BACTERIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS AND PUBLIC PERCEPTION ABOUT DRINKING WATER OF BOREHOLES IN ARIB (AIN DEFLA, ALGERIA)

<p>Water from boreholes in Arib (Ain Defla), south-west of Algeria was investigated to ascertain its quality status and suitability for drinking and domestic uses. Fifty six water samples were collected from four boreholes. The analyses of the Coliform counts obtained from various boreholes samples ranged between 0 and 200 CFU/ 100 ml with regard to total Coliforms and between 0 and 8 CFU/ 100 ml with regard to fecal Coliforms. Three<strong> </strong>of the boreholes samples showed contamination by <em>Streptococcus sp.</em> Pathogens like <em>Salmonella </em>were not identified but some low levels of sulfite-reducing bacteria was found. The interviews were done to assess perceptions on water taste problems, odour, colour, and turbidity and health problems. The respondents were taken from people in the community using random sampling technique. Sixty people were sampled at each area surrounding the boreholes. It was found out that 43.3% of the respondents rated their drinking water safe for consumption as well as absence of illness after drinking as indicators for judging the quality of the water. The others respondents (56.7%) reported having at least some concerns with safety of their water.  More  than 20% of the households reported at least one household member having suffered some water related illness in the past two years. Respondents were asked to judge the quality of the water, based on four sensory characteristics of drinking water. Many respondents rated the smell (33.3%), taste (20%), colour (23.3%) and turbidity (23.3%). These results showed that all the samples did not satisfy the WHO requirements for bacteriological characteristics in human consumption. <strong></strong></p

The potential of near and mid-infrared spectroscopy for rapid quantification of oleuropein, total phenolics, total flavonoids and antioxidant activity in olive tree (Olea europaea) leaves

Natural foods and food-related antioxidants such as phenolic phytochemicals are of great interest due to their preventive properties against oxidative damage. Olive tree leaves contain high quality and amount of phenolic compounds including oleuropein and therefore considered as nutraceutically valuable materials. The composition of olive leaves, its phenolics and antioxidant power are influenced by numerous factors causing great variation among samples. Additionally, traditional analytical methods performed to quantify these parameters in each product entail long and complicated sample preparation procedures, the use of toxic chemicals, skilled labors, instrumentation and sophisticated laboratory conditions. One appealing alternative is the use of infrared spectroscopy since it gives information about the food composition quickly and it is a multi-parametric and environmentally friendly choice. Therefore, we investigated the oleuropein, total phenolic content, total flavonoid content and antioxidant activity levels of 23 common cultivars of olive leaves harvested from Turkey and Italy using traditional reference methods and also developed near and mid-infrared based partial least squares regression (PLSR) models to predict these parameters without the need of sample preparation. Internal validations of the PLSR calibration models were done using full cross-validation and yielded very high correlation coefficients (0.95) and low errors in predictions (% standard error of cross-validation for parameters were lower than 7.54%). The levels of all the parameters of interest could be successfully predicted using both NIR and MIR instrumentation within seconds. Overall, infrared spectroscopy along with chemometrics exhibited great potential for future olive leave studies

Synergistic effects of Chinese herbal medicine and biological networks

Chinese Herbal Medicine (CHM), an integral part of Traditional Chinese Medicine, has been implementing complex herbal formulae usually consisting of two or more medicinal herbs for the prevention and treatment of various diseases since antiquity. The key mechanisms of action of CHM for the systematic management of many diseases largely rely on the concept of synergy to reach an optimal clinical outcome with minimal side effects. With the development of the modern analytical tools and computational programs, a number of methodologies have been applied to evaluate the synergy among herbal ingredients and chemical constituents in CHM. In this chapter, we introduce the concept of synergy in CHM, review studies that investigated synergy of CHM for the management of cancer, diabetes, musculoskeletal pain, cardiovascular, inflammatory, hepatic, infectious and oxidative stress-related diseases. The complex synergistic interactions of CHM components in pharmacokinetics studies and biological networks are also discussed. Despite some of the scientific reports supporting the synergistic effects of multi-herbal and/or herb-drug combinations, the level of evidence remains low particularly in terms of their molecular mechanisms of action and clinical relevance. Significant challenges in the development of suitable methods for CHM synergistic studies are also mentioned