The Role of Amaranth, Quinoa, and Millets for the Development of Healthy, Sustainable Food Products—A <i>Concise</i> Review

The selection of sustainable crops adaptable to the rapidly changing environment, which also cater to the dietary needs of the growing population, is a primary challenge in meeting food security. Grains from ancient crops such as amaranth, quinoa, and millets are positioned to address this challenge and hence have gained dietary predominance among cereals and pseudocereals due to their nutritional value and energy efficiency. From a nutritional perspective, they are recognized for their complete protein, phenolic compounds and flavonoids, prebiotic fibers, and essential micronutrients, including minerals and vitamins. Bioactive peptides from their proteins have shown antihypertensive, antidiabetic, antioxidant, and anticancer properties. The nutritional diversity of these grains makes them a preferred choice over traditional cereals for developing healthy, sustainable food products such as plant-based dairy, vegan meats, and gluten-free products. With growing consumer awareness about sustainability and health, the categories mentioned above are transitioning from ‘emerging’ to ‘mainstream’; however, there is still a significant need to include such healthy grains to fulfill the nutritional gap. This review article emphasizes the health benefits of amaranth, quinoa, and millet grains and discusses the recent research progress in understanding their application in new sustainable food categories. The challenges associated with their incorporation into novel foods and future research directions are also provided

The Dental Implant Maintenance

As dental implant treatment has become a part of mainstream dental therapy, it is imperative to implement dental implant maintenance guidelines to achieve the long-term success of implant prostheses. Earlier, the success of a dental implant was mainly focused on the surgical phase to achieve good primary stability, with time, this belief has taken a major paradigm shift towards implementing and ensuring a periodic recall and following a maintenance phase for dental implants to achieve long-term success. As the dental team strives to attain and maintain the long-term success of implant prostheses, the patient should also recognize that their contribution towards the success of implant prostheses is also equally indispensable. This chapter highlights the importance of maintaining oral hygiene in implant rehabilitated patients and enumerates the implant maintenance protocol to be followed along with the different in-home and in-office procedures which can be implemented to achieve long-term success of the implant and peri-implant structures

Probiotic potential of lactic acid bacteria present in home made curd in southern India

Background & objectives: The human gut microbiota play a significant role in nutritional processes. The concept of probiotics has led to widespread consumption of food preparations containing probiotic microbes such as curd and yogurt. Curd prepared at home is consumed every day in most homes in southern India. In this study the home-made curd was evaluated for lactic acid bacteria (LAB) with probiotic potential. Methods: Fifteen LAB (12 lactobacilli, 1 l0 actococcus , 2 Leuconostoc) and one yeast isolated from home-made curd were evaluated for resistance to acid, pepsin, pancreatin and bile salts; antimicrobial resistance; intrinsic antimicrobial activity; adherence to Caco-2 epithelial cells; ability to block pathogen adherence to Caco-2 cells; ability to inhibit interleukin (IL)-8 secretion from HT-29 epithelial cells in response to Vibrio cholerae; and ability to induce anti-inflammatory cytokine expression in THP-1 monocyte cells. Results: Lactobacillus abundance in fermenting curd peaked sharply at 12 h. Nine of the strains survived exposure to acid (pH 3.0) for at least one hour, and all strains survived in the presence of pancreatin or bile salts for 3 h. None showed haemolytic activity. All were resistant to most antimicrobials tested, but were sensitive to imipenem. Most strains inhibited the growth of Salmonella Typhimurium while five inhibited growth of V. cholerae O139. Seven strains showed adherence to Caco-2 cells ranging from 20-104 per cent of adherence of an adherent strain of Escherichia coli, but all inhibited V. cholerae adherence to Caco-2 cells by 20-100 per cent. They inhibited interleukin-8 secretion from HT-29 cells, in response to V. cholerae, by 50-80 per cent. Two strains induced IL-10 and IL-12 messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) expression in THP-1 cells. Interpretation & conclusions: LAB in curd had properties consistent with probiotic potential, but these were not consistent across species. LAB abundance in curd increased rapidly at 12 h of fermentation at room temperature and declined thereafter

Microbial Degradation of Lobster Shells to Extract Chitin Derivatives for Plant Disease Management

International audienceBiodegradation of lobster shells by chitinolytic microorganisms are an environment safe approach to utilize lobster processing wastes for chitin derivation. In this study, we report degradation activities of two microbes, " S223 " and " S224 " isolated from soil samples that had the highest rate of deproteinization, demineralization and chitinolysis among ten microorganisms screened. Isolates S223 and S224 had 27.3 and 103.8 protease units mg −1 protein and 12.3 and 11.2 µg ml −1 of calcium in their samples, respectively, after 1 week of incubation with raw lobster shells. Further, S223 contained 23.8 µg ml −1 of N-Acetylglucosamine on day 3, while S224 had 27.3 µg ml −1 on day 7 of incubation with chitin. Morphological observations and 16S rDNA sequencing suggested both the isolates were Streptomyces. The culture conditions were optimized for efficient degradation of lobster shells and chitinase (∼30 kDa) was purified from crude extract by affinity chromatography. The digested lobster shell extracts induced disease resistance in Arabidopsis by induction of defense related genes (PR1 > 500-fold, PDF1.2 > 40-fold) upon Pseudomonas syringae and Botrytis cinerea infection. The study suggests that soil microbes aid in sustainable bioconversion of lobster shells and extraction of chitin derivatives that could be applied in plant protection

Synthesis of fluorescent carbon quantum dots from Manihot esculenta waste peels for nonlinear optical and biological applications

The synthesis of carbon quantum dots using cassava (Manihot esculenta) waste peels by simple hydrothermal method. Carbon quantum dots were studied using PXRD, and HRTEM analysis, signifying an amorphous graphite carbon structure. The carbon quantum dots have two absorption peaks in the UV–vis spectrum, around 272 and 304 nm which lead to the π–π* and n–π* transitions. The produced CQDs exhibit excitation dependent fluorescence characteristics, with a fluorescence quantum yield of 4.664% at an excitation wavelength of 330 nm. The CQDs revealed a white light emitting diode with the Commission Internationale d'Eclairage (CIE) coordinates (0.35, 0.35). The nonlinear optical absorption 0.294×10−4 (cm/W), nonlinear refractive index 1.8138×10−8 (cm2/W), and third-order NLO susceptibility 5.5 × 10−6 (esu) were calculated using Z-Scan analysis. The synthesized CQDs were utilized for their antibacterial activity used S. aureus (23 mm), B. cereus (33 mm), E. coli (43 mm), and P. aeruginosa (30 mm) as harmful microbes. Our results suggest that Manihot esculenta waste peels CQDs have potential for application in NLO devices, optical switching, and pharmaceuticals

A systematic review and meta-analysis of digital application use in clinical research in pain medicine.

ImportancePain is a silent global epidemic impacting approximately a third of the population. Pharmacological and surgical interventions are primary modes of treatment. Cognitive/behavioural management approaches and interventional pain management strategies are approaches that have been used to assist with the management of chronic pain. Accurate data collection and reporting treatment outcomes are vital to addressing the challenges faced. In light of this, we conducted a systematic evaluation of the current digital application landscape within chronic pain medicine.ObjectiveThe primary objective was to consider the prevalence of digital application usage for chronic pain management. These digital applications included mobile apps, web apps, and chatbots.Data sourcesWe conducted searches on PubMed and ScienceDirect for studies that were published between 1st January 1990 and 1st January 2021.Study selectionOur review included studies that involved the use of digital applications for chronic pain conditions. There were no restrictions on the country in which the study was conducted. Only studies that were peer-reviewed and published in English were included. Four reviewers had assessed the eligibility of each study against the inclusion/exclusion criteria. Out of the 84 studies that were initially identified, 38 were included in the systematic review.Data extraction and synthesisThe AMSTAR guidelines were used to assess data quality. This assessment was carried out by 3 reviewers. The data were pooled using a random-effects model.Main outcomes and measuresBefore data collection began, the primary outcome was to report on the standard mean difference of digital application usage for chronic pain conditions. We also recorded the type of digital application studied (e.g., mobile application, web application) and, where the data was available, the standard mean difference of pain intensity, pain inferences, depression, anxiety, and fatigue.Results38 studies were included in the systematic review and 22 studies were included in the meta-analysis. The digital interventions were categorised to web and mobile applications and chatbots, with pooled standard mean difference of 0.22 (95% CI: -0.16, 0.60), 0.30 (95% CI: 0.00, 0.60) and -0.02 (95% CI: -0.47, 0.42) respectively. Pooled standard mean differences for symptomatologies of pain intensity, depression, and anxiety symptoms were 0.25 (95% CI: 0.03, 0.46), 0.30 (95% CI: 0.17, 0.43) and 0.37 (95% CI: 0.05, 0.69), respectively. A sub-group analysis was conducted on pain intensity due to the heterogeneity of the results (I 2 = 82.86%; p = 0.02). After stratifying by country, we found that digital applications were more likely to be effective in some countries (e.g., United States, China) than others (e.g., Ireland, Norway).Conclusions and relevanceThe use of digital applications in improving pain-related symptoms shows promise, but further clinical studies would be needed to develop more robust applications.Systematic review registrationhttps://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/, identifier: CRD42021228343

2‑Phenylindole and Arylsulphonamide: Novel Scaffolds Bactericidal against <i>Mycobacterium tuberculosis</i>

A cellular activity-based screen on <i>Mycobacterium tuberculosis</i> (Mtb) H37Rv using a focused library from the AstraZeneca corporate collection led to the identification of 2-phenylindoles and arylsulphonamides, novel antimycobacterial scaffolds. Both the series were bactericidal <i>in vitro</i> and in an intracellular macrophage infection model, active against drug sensitive and drug resistant Mtb clinical isolates, and specific to mycobacteria. The scaffolds showed promising structure–activity relationships; compounds with submicromolar cellular potency were identified during the hit to lead exploration. Furthermore, compounds from both scaffolds were tested for inhibition of known target enzymes or pathways of antimycobacterial drugs including InhA, RNA polymerase, DprE1, topoisomerases, protein synthesis, and oxidative-phosphorylation. Compounds did not inhibit any of the targets suggesting the potential of a possible novel mode of action(s). Hence, both scaffolds provide the opportunity to be developed further as leads and tool compounds to uncover novel mechanisms for tuberculosis drug discovery