The anticancer properties of dietary polyphenols and its relation with apoptosis

Aberrantly regulated apoptosis is involved in the pathogenesis of several diseases and defective apoptosis leads to uncontrolled cell proliferation and tumorigenesis. Cancer is an example of a pathologic condition where the normal mechanisms of cell cycle regulation are dysfunctional either by excessive cell proliferation, inhibited/suppressed apoptosis or both. Dietary habits are estimated to contribute to, at least, one third of all human cancers, showing that dietary components can exacerbate or interfere with carcinogenesis. However, several epidemiological studies have revealed that some dietary factors can decrease the risk of different types of cancer. Apoptosis is suggested to be a crucial mechanism for the chemopreventive properties associated with several dietary factors by eliminating potentially deleterious (damaged/mutated) cells. Food, a readily available item, contains several promising chemopreventive agents. Polyphenols are serious candidates since they are responsible for the cancer protective properties of a diet rich in vegetables and fruits: numerous phenolic compounds showed antiproliferative and cytotoxic effects, and more specifically pro-apoptotic activities, in several cancer cells lines and animal tumor models. The aim of the present review is to analyze and summarize several aspects related to the molecular mechanisms of apoptosis induced by dietary factors with particular emphasis on polyphenols. Dietary factors that can activate cell death signals and induce apoptosis, preferentially in precancerous or malignant cells, and the study of their apoptotic inducing targets can represent a mean to devise new strategies for cancer prevention in the future

Microglia and neurons in the hippocampus of migratory sandpipers.

The semipalmated sandpiper Calidris pusilla and the spotted sandpiper Actitis macularia are long- and short-distance migrants, respectively. C. pusilla breeds in the sub-arctic and mid-arctic tundra of Canada and Alaska and winters on the north and east coasts of South America. A. macularia breeds in a broad distribution across most of North America from the treeline to the southern United States. It winters in the southern United States, and Central and South America. The autumn migration route of C. pusilla includes a non-stop flight over the Atlantic Ocean, whereas autumn route of A. macularia is largely over land. Because of this difference in their migratory paths and the visuo-spatial recognition tasks involved, we hypothesized that hippocampal volume and neuronal and glial numbers would differ between these two species. A. macularia did not differ from C. pusilla in the total number of hippocampal neurons, but the species had a larger hippocampal formation and more hippocampal microglia. It remains to be investigated whether these differences indicate interspecies differences or neural specializations associated with different strategies of orientation and navigation

Thermal Cycling Stability of Silica Membranes for Gas Separation

Hydrogen is being seen as an alternative energy carrier to conventional hydrocarbons to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. High efficiency separation technologies to remove hydrogen from the greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide, are therefore in growing demand. Traditional thermodynamic separation systems utilise distillation, absorption and adsorption, but are limited in efficiency at compact scales. Molecular sieve silica (MSS) membranes can perform this separation as they have high permselectivity of hydrogen to carbon dioxide, but their stability under thermal cycling is not well reported. In this work we exposed a standard MSS membrane and a carbonised template MSS (CTMSS) membrane to thermal cycling from 100 to 450°C. The standard MSS and carbonised template CTMSS membranes both showed permselectivity of helium to nitrogen dropping from around 10 to 6 in the first set of cycles, remaining stable until the last test. The permselectivity drop was due to small micropore collapse, which occurred via structure movement during cycling. Simulating single stage membrane separation with a 50:50 molar feed of H2:CO2, H2 exiting the permeate stream would start at 79% and stabilise at 67%. Higher selectivity membranes showed less of a purity drop, indicating the margin at which to design a stable membrane separation unit for CO2 capture

Sample size for family evaluation in potato breeding programs.

Clonal families from a broad genetic base population in the Potato Breeding Program at the Universidade Federal de Lavras (UFLA), Brazil, were used in this trials. Twenty-five families were assessed in a 5 x 5 triple lattice design. Each plot consisted of 30 clones distributed in three rows of ten plants. Tuber yield per plant, percentage of large tubers, mean weight of large tubers, mean medium-sized tuber weight and tuber specific gravity were measured. Three hundred experiments were simulated varying the family sizes from three to 90 clones. The coefficients of experimental variation (CVe), the coefficients of genetic variation (CVg), heritabilities for family mean and the CVg/CVe ratio were estimated. Genetic parameters were stabilized with family sizes as small as six clones, depending on the trait. This indicates that the families can be adequately represented by a small sample of clones. Using the maximum curvature method it is possible to conclude that approximately 30 clones would be sufficient to represent each family, even for traits with the highest CVe. The genetic variance within family was greater than the genetic variance among families for all traits, indicating a favorable potential for within family selection. The correlation coefficients of the family means with the 5%, 10%, 15% and 20% best clones from each family, considering the five traits assessed, were always high, meaning that within the best families generally are the best clones

Hydrothermal stable templated molecular sieve silica (TMSS) membranes for gas separation

In this work we compare the hydrothermal stability performance of a Templated Molecular Sieve Silica (TMSS) membrane against a standard, non-templated Molecular Sieve Silica (MSS) membrane. The tests were carried under dry and wet (steam) conditions for single gas (He, H2, CO and CO2) at 1-2 atm membrane pressure drop at 200oC. Single gas TMSS membrane H2, permeance and H2/CO permselectivity was found to be 2.05 x 10-8 mols.m-2.s-1.Pa-1 and 15, respectively. The MSS membrane showed similar selectivity, but increased overall flux. He permeance through membranes decayed at a rate of 4-5 x 10-10 mols.m-2.s-1.Pa-1 per day regardless of membrane ambience (dry or wet). Although H2/CO permselectivity of the TMSS membrane slightly improved from 15 to 18 after steam testing, the MSS membrane resulted in significant reduction from 16 to 8.3. In addition, membrane regeneration after more than 50 days resulted in the TMSS membrane reverting to its original permeation levels while no significant improvements were observed for the MSS membra ne. Results showed that the TMSS membrane had enhanced hydrothermal stability and regeneration ability

Hydrostability and Scaling Up Molecular Sieve Silica (MSS) Membranes for H2/CO Separation in Fuel Cell Systems

MSS membranes are a good candidate for CO cleanup in fuel cell fuel processing systems due to their ability to selectively permeate H2 over CO via molecular sieving. Successfully scaled up tubular membranes were stable under dry conditions to 400°C with H2 permeance as high as 2 x 10-6 mol.m-2.s^-1.Pa^-1 at 200 degrees C and H2/CO selectivity up to 6.4, indicating molecular sieving was the dominant mechanism. A novel carbonised template molecular sieve silica (CTMSS) technology gave the scaled up membranes resilience in hydrothermal conditions up to 400 degrees C in 34% steam and synthetic reformate, which is required for use in fuel cell CO cleanup systems

Estudo do impacto no meio ambiente pelo processamento da farinha de mandioca no Município de São Felipe, Bahia.

O município de São Felipe localiza-se a uma latitude 12º50'50" sul e a uma longitude 39º05'22" oeste estando a uma altitude de 195 metros. Possui uma área de 198,71 km² uma população de aproximadamente 21.000 habitantes. Das atividades agrícolas destaca-se o cultivo da mandioca com técnicas ainda rudimentares. O Brasil é o segundo produtor de mandioca do mundo, sendo a planta resistente nas diferentes condições de cultivo, encontrada em todos os estados brasileiros. As utilizações culinárias caseiras da mandioca não acumulam resíduo significativo, pela pequena quantidade processada. Contudo, quando o processamento é maior, os subprodutos podem vir a apresentar problemas de disposição e soluções deverão ser encontradas. O processamento industrial da mandioca causa sérios problemas ambientais na disposição de resíduos, como poluição de rios, do solo, lençol freático e mortandade de peixes. Apesar dos agricultores serem familiarizados com a mandioca, desconhecem as variedades, os impactos que seus resíduos causam ao meio ambiente e o aproveitamento dos resíduos como uma fonte de sustentabilidade.PDF.035

Ultramicroporous membranes for hydrogen separation

Fuel cell systems offer excellent efficiencies when compared to internal combustion engines, which result in reduced fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. One of the areas requiring research for the success of fuel cell technology is the H2 fuel purification to reduce CO, which is a poison to fuel cells. Molecular sieve silica (MSS) membranes have a potential application in this area. In this work showed activated transport, a characteristic of ultramicroporous (d