Over a long period of time, humans have explored many natural resources looking for remedies of various ailments. Traditional medicines have played an intrinsic role in human life for thousands of years, with people depending on medicinal plants and their products as dietary supplements as well as using them therapeutically for treatment of chronic disorders, such as cancer, malaria, diabetes, arthritis, inflammation, and liver and cardiac disorders. However, plant resources are not sufficient for treatment of recently emerging diseases. In addition, the seasonal availability and other political factors put constrains on some rare plant species. The actual breakthrough in drug discovery came concurrently with the discovery of penicillin from Penicillium notatum in 1929. This discovery dramatically changed the research of natural products and positioned microbial natural products as one of the most important clues in drug discovery due to availability, variability, great biodiversity, u... [more]

Protein glycation and oxidative stress lead to severe health complications in various diseases including diabetes mellitus. The intake of flavonoid-rich foods has been confirmed previously to have a positive effect on human health. Ginger is an important source of flavonoids and is one of the most widely used traditional medicines in many Asian countries. The aim of this study was to verify the therapeutic potential of methanolic extract from ginger against glycation and other oxidative stress-induced complications using in vitro study. In this study, quantitative estimations of antioxidant components such as total phenolic and flavonoids were determined by UV−visible spectrophotometry. The anti-inflammatory action of the ginger extract was checked by determining its protective action against the denaturation of proteins, anti-proteinase activity and its membrane stabilization effect. The anti-inflammatory action of ginger extract was found to be comparable with reference standard drug... [more]

Heating flame furnaces are the main type of furnaces used for heating and heat treatment of metal products in metallurgy and mechanical engineering. In the working chamber of a modern heating furnace, there should be neither high-temperature nor stagnation zones. One of the methods used to provide such combustion conditions is the application of distributed (volumetric) combustion. Owing to this method, heating quality is ensured by creating a uniform temperature field and equivalent heat exchange conditions, regardless of the placement of the charge in the working chamber of the furnace. In this work, we numerically study the volumetric combustion and influences of small- and large-scale recirculation ratios of furnace gases, the influence of temperature fluctuation on the regenerator nozzle, and the working parameters at the starting phase and reverse.

Microorganisms colonizing plastic waste material collected in composting-, landfill-, and anaerobic digestion plants were isolated to obtain novel strains maximally adapted to the degradation of plastics due to long-term contact with plastic polymers. Twenty-six bacterial strains were isolated and identified by the 16 S rRNA method, and eighteen strains of yeasts and fungi using 18 S rRNA and the internal transcribed spacer ITS sequencing of the 18 S rRNA gene. In selected strains, the ability to degrade linear low-density polyethylene (LLDPE), low-density polyethylene (LDPE), polystyrene (PS), and polyvinyl chloride (PVC) was tested in aerobic liquid-medium cultures. An oxidative, two-step pretreatment of LLDPE and LDPE using γ- or UV-irradiation followed by a high-temperature treatment was carried out, and the pretreated plastics were also included in the degradation experiments. The respective weight losses after biodegradation by Trichoderma hamatum were: virgin and γ/T90-pretreate... [more]

The porous Ti/Sb-SnO2/Ni-Ce-PbO2 electrode was prepared by using a porous Ti plate as a substrate, an Sb-doped SnO2 as an intermediate, and a PbO2 doped with Ni and Ce as an active layer. The surface morphology and crystal structure of the electrode were characterized by scanning electron microscope(SEM), energy dispersive spectrometer(EDS), and X-Ray diffraction(XRD). The electrochemical performance of the electrodes was tested by linear sweep voltammetry (LSV), cyclic voltammetry (CV), electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS), and electrode life test. The results show that the novel porous Ni-Ce-PbO2 electrodes with larger active surface area have better electrochemical activity and longer electrode life than porous undoped PbO2 electrodes and flat Ni-Ce-PbO2 electrodes. In this work, the removal of Cl− in simulated wastewater on three electrodes was also studied. The results show that the removal effect of the porous Ni-Ce-PbO2 electrode is obviously better than the other two el... [more]

Biomass is currently one of the world’s major renewable energy sources. Biomass in a powder form has been recently proposed as the most encouraging of biomass contours, especially because it burns like a gas. In the current study, biomass powder was examined, for the first time, as a direct solid fuel in internal combustion engines. The aim of the current study was to investigate modeling tools for simulation of biomass powder in combustion engines (CE). The biomass powder applied was in a micro-scale size with a typical irregular shape; the powder length was in the range of 75−5800 μm, and the diameter was in the range 30−1380 μm. Different mechanisms for biomass powder drying and devolatilization/gasification were proposed, including different schemes’ and mechanisms’ rate constants. A comparison between the proposed models and experiments was carried out and results showed good matching. Nevertheless, it is important that a biomass powder simulation addresses overlapping/complicated... [more]

Amyloid beta peptide (Aβ)-related studies require an adequate supply of purified Aβ peptide. However, Aβ peptides are “difficult sequences” to synthesize chemically, and low yields are common due to aggregation during purification. Here, we demonstrate an easier synthesis, deprotection, reduction, cleavage, and purification process for Aβ(1-40) using standard 9-fluorenylmethyloxycarbonyl (Fmoc)-protected amino acids and solid-phase peptide synthesis (SPPS) resin [HMBA (4-hydroxymethyl benzamide) resin] that provides higher yields of Aβ(1-40) than previous standard protocols. Furthermore, purification requires a similar amount of time as conventional purification processes, although the peptide must be cleaved from the resin immediately prior to purification. The method described herein is not limited to the production of Aβ(1-40), and can be used to synthesize other easily-oxidized and aggregating sequences. Our proposed methodology will contribute to various fields using “difficult se... [more]

A numerical simulation study was carried out to study the combined thermal behavior and hydrodynamics of a pseudo-2D fluidized bed using a computational fluid dynamics−discrete element method (CFD-DEM). To mimic the effect of heterogeneous exothermic reactions, a constant heat source was implemented in the particle energy equation. The effects of superficial gas velocity, bed height and heat source distribution were analyzed with the aid of averaged volume fraction and temperature distributions and velocity profiles. It was found that both the gas superficial velocity and the bed aspect ratio have a profound influence on fluidization behavior and temperature distributions.

Monitoring process variables in bioprocesses with complex expression systems, such as filamentous fungi, requires a vast number of offline methods or sophisticated inline sensors. In this respect, cell viability is a crucial process variable determining the overall process performance. Thus, fast and precise tools for identification of key process deviations or transitions are needed. However, such reliable monitoring tools are still scarce to date or require sophisticated equipment. In this study, we used the commonly available size exclusion chromatography (SEC) HPLC technique to capture impurity release information in Penicillium chrysogenum bioprocesses. We exploited the impurity release information contained in UV chromatograms as fingerprints for development of principal component analysis (PCA) models to descriptively analyze the process trends. Prediction models using well established approaches, such as partial least squares (PLS), orthogonal PLS (OPLS) and principal component... [more]

In this work, we explore the synthesis of layered double hydroxide (LDH) particles containing different molar ratios of Gd3+ and Dy3+ cations. A single crystalline phase was obtained for Zn2.0Al0.75Gd0.125Dy0.125-LDH and Zn2.0Al0.5Gd0.25Dy0.25-LDH, and their efficiency as contrast agents was evaluated by T1- and T2-weighted magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Both GdDy-LDHs exhibited longitudinal relaxivity (r1) higher than a commercial reference. The highest contrast in the T1 mode was achieved with the Zn2.0Al0.75Gd0.125Dy0.125-LDH, which contained the lowest concentration of lanthanides; this efficiency is related to the lowest amount of carbonate anions complexing the lanthanide sites. On the contrary, the best contrast in the T2 mode was achieved with Zn2.0Al0.5Gd0.25Dy0.25-LDH. Zn2.0Al0.75Gd0.125Dy0.125-LDH and Zn2.0Al0.5Gd0.25Dy0.25-LDH presented r2/r1 ratios of 7.9 and 22.5, respectively, indicating that the inclusion of gadolinium and dysprosium into layered structures is a prom... [more]

In this work, the transformation of urine into nutrients using electrolytic oxidation in a single-compartment electrochemical cell in galvanostatic mode was investigated. The electrolytic oxidation was performed using thin film anode materials: boron-doped diamond (BDD) and dimensionally stable anodes (DSA). The transformation of urine into nutrients was confirmed by the release of nitrate (NO3−) and ammonium (NH4+) ions during electrolytic treatment of synthetic urine aqueous solutions. The removal of chemical oxygen demand (COD) and total organic carbon (TOC) during electrolytic treatment confirmed the conversion of organic pollutants into biocompatible substances. Higher amounts of NO3− and NH4+ were released by electrolytic oxidation using BDD compared to DSA anodes. The removal of COD and TOC was faster using BDD anodes at different current densities. Active chlorine and chloramines were formed during electrolytic treatment, which is advantageous to deactivate any pathogenic micro... [more]

Size and thermal effect on molar heat capacity of liquid at constant volume (Cv) on a nanometer scale have been investigated by controlling the temperature and density of the liquid domain using equilibrium molecular dynamics (EMD) simulations. Lennard-Jones (LJ) type molecular model with confinement gap thickness (h) 0.585 nm to 27.8 nm has been used with the temperature (T) ranging from 100 K to 140 K. The simulation results revealed that the heat capacity of the nanoconfined liquid surpasses that of the bulk liquid within a defined interval of gap thickness; that the temperature at which maximum heat capacity occurs for a nanoconfined liquid vary with gap thickness following a power law, TCv,max = 193.4 × (h/a)−0.3431, ‘a’ being the lattice constant of Argon (solid) at 300 K; and that for a specified gap thickness and temperature, the confined liquid can exhibit a heat capacity that can be more than twice the heat capacity of the bulk liquid. The increase in heat capacity is underpi... [more]

The importance of fruit-derived resveratrol (RES) in the treatment of various diseases has been discussed in various research publications. Those research findings have indicated the ability of the molecule as therapeutic in the context of in vitro and in vivo conditions. Mostly, the application of RES in in vivo conditions, encapsulation processes have been carried out using various nanoparticles that are made of biocompatible biomaterials, which are easily digested or metabolized, and RES is absorbed effectively. These biomaterials are non-toxic and are safe to be used as components in the biotherapeutics. They are made from naturally available by-products of food materials like zein or corn or components of the physiological system as with lipids. The versatility of the RES nanoparticles in their different materials, working range sizes, specificity in their targeting in various human diseases, and the mechanisms associated with them are discussed in this review.

Due to climate change problems caused by greenhouse gas emissions generated by fossil fuels and from waste disposition, fuel alternatives for power generation are being extensively researched. Currently, in Brazil and in many countries, wood waste is disposed in landfills. However, due to lignin, one of the major constituents of biomass, which prevents wood waste from suffering microbial degradation, there is no significant mass degradation, even over decades, when landfilled. Hence, landfilling is not a solution to discard wood waste. Hence, one of the solutions to get rid of the great amount of wood waste is to use it as feedstock in waste-to-electricity (WTE) projects. WTE projects are in high demand in the world, as they can replace fossil fuels and they reduce two major environmental problems (greenhouse gas emissions due to the use of fossil fuels and the accumulation of waste in landfills), while generating biofuels and/or electricity. One of the residues that can be used in WTE... [more]

Machining processes are critical and widely used components in the manufacturing industry because they help to precisely make products and reduce production time. To keep the previous advantages, a machine tool should be installed at the designated place and condition of the machine tool should be maintained appropriately to working environment. In various maintenance methods for keeping the condition of machine tool, condition-based maintenance can be robust to unpredicted accidents and reduce maintenance costs. Tool monitoring and diagnosis are some of the most important components of the condition based maintenance. This paper proposes stacked auto-encoder based CNC machine tool diagnosis using discrete wavelet transform feature extraction to diagnose a machine tool. The diagnosis model, which only uses cutting force data, cannot sufficiently reflects tool condition. Hence, we modeled diagnosis model using features extracted from a cutting force, a current signal, and coefficients o... [more]

Twenty fluorescent Pseudomonas isolates were tested for their ability to produce siderophores on chrome azurol S (CAS) agar plates and their antagonistic activity against six plant pathogenic fungal isolates was assessed. Scaling-up production of siderophores from the promising isolates, P. aeruginosa F2 and P. fluorescens JY3 was performed using batch and exponential fed-batch fermentation. Finally, culture broth of the investigated bacterial isolates was used for the preparation of two economical bioformulations for controlling Fusarium oxysporum and Rhizoctonia solani. The results showed that both isolates yielded high siderophore production and they were more effective in inhibiting the mycelial growth of the tested fungi compared to the other bacterial isolates. Exponential fed-batch fermentation gave higher siderophore concentrations (estimated in 10 µL), which reached 67.05% at 46 h and 45.59% at 48 h for isolates F2 and JY3, respectively, than batch fermentation. Formulated P.... [more]

In this study, we evaluate potato pulp waste as a potential raw material for obtaining yeast biomass. A portion of the carbohydrates in the potato pulp waste can thereby be converted into more valuable protein. The potato pulp waste was analyzed in terms of protein and ash content, dry mass, simple sugars, and starch content. Two kinds of hydrolysis were performed (thermo-acidic and enzymatic) to produce media for cultivating Candida guilliermondii and Pichia stipitis. The hydrolysates and post-cultivation leachates were analyzed by High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC). The highest biomass yield after 48 h (39.3%) was noted for Candida guilliermondii yeast grown on enzymatic hydrolysate-based medium. Our results prove that potato waste pulp is a promising raw material for the production of yeast single-cell protein (SCP).

Cell-free protein synthesis (CFPS) is an emerging tool for the rapid production of difficult-to-express proteins as well as for identifying protein synthesis bottlenecks. In CFPS, the biotic phase is substituted by extracts of living cells devoid of any of their own genetic material. The main advantage is that these systems delineate cell growth from recombinant protein production, enabling the expression of targets that would otherwise place too big a burden on living cells. We have conducted a techno-economic analysis of a CFPS system to produce monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) using extracts of Chinese hamster ovary (CHO) cells. We compare the performance of the CFPS system with two alternative production strategies: stable and transient gene expression in CHO cells. Our assessment shows that the viability of CFPS for mAb production requires a significant increase in the product yield and the recycling of high-cost components such as DNA. Nevertheless, CFPS shows significant promise for... [more]

The aim of the study was to compare the physical and sensory properties of gluten-free bread with the addition of whole and ground flax seeds. The grinding process of flax seeds was carried out using a knife grinder and ball mill. After short-knife grinding (20 s) (GM-200, Retsch), the seeds were divided into whole (average particle size 0.634 mm), coarse (769 mm) and fine (0.328 mm) flour, and these flours were additionally ground with ball milling (60 s) (Pulverisette 6, Fritsh). The grinding energy of seeds was evaluated. Baking of gluten-free bread was performed with 10% addition of different forms of whole and ground flaxseeds. The colour, volume, texture and sensory parameters of bread were evaluated. In addition, the crumbling index of bread was developed and defined as the percentage share of crumbed pieces of the bread slice in relation to the mass of the entire crumb sample cut out together with crumbs. Specific grinding energy of flaxseeds during short (20 s) knife grinding... [more]

The steam/water loop is a crucial part of a steam power plant. However, satisfying control performance is difficult to obtain due to the frequent disturbance and load fluctuation. A fractional order model predictive control was studied in this paper to improve the control performance of the steam/water loop. Firstly, the dynamic of the steam/water loop was introduced in large-scale ships. Then, the model predictive control with an extended prediction self adaptive controller framework was designed for the steam/water loop with a distributed scheme. Instead of an integer cost function, a fractional order cost function was applied in the model predictive control optimization step. The superiority of the fractional order model predictive control was validated with reference tracking and load fluctuation experiments.

Nanofiltration membrane separation is an energy-saving technology that was used in this study to concentrate extracellular lipase and increase its total activity for biodiesel production. Lipase was produced by recombinant Aspergillus oryzae expressing Fusarium heterosporum lipase (FHL). A sulfonated polyethersulfone nanofiltration membrane, NTR-7410, with a molecular weight cut-off of 3 kDa was used for the separation, because recombinant lipase has a molecular weight of approximately 20 kDa, which differs from commercial lipase at around 30 kDa for CalleraTM Trans L (CalT). After concentration via nanofiltration, recombinant lipase achieved a 96.8% yield of fatty acid methyl ester (FAME) from unrefined palm oil, compared to 50.2% for CalT in 24 h. Meanwhile, the initial lipase activity (32.6 U/mL) of recombinant lipase was similar to that of CalT. The composition of FAME produced from recombinant concentrated lipase, i.e., C14:1, C16:0, C18:0, C18:1 cis, and C18:2 cis were 0.79%, 34.... [more]

The main goal of the research was to optimize microwave-assisted simultaneous distillation and extraction (MA-SDE) using response surface methodology (RSM), based on Box−Behnken design (BBD). A process was designed to extract the essential oil from the leaf sheath of Siam cardamom. The experimental data were fitted to quadratic equations, and the experiment conditions for optimal extraction of 1,8-cineole were extraction time 87.68 min, material-to-water ratio 1:13.18 g/mL and microwave power 217.77 W. Under such conditions, the content of 1,8-cineole was 157.23 ± 4.23 µg/g, which matched with the predicted value. GC−MS results indicated the presence of predominant oxygenated monoterpenes including 1,8-cineole (20.63%), iso-carveol (14.30%), cis-p-mentha-1(7),8-dien-2-ol (12.27%) and trans-p-2,8-menthadien-1-ol (9.66%), and oxygenated contents were slightly higher in the MA-SDE and extraction compared to usual SDE. In addition, the essential oil extracted by MA-SDE exhibited strong ant... [more]

Oil pollutants, due to their toxicity, mutagenicity, and carcinogenicity, are considered a serious threat to human health and the environment. Petroleum hydrocarbons compounds, for instance, benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, xylene, are among the natural compounds of crude oil and petrol and are often found in surface and underground water as a result of industrial activities, especially the handling of petrochemicals, reservoir leakage or inappropriate waste disposal processes. Methods based on the conventional wastewater treatment processes are not able to effectively eliminate oil compounds, and the high concentrations of these pollutants, as well as active sludge, may affect the activities and normal efficiency of the refinery. The methods of removal should not involve the production of harmful secondary pollutants in addition to wastewater at the level allowed for discharge into the environment. The output of sewage filtration by coagulation and dissolved air flotation (DAF) floccul... [more]

Nowadays, psychological stress represents a burdensome condition affecting an increasing number of subjects, in turn putting into practice several strategies to cope with this issue, including the administration of relaxation protocols, often performed in non-structured environments, like workplaces, and constrained within short times. Here, we performed a quick relaxation protocol based on a short audio and video, and analyzed physiological signals related to the autonomic nervous system (ANS) activity, including electrocardiogram (ECG) and galvanic skin response (GSR). Based on the features extracted, machine learning was applied to discriminate between subjects benefitting from the protocol and those with negative or no effects. Twenty-four healthy volunteers were enrolled for the protocol, equally and randomly divided into Group A, performing an audio-video + video-only relaxation, and Group B, performing an audio-video + audio-only protocol. From the ANS point of view, Group A sub... [more]

Investigating the polyphenolic profile of natural Rosmarinus officinalis and Ocimum basilicum populations may reveal essential compounds that have biological activities. Natural populations of R. officinalis and O. basilicum in Northern Riyadh were investigated by HPLC-DAD analyses. Several polyphenols, including rosmarinic acid, gentisic acid, 3,4-dihydroxyphenylacetic acid, rutoside, and others, out of 38 screened were confirmed. Rosmarinic acid was the major polyphenol in both of R. officinalis and O. basilicum. R. officinalis methanolic leaf extracts contained other phenols such as gentisic acid while O. basilicum contained also 3,4-dihydroxyphenylacetic acid and rutoside as well as others. R. officinalis showed higher antioxidant activities than O. basilicum using 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH), ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP), and β-carotene bleaching assays. These higher activities are associated with a higher composition of rosmarinic acid in leaf extracts. The a... [more]