Monitoring the Bioactive Compounds Status in Olea europaea According to Collecting Period and Drying Conditions

Polyphenols and triterpenoids in olive have relevant importance both in the physiology of the plant and the nutritional and biological value of its products. Olive leaf extracts are of special interest for their numerous health-promoting properties. The present research is investigating the occurrence of phytochemicals in supercritical fluid extracts from leaves with regard to collection time and drying temperature. The phytochemical profiles of the olive leaf extracts were determined by reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) coupled to electrospray ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (ESI-TOF-MS) detection. The main extracted phytochemicals were phenols and terpenoids. A significant variation in the amounts of the different components was observed as a function of the different drying temperature and collecting time (p < 0.05). Among samples, the maximal contents of polyphenols and secoiridoid derivatives were found in the extracts from olive leaves collected in November and dried at 120 ºC, whereas triterpenoids showed the highest content in fresh leaves collected in August.This work was supported by the Tunisian Ministry of Higher Education under the Tunisian-Korean project “Development of Anti-arthritic remedy with Olive by-products”

Modelling the transmission dynamics of cystic echinococcosis in donkeys of different ages from Tunisia

During the period from March 2006 to July 2009 a total of 2040 slaughtered donkeys were examined for cystic echinococcosis (CE). CE prevalence in donkeys was 8.48% and the infection pressure (0.0088 infections per year) and infection rate (0.0448 cysts per year) appeared to be lower than those previously reported for cattle, sheep, dromedaries and goats in Tunisia. However, the number of cysts per infection was relatively high (5.07 cysts per infection). Among the 901 collected hydatid cysts the majority were located in the liver (89.9%), 10.09% in the lungs and 4.77% were fertile (43/901). The amplification of a fragment within the mitochondrial gene coding for cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (cox1) revealed that donkeys were infected with both Echinococcus equinus (horse strain, G4 genotype) and Echinococcus granulosus (sheep strain, G1 genotype). E. granulosus G1 developed into fertile cysts (15,112 protoscoleces/ml) with a protoscoleces viability of 65.78%. This investigation is the first detailed epidemiological report on cystic echinococcosis infection in donkeys for any endemic region