains. Our study investigated the effects of microbial combinations on the fermentation from three aspects: microbial composition, microbial interactions, and microbial association with flavor compounds. The results showed that the added functional microorganisms (, , , , and ) became the dominant species in the fermentation system and formed positive interactions with other microorganisms, while the negative interactions between microorganisms were significantly reduced in the fermentation systems that contained both Daqu and functional microorganisms. The redundancy analysis showed that the functional microorganisms (, , , , , , and ) showed strong positive correlations with the main flavor compounds (hexanoic acid, ethyl ester; lactic acid, ethyl ester; butanoic acid, ethyl ester; acetic acid, ethyl ester; and octanoic acid, ethyl ester). These results indicated that it was feasible to produce Baijiu with a functional microbial combination, and that this could promote stable Baijiu production.
PubMed: 36766173
DOI: 10.3390/foods12030644 -
ACS Omega Jan 2023Colloidal nanocrystals (NCs) play an important role in the field of optoelectronic devices such as photovoltaic cells, photodetectors, and light-emitting diodes (LEDs)....
Colloidal nanocrystals (NCs) play an important role in the field of optoelectronic devices such as photovoltaic cells, photodetectors, and light-emitting diodes (LEDs). The properties of NC films are strongly affected by ligands attached to them, which constitute a barrier for charge transport between adjacent NCs. Therefore, the method of surface modification by ligand exchange has been used to improve the electrical conductivity of NC films. However, surface modification to NCs in LEDs can also affect emission characteristics. Among NCs, nanorods have unique properties, such as suppression of nonradiative Auger recombination and linearly polarized light emission. In this work, CdSe/CdS nanorods (NRs) were prepared by the hot injection method. To increase the charge transport into CdSe/CdS NRs, we adopted ligand modification to CdSe/CdS NRs. Using this technique, we could shorten the injection barrier length between CdSe/CdS NRs and adjacent layers. It leads to a more balanced charge injection of electron/hole and a greatly increased current efficiency of CdSe/CdS NR-LEDs. In the NR-LEDs, the ligand exchange boosted the electroluminance, reaching a sixfold increase from 848 cd/m of native surfactants to 5600 cd/m of the exchanged -octanoic acid ligands at 12 V. The improvement of CdSe/CdS NR-LED performance is closely correlated to the efficient control of charge balance via ligand modification strategy, which is expected to be indispensable to the future NR-LED-based optoelectronic system.
PubMed: 36743009
DOI: 10.1021/acsomega.2c05730 -
Nature Communications Feb 2023Mitochondrial fatty acid synthesis (mtFAS) is essential for respiratory function. MtFAS generates the octanoic acid precursor for lipoic acid synthesis, but the role of...
Mitochondrial fatty acid synthesis (mtFAS) is essential for respiratory function. MtFAS generates the octanoic acid precursor for lipoic acid synthesis, but the role of longer fatty acid products has remained unclear. The structurally well-characterized component of mtFAS, human 2E-enoyl-ACP reductase (MECR) rescues respiratory growth and lipoylation defects of a Saccharomyces cerevisiae Δetr1 strain lacking native mtFAS enoyl reductase. To address the role of longer products of mtFAS, we employed in silico molecular simulations to design a MECR variant with a shortened substrate binding cavity. Our in vitro and in vivo analyses indicate that the MECR G165Q variant allows synthesis of octanoyl groups but not long chain fatty acids, confirming the validity of our computational approach to engineer substrate length specificity. Furthermore, our data imply that restoring lipoylation in mtFAS deficient yeast strains is not sufficient to support respiration and that long chain acyl-ACPs generated by mtFAS are required for mitochondrial function.
Topics: Humans; Fatty Acids; Mitochondria; Oxidoreductases; Respiration; Saccharomyces cerevisiae; Enoyl-(Acyl-Carrier-Protein) Reductase (NADH)
PubMed: 36739436
DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-36358-7 -
Environmental Health Perspectives Feb 2023Perfluoroalkyl acids (PFAA) have been measured in ovarian follicular fluid from women using fertilization (IVF), although associations between follicular fluid PFAA and...
BACKGROUND
Perfluoroalkyl acids (PFAA) have been measured in ovarian follicular fluid from women using fertilization (IVF), although associations between follicular fluid PFAA and IVF outcomes have been inconsistent.
OBJECTIVES
We investigated the association between follicular fluid PFAA and embryo quality in women undergoing IVF.
METHODS
We prospectively enrolled 729 women undergoing IVF treatment in Guangxi province, China, from July 2018 to December 2018. We measured 32 PFAA, including branched isomers, in follicular fluid using ultra-performance liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry. We applied restricted cubic splines, linear regression, and log-binominal regression models to investigate associations between follicular fluid PFAA and embryo quality, adjusting for confounding variables and investigated oocyte maturity as an intervening variable using causal mediation analysis. We further estimated the overall effect of the PFAA mixture on outcomes using Bayesian kernel machine regression (BKMR).
RESULTS
We detected 8 of 32 measured PFAA in of follicular fluid samples. Higher PFAA concentrations were associated with fewer high-quality embryos from IVF. The high-quality embryo rates at the 50th percentile of linear perfluoro-1-octanesulfonate acid (n-PFOS), all branched PFOS isomers (Br-PFOS) and linear perfluoro--octanoic acid (n-PFOA) were [95% confidence interval (CI): , ], (95% CI: , ) and (95% CI: , ) lower, respectively, than the high quality embryo rates at the reference 10th percentile of PFAA. Oocyte maturity mediated 11.76% (95% CI: 3.18, 31.80%) and 14.28% (95% CI: 2.95, 31.27%) of the n-PFOS and n-PFOA associations, respectively. The results of the BKMR models showed a negative association between the PFAA mixture and the probability of high-quality embryos, with branched PFOS isomers having posterior inclusion probabilities of 1 and accounting for the majority of the association.
DISCUSSION
Exposure to higher PFAA concentrations in follicular fluid was associated with poorer embryo quality during IVF. Branched PFOS isomers may have a stronger effect than linear PFOS isomers. More studies are needed to confirm these findings and to directly estimate the effects on pregnancy and live-birth outcomes. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP10857.
Topics: Pregnancy; Female; Humans; Follicular Fluid; Alkanesulfonic Acids; Prospective Studies; Fluorocarbons; Bayes Theorem; China; Fertilization in Vitro
PubMed: 36723383
DOI: 10.1289/EHP10857 -
Journal of Agricultural and Food... Feb 2023The measurement of aromatic maturity during grape ripening provides very important information for determining the harvest date, particularly in white cultivars....
The measurement of aromatic maturity during grape ripening provides very important information for determining the harvest date, particularly in white cultivars. However, there are currently no tools that allow this measurement to be carried out in a noninvasive and rapid way. For this reason, in the present work, we have studied the use of hyperspectral imaging (HSI)) to estimate the aromatic composition of L. Tempranillo Blanco berries during ripening. A total of 236 spectra in the VIS+short wave near-infrared (VIS+SW-NIR) range (400-1000 nm) of intact berries were acquired contactless under laboratory conditions. As gold standard values, a total of 20 volatile compounds were quantified by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS), and the concentration of total soluble solids (TSS) was measured by refractometry. Calibration, cross-validation, and prediction models were built using partial least squares (PLS). Values of ≥ 0.70 were obtained for α-terpineol, cymene, β-damascenone, β-ionone, benzaldehyde, benzyl alcohol, hexanal, citral, linalool, 2-phenylethanol, octanoic acid, nonanoic acid, 2-hexenal, 2-hexen-1-ol, (Z)-3-hexen-1-ol, total C norisoprenoids, total C6 compounds, total positive compounds (i.e., the sum of all families except C6 compounds), total benzenoids, and total soluble solids (TSS). Therefore, it can be affirmed that HSI in the VIS + SW-NIR range could be a good tool to estimate the aromatic composition of Tempranillo Blanco grape berries in a contactless, fast, and nondestructive way.
Topics: Humans; Vitis; Odorants; Fruit; Hyperspectral Imaging; Benzyl Alcohol; Volatile Organic Compounds; Wine
PubMed: 36700632
DOI: 10.1021/acs.jafc.2c07425 -
Avicenna Journal of Phytomedicine 2023Medicinal plants with fewer side effects and low cost than synthetic medicines are increasingly advised to treat diseases. The present study aimed to identify compounds...
OBJECTIVE
Medicinal plants with fewer side effects and low cost than synthetic medicines are increasingly advised to treat diseases. The present study aimed to identify compounds and evaluate the plant's effects on hyperglycemic and hyperlipidemia indices, and liver, and kidney function.
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Following identification of using GC/MS method, 72 participants were randomly divided into two groups (n=36 per group), receiving oral hypoglycemic medication (metformin) with or without 50 ml hydrosol twice a day for three months as intervention and placebo control, respectively. Body mass index (BMI), systolic and diastolic blood pressure, fasting blood sugar (FBS), glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c), total cholesterol, triglyceride, HDL-C, and LDL-C levels were measured at the beginning and end of the experiment. Also, aspartate transaminase, alanine transaminase, blood urea nitrogen, and creatinine levels were measured to assess adverse effects on liver and kidney functions.
RESULTS
The main components were terpenes with 46.69% of the total ingredients of essential oil. Other prominent compounds identified included octanoic acid (12.14 %) and isoxazole (6.72 %). Intergroup changes in blood parameters showed that hydrosol for three months could significantly reduce HbA1C and blood cholesterol levels but did not affect other measured parameters. Also, there were no adverse effects on kidney or liver function.
CONCLUSION
The present findings showed that the consumption of 50 ml of hydrosol as a complementary treatment in diabetic patients reduced HbA1C and cholesterol levels without adverse effects on the liver or kidneys functions.
PubMed: 36698734
DOI: 10.22038/AJP.2022.21175 -
Current Research in Food Science 2023Roasting plays important roles in shaping the volatile profile of oolong tea. In this study, the sensory attributes and volatile compositions of 153 roasted or unroasted...
Roasting plays important roles in shaping the volatile profile of oolong tea. In this study, the sensory attributes and volatile compositions of 153 roasted or unroasted oolong tea samples, belonging to four typical types, namely, High Mountain oolong tea (HMT), Tieguanyin tea (TGYT), Dongding oolong tea (DDT) and Wuyi rock tea (WRT), were studied in detail. Based on the sensory evaluation by tea evaluation experts, their respective sensory profiles were established and compared. Unroasted teas had more pronounced fresh and green flavors, while roasted teas had higher scores in pungent and caramel flavors. In particular, WRT demonstrated a unique fragrance of floral fruity flavors. By using HS-SPME-GC-MS analysis, a total of 128 compounds were identified across all samples. Notably, it was found that roasting largely increased the variety of volatile compounds in oolong tea. Furthermore, the characteristic volatile compounds of each type of tea were identified by PLS-DA modeling. Linalool and geraniol were the characteristic volatiles of HMT. Four volatiles, including -nerolidol, jasmin lactone, benzeneacetaldehyde, and 4-methyl benzaldehyde oxime were identified as the characteristic volatiles of TGYT. Seven volatiles, including N-ethyl pyrrole, 3-(hydroxy methyl) pyridine, 4-pyridylcarbinol, 1-methyl pyrrole-2-carboxaldehyde, 2-ethyl-3,5-dimethyl pyrazine, 4-amino-2,3-xylenol, and 4,6-dimethyl pyrimidine were the characteristic volatiles of DDT. For WRT, 2,2,6-trimethyl cyclohexan-1-one, hexanoic acid, benzaldehyde, benzyl alcohol, β-cyclocitral, -β-ionone, α-ionone, and octanoic acid were the characteristic volatiles. These findings expand our knowledge of the volatile fingerprints of oolong tea.
PubMed: 36687170
DOI: 10.1016/j.crfs.2023.100442 -
BMC Plant Biology Jan 2023This study aims to provide insights into plant-insect interaction during the formation and development of open gall structure on the leaves of Robinia pseudoacacia...
This study aims to provide insights into plant-insect interaction during the formation and development of open gall structure on the leaves of Robinia pseudoacacia during gall formation by Obolodiplosis robiniae. This was the first time such far-reaching studies were performed at a biochemical and anatomical level. The gall wall is created from a few thick cells covered with epidermis. This parenchymatous nutritive tissue is rich in starch. Sclerenchyma only occurs around the vascular bundles as a result of the lignification of the parenchyma of the bundle sheaths. The level of reactive oxygen species (ROS) in the new structure was reduced and catalase activity was inhibited, which suggests another pathway of ROS decomposition - e.g. by ascorbate or glutathione peroxidase. The gall structure was combined with an increasing level of protein and non-protein thiols. Phenols seems to be a good protective factor; whose level was lower in infected leaflets. Levels of MUFA (monosaturated fatty acids) and SFA (saturated fatty acids) rose, probably as source of food for insects. The amount of fatty acid is positively correlated with the plant response. We detected that non infected leaflets produced C6:0 (hexanoic acid) and C8:0 (octanoic acid) fatty acids connected with odor. Changes in gall color as they develop are connected with photosynthetic pigments degradation (mainly chlorophylls) where the pathway of astaxanthin transformation to fatty acid is considered to be the most important process during gall maturation. Nutritive tissue is composed mainly of octadecanoic acid (C18:0) - a main source of food for O. robiniae.
Topics: Animals; Robinia; Reactive Oxygen Species; Insecta; Plants; Diptera; Fatty Acids; Plant Leaves; Plant Tumors
PubMed: 36627562
DOI: 10.1186/s12870-022-03914-0