Investigations on the Great Northern Beans (Phaseolus Vulgaris L.): Protein Functionality, Antinutrients, Flatus Factors, Fermentation, and Carbohydrates

Protein content of the Great Northern beans was 26.10 percent on a dry weight basis. The apparent isoelectric pH of the NaCl extractable proteins was about 4.4. Among the several solubilizing agents, Na2CO3, K2S04, sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS), and NaOH at the respective concentrations of 0.5, 5.0, 5.0 (all w/v), and 0.02 N were the best protein solubilizing agents, solubilizing 93.6 grams Lowry protein per 100 grams Kjeldahl protein. AIbumins and globulins accounted for 21.18 and 73.40 percent, respectively, of the total bean proteins. The bean proteins were fractionated and protein concentrates and protein isolates were prepared. The bean flour proteins, albumins, globulins, protein concentrates, and protein isolates (heretofore referred to as fractions) were studied electrophoretically. Several functional properties of the fractions were investigated. Protein concentrates had the highest water and oil absorption capacity (5.93 and 4.12 g/g, respectively) and emulsion capacity (72.6 g oil emulsified/g). Albumins registered the highest emulsion stability (780 hours at 21 °C). Foaming performance of the Great Northern bean proteins was fair and concentration dependent. Sorption isotherms studies indicated that the bean flour had higher equilibrium moisture content at corresponding temperature and equilibrium relative humidity than other fractions. Buffer capacity of the bean proteins over a pH range of 4-8 was modest. Modification (succinylation and oxidation) improved the water and oil absorption capacity of the bean proteins. Globulins registered the highest stickiness (92 N) among all the fractions. Alkali solubilization of the bean proteins resulted in significant reduction in trypsin and chymotrypsin inhibitory activities and elimination of hemagglutinating activity. Protein concentrates were essentially void of flatulence activity. Amino acid profiles indicated that the bean flour proteins, albumins, and protein isolates contained high acidic amino acids, while globulins and protein concentrates were characterized by high proportions of hydrophobic amino acids. Sulfur containing amino acids and leucine were the first and second limiting amino acids in the Great Northern bean proteins. Heat treatment of the fractions improved the in vitro protein digestibility. Baking studies indicated that replacement of wheat flour by the bean flour and the protein concentrates for improved nutritionality of cookies and bread was possible without adversely affecting the sensory quality attributes. In cookie preparation, bean flour and protein concentrates could replace wheat flour up to 30 percent and 20 percent (by weight), respectively; the corresponding figures for the wheat flour replacement in breadmaking were 10 percent and 10 percent (by weight). Fermentation of the Great Northern beanrice blends suggested the potential for these beans in developing fermented foods. The beans contained 59.20 percent (on a dry weight basis) of starch. Starch granule size ranged from 12 X 12 μm to 58 X 40 μm (length X width) and the granule shape was round to oval to elliptical, and in certain cases, concave as well. Lamellae were present on all the starch granules observed. Amylose content of the starch was 10.20 percent (on starch basis). Stable gel formation by the bean starch was observed at concentrations of 7 percent and above (w /v). The viscoamylographic studies of the isolated starch indicated the restricted swelling character of the bean starch. Solubility and swelling of the bean starch was both pH and temperature dependent. The addition of free fatty acids to the isolated starch reduced the viscosity and raised the gelatinization temperature of the bean starch. Modifications (acetylation and oxidation) of the isolated starch resulted in altered solubility and swelling characteristics. Replacement of wheat flour by the bean starch caused an increase in alkaline water retention capacity. The bean contained an arabinogalactan type mucilage principle (arabinose:galactose ratio of 2.0: l.7), the viscosity of which was dependent on concentration, pH, and temperature

Electrostatics in chemistry: 4. Electrostatic models for weak molecular complexation

This article does not have an abstract

Electrostatics in chemistry. 3. Molecular electrostatic potential: visualization and topography

Topographical features of the electrostatic potential of molecules (MESP) are discussed. Three-dimensional visualization of the MESP of some small molecules is presented. The details are correlated with the reactivity of molecules

A Giant Lipoma In The Hand - Report Of A Rare Case

A 38 years old male patient presented with a large painless swelling in the right palm with ultrasound examination suggestive of fatty nature of the swelling MRI showing a well-circumscribed soft tissue swelling in the deep palmar space. The giant tumor of 6.5 X 4 cm was excised and the patient was symptom free two years following the surgery

A review of breast cancer awareness among women in India: Cancer literate or awareness deficit?

BACKGROUND: Breast cancer is the most common female cancer worldwide including India, where advanced stages at diagnosis, and rising incidence and mortality rates, make it essential to understand cancer literacy in women. We conducted a literature review to evaluate the awareness levels of risk factors for breast cancer among Indian women and health professionals. METHODS: A structured literature search using combined keywords was undertaken on bibliographic databases including MEDLINE, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health (CINAHL) and SCOPUS. Searches were restricted to research published in English language peer-reviewed journals through December, 2014 in India. RESULTS: A total of 7066 women aged 15-70 years showed varied levels of awareness on risk factors such as family history (13-58%), reproductive history (1-88%) and obesity (11-51%). Literacy levels on risk factors did not improve over the 8-year period (2005-2013). On average, nurses reported higher, though still varied, awareness levels for risk factors such as family history (40.8-98%), reproductive history (21-90%) and obesity (34-6%). Awareness levels were not consistently higher for the stronger determinants of risk. CONCLUSION: Our review revealed low cancer literacy of breast cancer risk factors among Indian women, irrespective of their socio-economic and educational background. There is an urgent need for nation- and state-wide awareness programmes, engaging multiple stakeholders of society and the health system, to help improve cancer literacy in India

Signatures of molecular recognition from the topography of electrostatic potential

The recognition of interaction between two molecules is analysed via the topography of their molecular electrostatic potentials (MESP). The point of recognition between two species is proposed to be the geometry at which there is a change in the nature of the set of MESP critical points of one of the molecules vis-a-vis with its MESP topography at infinite separation. These results are presented for certain model systems such as pyridine and benzene dimers, cytosine-guanine and adenine-thymine base pairs in various orientations of approach of the two species

Molecular tailoring approach for geometry optimization of large molecules: Energy evaluation and parallelization strategies

A linear-scaling scheme for estimating the electronic energy, gradients, and Hessian of a large molecule at ab initio level of theory based on fragment set cardinality is presented. With this proposition, a general, cardinality-guided molecular tailoring approach (CG-MTA) for ab initio geometry optimization of large molecules is implemented. The method employs energy gradients extracted from fragment wave functions, enabling computations otherwise impractical on PC hardware. Further, the method is readily amenable to large scale coarse-grain parallelization with minimal communication among nodes, resulting in a near-linear speedup. CG-MTA is applied for density-functional-theory-based geometry optimization of a variety of molecules including alpha-tocopherol, taxol, gamma-cyclodextrin, and two conformations of polyglycine. In the tests performed, energy and gradient estimates obtained from CG-MTA during optimization runs show an excellent agreement with those obtained from actual computation. Accuracy of the Hessian obtained employing CG-MTA provides good hope for the application of Hessian-based geometry optimization to large molecules.The authors thank C-DAC, UGC (CAS program to the University of Pune) and the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), New Delhi for financial assistance

Molecular tailoring approach for exploring structures, energetics and properties of clusters

Molecular Tailoring Approach (MTA) is a method developed for enabling ab initio calculations on prohibitively large molecules or atomic/molecular clusters. A brief review of MTA, a linear scaling technique based on set inclusion and exclusion principle, is provided. The Molecular Electrostatic Potential (MESP) of smaller clusters is exploited for building initial geometries for the larger ones, followed by MTA geometry optimization. The applications of MTA are illustrated with a few test cases such as (CO2)n and Lin clusters employing Density Functional theory (DFT) and a nanocluster of orthoboric acid at the Hartree-Fock (HF) level. Further, a discussion on the geometries and energetics of benzene tetramers and pentamers, treated at the Moller-Plesset second order (MP2) perturbation theory, is given. MTA model is employed for evaluating some cluster properties viz. adiabatic ionization potential, MESP, polarizability, Hessian matrix and infrared frequencies. These property evaluations are carried out on a series of test cases and are seen to offer quite good agreement with those computed by an actual calculation. These case studies highlight the advantages of MTA model calculations vis-a-vis the actual ones with reference to the CPU-time, memory requirements and accuracy