Consumer Preferences for Purple Yam (Dioscorea alata L.) Powder Brands: Implications for a Product Developed by the University of the Philippines Los Baños

The study compares the attributes of three brands of purple yam (Dioscorea alata L.) powder, namely, Giron Powdered Purple Yam, FST Foods Purple Yam “Ubi” Powder, and Bohol’s Tru Ubi Powder, and the resulting ubi halaya, a local pudding made of purple yam, made from these brands. Store checks, focus group discussions (FGDs), product and home placement tests, and a consumer survey for the local market were used as data-gathering tools. Frequency counts, mean ratings, and standard deviation were used to analyze consumer awareness, consumption behavior, and product attribute importance ratings of respondents. Kruskal-Wallis test was also employed to find out if there were significant differences in the mean ratings for all attributes across brands. The results of the study show that consumers preferred the attributes of the FST Foods Purple Yam “Ubi” Powder and the halaya made using the brand. The product can thus be considered ready for commercialization by potential investors. However, it is recommended that a detailed set of product use instructions should be printed in its packaging to come up with halaya that has better taste, aroma, and consistency.

7th Drug hypersensitivity meeting: part two

No abstract availabl

Additional file 1: Figure S1. of Acute neuroinflammation provokes intracellular acidification in mouse hippocampus

Demonstration of pHo measurements. A. A calibration curve built using two phosphate buffers (pH 6.9 and 7.4). Such calibration curves were built for each of the pH-sensitive micropipettes. B. Recordings of voltage profiles with a pH-sensitive (Vp) and a regular (Ve) micropipette. The pH-sensitive micropipette was first placed at the starting position 200 μm above the slice surface and then moved down by 20-μm steps to the position −180 μm below the slice surface. The same procedure was repeated with the regular microelectrode (Ve). The difference between the Vp and Ve values was used to compute pHo at each distance from the slice surface, thus generating a pHo profile. C. Profile of pHo. The values were computed as pHo = (Vp − Ve)/K

Monoacylglycerol lipase inhibitor JZL184 improves behavior and neural properties in Ts65Dn mice, a model of down syndrome.

Genetic alterations or pharmacological treatments affecting endocannabinoid signaling have profound effects on synaptic and neuronal properties and, under certain conditions, may improve higher brain functions. Down syndrome (DS), a developmental disorder caused by triplication of chromosome 21, is characterized by deficient cognition and inevitable development of the Alzheimer disease (AD) type pathology during aging. Here we used JZL184, a selective inhibitor of monoacylglycerol lipase (MAGL), to examine the effects of chronic MAGL inhibition on the behavioral, biochemical, and synaptic properties of aged Ts65Dn mice, a genetic model of DS. In both Ts65Dn mice and their normosomic (2N) controls, JZL184-treatment increased brain levels of 2-arachidonoylglycerol (2-AG) and decreased levels of its metabolites such as arachidonic acid, prostaglandins PGD2, PGE2, PGFα, and PGJ2. Enhanced spontaneous locomotor activity of Ts65Dn mice was reduced by the JZL184-treatement to the levels observed in 2N animals. Deficient long-term memory was also improved, while short-term and working types of memory were unaffected. Furthermore, reduced hippocampal long-term potentiation (LTP) was increased in the JZL184-treated Ts65Dn mice to the levels observed in 2N mice. Interestingly, changes in synaptic plasticity and behavior were not observed in the JZL184-treated 2N mice suggesting that the treatment specifically attenuated the defects in the trisomic animals. The JZL184-treatment also reduced the levels of Aβ40 and Aβ42, but had no effect on the levels of full length APP and BACE1 in both Ts65Dn and 2N mice. These data show that chronic MAGL inhibition improves the behavior and brain functions in a DS model suggesting that pharmacological targeting of MAGL may be considered as a perspective new approach for improving cognition in DS

Long-term memory: Novel object recognition with the retention period of 24 hours.

<p>A: Time of object exploration during acquisition. There was no difference between the groups, and no effect of JZL184-treatment on the exploration time. B: Testing phase. Left: Time of object exploration during testing was smaller in vehicle-treated Ts65Dn vs. 2N mice. There was no such difference between the JZL184-treated Ts65Dn and 2N groups. Right: Discrimination index was smaller in the vehicle-treated Ts65Dn vs. 2N mice. JZL184-treatment significantly increased the discrimination index in Ts65Dn mice, but had no effect on the performance of their 2N littermates.</p