Modulation effect of sulfated polysaccharide from Sargassum fusiforme on gut microbiota and their metabolites in vitro fermentation

The present study demonstrated the digestion behavior and fermentation characteristics of a sulfated polysaccharide from Sargassum fusiforme (SFSP) in the simulated digestion tract environment. The results showed that the molecular weight of two components in SFSP could not be changed by simulated digestion, and no free monosaccharide was produced. This indicates that most of SFSP can reach the colon as prototypes. During the fermentation with human intestinal flora in vitro, the higher-molecular-weight component of SFSP was utilized, the total sugar content decreased by 16%, the reducing sugar content increased, and the galactose content in monosaccharide composition decreased relatively. This indicates that SFSP can be selectively utilized by human intestinal flora. At the same time, SFSP also changed the structure of intestinal flora. Compared with the blank group, SFSP significantly increased the abundance of Bacteroidetes and decreased the abundance of Firmicutes. At the genus level, the abundances of Bacteroides and Megamonas increased, while the abundances of Shigella, Klebsiella, and Collinsella decreased. Moreover, the concentrations of total short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs), acetic, propionic and n-butyric acids significantly increased compared to the blank group. SFSP could down-regulate the contents of trimethylamine, piperidone and secondary bile acid in fermentation broth. The contents of nicotinic acid, pantothenic acid and other organic acids were increased. Therefore, SFSP shows significant potential to regulate gut microbiota and promote human health

Effect of Different Modified Starches on Storage Quality of Protein Bars

In order to mitigate protein bar aging during storage and enhance their sensory attributes, the effects of adding four different modified starches on protein bar aging were investigated in the present study through systematic measurements of hardness, colorimetric parameters, and amylose/amylopectin contents. The findings demonstrated that all four modified starches significantly inhibited protein bar hardening and browning (P<0.05). Pregelatinized acetylated distarch adipate (PADA), hydroxypropyl distarch phosphate (HDP), and distarch phosphate (DP) altered the ratio of straight-chain to branched-chain starch content while substantially increasing slowly digestible starch (SDS) levels (P<0.05). Acetylated distarch adipate (ADA) notably reduced hardness, browning intensity, and enthalpy of aging (P<0.05), thereby enhancing the sensory quality of protein bars. Therefore, ADA is the most suitable modified starch to be added to protein bars

Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research.Peer reviewe

Establishment and evaluation of a competitive performance evaluation system for blood centers

Objective To investigate the establishment of a competitive performance evaluation management program for blood centers to ensure the blood supply. Methods A competitive performance evaluation system for Blood Donor Service Department of blood centers in eastern Shenzhen was established. The data concerning blood collection after (May to October 2021, the experiment group) and before (the corresponding period in 2020, the control) the launch of evaluation system was compared, including the proportion of total/novel blood donors in fixed donation sites, the donation rate of 400 mL and pre-collection deferral rate; collected units per shift, the average collection volume of staff, and the growth rate of per capita donation; the proportion of first-time/repeated/double-dose platelet apheresis donors; the proportion of transfer-in/transfer-out of red blood cells; the ratio of group to street blood donors. Results The proportion of total/novel blood donors in fixed donation sites(81.13% vs 75.87%), the donation rate of 400 mL(58.14% vs 57.91%) and pre-collection deferral rate(76.55% vs 65.92%) in the experimental group was higher than that of the control, while the proportion of pre-collection deferral was lower(18.87% vs 24.13%) (P<0.05). Compared by the control, the units collected per shift, the average collection volume of staff and the blood donation per capita at fixed sites in the experiment group increased by 54.29%, 52.21%, and 3.36% (P<0.05). The proportion of first-time platelet donors was greater than that in the control(43.90% vs 19.61%), while the proportion of repeated platelet donors was lower (56.10% vs 80.39%). The proportion of double-dose platelet donors was lower than that in the control(12.62% vs 22.19%) (P<0.05). The amount of red blood cells transfer-in was 0%, lower than 2.38% in the control group(P<0.05), while the amount of red blood cell transfer-out was 1.86%, higher than 0% in the control group (P<0.05). The proportion of group blood donors decreased from 24% to 15.19%, while street blood donors increased from 76% to 84.81% (P<0.05). Conclusion Proper competitive performance evaluation system can effectively mobilize employee motivation, improve the efficacy of blood collection and internal management, and ensure clinical blood supply

Phosphatase activity in relation to key litter and soil properties in mature subtropical forests in China

Phosphatase-mediated phosphorus (P) mineralization is one of the critical processes in biogeochemical cycling of P and determines soil P availability in forest ecosystems; however, the regulation of soil phosphatase activity remains elusive. This study investigated the potential extracellular activities of acid phosphomonoesterase (AcPME) and phosphodiesterase (PDE) and how they were related to key edaphic properties in the L horizon (undecomposed litter) and F/H horizon (fermented and humified litter) and the underlying mineral soil at the 0–15 cm depth in eight mature subtropical forests in China. AcPME activity decreased significantly in the order of F/H horizon > L horizon > mineral soil horizon, while the order for PDE activity was L horizon = F/H horizon > mineral soil horizon. AcPME (X axis) and PDE (Y axis) activities were positively correlated in all horizons with significantly higher slope in the L and F/H horizons than in the mineral soil horizon. Both AcPME and PDE activities were positively related to microbial biomass C, moisture content and water-holding capacity in the L horizon, and were positively related to soil C:P, N:P and C:N ratios and fine root (diameter ≤ 2 mm) biomass in the mineral soil horizon. Both enzyme activities were also interactively affected by forest and horizon, partly due to the interactive effect of forest and horizon on microbial biomass. Our results suggest that modulator(s) of the potential extracellular activity of phosphatases vary with horizon, depending on the relative C, P and water availability of the horizon.Griffith Sciences, Griffith School of EnvironmentNo Full Tex

Differential Diagnosis Value of Shear-Wave Elastography for Superficial Enlarged Lymph Nodes

ObjectivesTo evaluate the diagnostic efficiency and diagnostic threshold of conventional US and shear-wave elastography (SWE) in superficial enlarged lymph nodes (LNs).MethodsA total of 204 patients with superficial enlarged LNs were enrolled in this retrospective study aged 46.0 ± 15.2 years from March 2020 to March 2021. LNs with a long axis larger than 0.7 cm were considered as superficial enlarged. Before the histological biopsy, LNs that were considered suspicious according to both conventional US and SWE were included, while LNs with no or unclear pathological results, or with no satisfactory SWE images, were excluded. The conventional and 2-D SWE examinations were performed with Aplio i800 and Acuson sequoia equipped with i18LX5 linear-array transducer (5-18 MHz) and 10L4 linear-array transducer (4-10 MHz), respectively. Both E Median and Vs Median parameters were investigated by two senior ultrasound physicians. The pathological results were performed as the gold standard.ResultsVariables including transverse axis size, lymphatic hilum, L/T ratio, echogenicity, and color Doppler pattern were considered significant. The mean E Median value in benign, metastatic LNs, and lymphoma were 28.26 ± 8.87 kPa, 77.46 ± 22.85 kPa, and 50.37 ± 5.41 kPa (p &amp;lt;0.001), while Vs Median values were 3.02 ± 0.50 m/s, 4.87 ± 0.90 m/s, and 4.09 ± 0.22 m/s, respectively (p &amp;lt; 0.001). The diagnostic performance indicated the high sensitivity, specificity, PPV, NPV, and overall accuracy of conventional US combined with SWE. The optimal cutoff values of E Median and Vs Median for predicting malignant LNs were 42.90 kPa and 3.73 m/s, respectively. As AUC value, sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, PPV, and NPV revealed, the indexes of E Median were 0.976, 0.927, 0.975, 0.946, 0.983, and 0.897, respectively, while Vs Median were 0.970, 0.927, 0.963, 0.941, 0.975, and 0.895, respectively (p &amp;lt;0.001). The ROC curves of both E Median (AUC=0.976) Vs Median (AUC=0.970) suggested the remarkable diagnostic efficiency in distinguishing benignity between suspected malignant LNs.ConclusionsAbove results indicated that conventional US together with 2-D SWE could elevate the diagnostic performance. Meanwhile, the parameters of 2-D SWE including E Median and Vs Median could effectively assess malignant LNs, which provide valuable differentiating information in superficial enlarged LNs.</jats:sec

Effects of Different Yeasts on Texture and Flavor of Sweet Potato Bread

In order to investigate the effects of different yeasts on the quality and flavor of sweet potato bread, the rheological properties, color, texture and flavor of sweet potato bread were compared and analyzed. The results showed that different yeasts had significant effects on the color, texture and flavor of sweet potato bread. The results of dynamic rheology showed that the G' and G" of yeast No.4 fermented dough were significantly higher than other groups(P<0.05). The hardness, chewiness, elasticity, cohesion and resilience of commercial yeast fermented bread were significantly lower than those of old yeast fermented bread(P<0.05). The L* value and W value of No.4 old dough yeast fermented bread were significantly higher than others(P<0.05). The results of electronic nose test showed that the main flavor substance of sweet potato bread fermented by 7 different yeasts was inorganic sulfide. A total of 61 volatile compounds were detected by GC-IMS, which were mainly alcohols, ketones and acids, followed by aldehydes, ethers, esters and pyridines. Principal component analysis showed that there were significant differences in volatile flavor compounds of 7 kinds of yeast fermented breads, two principal component contribution rate of 85%, indicating GC-IMS technology could distinguish bread fermented by different yeasts. To sum up, this paper made a detailed comparative analysis of the nature and flavor differences of bread fermented by different yeasts, and would provide a scientific basis for yeast selection in bread production