Encapsulation of flavonoid in multiple emulsion using spinning disc reactor technology

Rutin (quercetin-3-rutinoside) and anthocyanin flavonoids have numerous biological activities which are beneficial to human health such as antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects. In order to aid delivery of their health benefits, an attempt has been made to encapsulate rutin and Hibiscus anthocyanins in multiple emulsions using a spinning disc reactor (SDR) as a novel processing aid. The encapsulation of flavonoids may prolong their shelf-life and increase their bioavailability for absorption by the body (Munin & Edwards-Lévy, 2011). The advantage of using SDR technology in the second stage of emulsification is that it does not break the droplets of the primary emulsion. The time-dependent stability of the multiple emulsions was investigated using particle size, microscopy, visual assessment and stability index measurements. At 2 wt. % emulsifier, Brij 78 was found to be capable of producing uniform droplets of the final W/O/W emulsion in the size range of 13-15 µm. The results show that the SDR technology can be used as an alternative process for making stable W/O/W multiple emulsions with a fairly narrow droplet size distribution. Rutin and anthocyanins were successfully encapsulated within the internal aqueous phase of W/O/W multiple emulsions, giving an encapsulation efficiency of >80%. In the presence of flavonoids, a reduction in the average particle size has also been observed, possibly due to its surface active properties. Confocal laser microscopy confirmed the successful formation of SDR-processed multiple emulsions

Seawater-Based Biocatalytic Strategy : Stereoselective Reductions of Ketones with Marine Yeasts

The large consumption of freshwater in fermentations and bio-transformations is a matter of concern for the sustainability of many bio-processes. The use of seawater to perform bio-processes is a sustainable alternative. In this work, we used marine yeasts from deep-sub-seafloor sediments grown in seawater as bio-catalysts to perform the stereoselective reduction of different ketones, and the bio-transformations were accomplished in seawater as well. Strains of Meyerozyma guilliermondii and Rhodotorula mucilaginosa were able to reduce different aromatic ketones with high molar conversions and moderate-to-high enantioselectivity with no significant differences between bio-catalysis performed in seawater and freshwater. Finally, the selected marine yeasts were used for the reduction of key intermediates in seawater for the synthesis of molecules of pharmaceutical interest (desogestrel, norgestrel, gestodene, pramipexole)

Insights into fungal diversity of a shallow-water hydrothermal vent field at Kueishan Island, Taiwan by culture-based and metabarcoding analyses.

This paper reports the diversity of fungi associated with substrates collected at a shallow hydrothermal vent field at Kueishan Island, Taiwan, using both culture-based and metabarcoding methods. Culture of fungi from yellow sediment (with visible sulfur granules), black sediment (no visible sulfur granules), the vent crab Xenograpsus testudinatus, seawater and, animal egg samples resulted in a total of 94 isolates. Species identification based on the internal transcribed spacer regions of the rDNA revealed that the yellow sediment samples had the highest species richness with 25 species, followed by the black sediment (23) and the crab (13). The Ascomycota was dominant over the Basidiomycota; the dominant orders were Agaricales, Capnodiales, Eurotiales, Hypocreales, Pleosporales, Polyporales and Xylariales. Hortaea werneckii was the only common fungus isolated from the crab, seawater, yellow and black sediment samples. The metabarcoding analysis amplifying a small fragment of the rDNA (from 18S to 5.8S) recovered 7-27 species from the black sediment and 12-27 species from the yellow sediment samples and all species belonged to the Ascomycota and the Basidiomycota. In the yellow sediments, the dominant order was Pleosporales and this order was also dominant in the black sediment together with Sporidiobolales. Based on the results from both methods, 54 and 49 species were found in the black and yellow sediments, respectively. Overall, a higher proportion of Ascomycota (~70%) over Basidiomycota was recovered in the yellow sediment and the two phyla were equally abundant in the black sediment. The top five dominant fungal orders in descending order based on species richness were Pleosporales>Eurotiales>Polyporales>Hypocreales>Capnodiales in the black sediment samples, and Polyporales>Pleosporales>Eurotiales>Capnodiales>Hypocreales in the yellow sediment samples. This study is the first to observe a high diversity of fungi associated with various substrates at a marine shallow water hydrothermal vent ecosystem. While some fungi found in this study were terrestrial species and their airborne spores might have been deposited into the marine sediment, several pathogenic fungi of animals, including Acremonium spp., Aspergillus spp., Fusarium spp., Malassezia spp., Hortaea werneckii, Parengyodontium album, and Westerdykella dispersa, were recovered suggesting that these fungi may be able to cause diseases of marine animals