Fruitomics: The importance of combining sensory and chemical analyses in assessing cold storage responses of six peach (Prunus persica L. Batsch) cultivars

Cold storage is used to extend peach commercial life, but can affect quality. Quality changes are assessed through the content of nutritionally relevant compounds, aroma, physical characters and/or sensorially. Here, six peach and nectarine cultivars were sampled at commercial harvest and after 7 days of 1 °C storage. A trained panel was used to evaluate sensorial characters, while carotenoids, phenolics, vitamin C, total sugars, and qualitative traits including firmness, titrable acidity and soluble solid content were integrated with volatile organic compound (VOC) analysis previously reported. The different analyses reveal interesting patterns of correlation, and the six cultivars responded differently to cold storage. Sensory parameters were correlated with 64 VOCs and seven intrinsic characters. Acidity, firmness, and 10 VOCs were strongly negatively correlated with harmony and sweetness, but positively correlated with bitterness, astringency, and crunchiness. In contrast, Brix, b-carotene, and six VOCs were positively correlated with harmony and sweetness

Risk factors associated with adverse fetal outcomes in pregnancies affected by Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19): a secondary analysis of the WAPM study on COVID-19.

Objectives To evaluate the strength of association between maternal and pregnancy characteristics and the risk of adverse perinatal outcomes in pregnancies with laboratory confirmed COVID-19. Methods Secondary analysis of a multinational, cohort study on all consecutive pregnant women with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 from February 1, 2020 to April 30, 2020 from 73 centers from 22 different countries. A confirmed case of COVID-19 was defined as a positive result on real-time reverse-transcriptase-polymerase-chain-reaction (RT-PCR) assay of nasal and pharyngeal swab specimens. The primary outcome was a composite adverse fetal outcome, defined as the presence of either abortion (pregnancy loss before 22 weeks of gestations), stillbirth (intrauterine fetal death after 22 weeks of gestation), neonatal death (death of a live-born infant within the first 28 days of life), and perinatal death (either stillbirth or neonatal death). Logistic regression analysis was performed to evaluate parameters independently associated with the primary outcome. Logistic regression was reported as odds ratio (OR) with 95% confidence interval (CI). Results Mean gestational age at diagnosis was 30.6+/-9.5 weeks, with 8.0% of women being diagnosed in the first, 22.2% in the second and 69.8% in the third trimester of pregnancy. There were six miscarriage (2.3%), six intrauterine device (IUD) (2.3) and 5 (2.0%) neonatal deaths, with an overall rate of perinatal death of 4.2% (11/265), thus resulting into 17 cases experiencing and 226 not experiencing composite adverse fetal outcome. Neither stillbirths nor neonatal deaths had congenital anomalies found at antenatal or postnatal evaluation. Furthermore, none of the cases experiencing IUD had signs of impending demise at arterial or venous Doppler. Neonatal deaths were all considered as prematurity-related adverse events. Of the 250 live-born neonates, one (0.4%) was found positive at RT-PCR pharyngeal swabs performed after delivery. The mother was tested positive during the third trimester of pregnancy. The newborn was asymptomatic and had negative RT-PCR test after 14 days of life. At logistic regression analysis, gestational age at diagnosis (OR: 0.85, 95% CI 0.8-0.9 per week increase; pPeer reviewe

New challenges in the determination of food contaminants

Dottorato di Ricerca in Metodologie per lo Sviluppo di Molecole di Interesse Farmacologico, Ciclo XXII, a.a. 2009Università della Calabri

Advanced mass spectrometric approaches for the determination of food quality and development of new methodologies for enrichment of nutraceuticals in functional foods

Dottorato di Ricerca in Medicina traslazionale. Ciclo XXXThe research works presented in this Ph.D. thesis are based on the nutraceuticals and functional foods research. The first part of the thesis deals with three main topics: 1. Structural characterization of new HMG-flavonoids in bergamot juice Two unknown 3-hydroxy-3-methylglutaryl flavanone glycosides were identified and characterized by the combination of liquid chromatography and tandem mass spectrometry experiments. 2. Preparation of extracts enriched in HMG-flavonoids A novel food-grade procedure to obtain HMG-flavonoids enriched extracts with an high purity grade was developed. The purification procedure was tested on different citrus fruits, i.e. bergamot, sour orange and chinotto. 3. Development of a new procedure for the enrichment of foodstuffs in hydroxytyrosol New functional foods are presented. They were obtained by the enrichment of foodstuffs generally used in daily diet, i.e. flour, whole wheat flour and sugar, with the nutraceutical compound hydroxytyrosol. The second part concerns the development of advanced mass spectrometric analytical procedure for quality assessment of foods, through the quantification of nutraceutical compounds and the determination of target quality molecules. The works presented in this field are the following: 1. Determination of Hydroxytyrosol and Tyrosol derivatives compounds in Extra Virgin olive oil by Microwave Hydrolysis and LC-MS/MS analysis A novel method to determine the absolute amount of hydroxytyrosol and tyrosol derivatives in EVOO samples was developed. The procedure consists in a simple and fast microwave assisted acidic hydrolysis reaction, combined with the use of liquid chromatography- tandem mass spectrometry analysis. 2. Absolute Evaluation of Hydroxytyrosol in Extra Virgin Olive Oil by Paper Sray Tandem Mass Spectrometry A novel and fast methodology for the evaluation of the absolute amount of Hydroxytyrosol in extra virgin olive oil was set up. The method is based on the exploitation of paper spray ionization (PS) tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS). 3. Discriminant Analysis of Vegetables Oils by Paper Spray Mass Spectrometry and Statistical Approach An innovative approach for the characterization of triacylglycerols profile of different vegetable oils was developed. The method employs the paper spray ionization technique that in combination with chemometric analysis has allowed to discriminate the extra virgin olive oil from the others vegetable oils commonly used as adulterants. 4. Quantitative Evaluation of Caffeine in beverages and drugs by Paper spray tandem Mass Spectrometry A simple and fast method for the quantification of caffeine in beverages and drugs is presented. Also this analytical procedure is based on the use of paper spray tandem mass spectrometry.Università della Calabri

Mass spectrometric methodologies and life science

Dottorato di Ricerca in Methodologies for the Development of molecules of pharmacological interest, XXIII Ciclo,2009-2010Università della Calabri

A comprehensive evaluation of the kinetic method applied in the determination of the proton affinity of the nucleic acid molecules

AbstractThe determination of proton affinity (PA) of 2′-deoxyadenosine (dA) is used as a case study for the evaluation of possible drawbacks in the determination of the PA of the nucleic acid molecules by the kinetic method. The observed ΔPA among the different values obtain for dA by applying this procedure in its different extensions was 0.64 Kcal/mol, which is within the uncertainties of any theoretical or experimental approach. It was demonstrated that nucleosides can be generally used as reference compounds to measure the PA of an unknown nucleoside. The evaluation of ΔΔS value for two competing reaction channels taken by proton-bound heterodimers formed by two nucleosides provides clear information on the reference base which has to be discarded from the set of reference compounds used for the estimation of an unknown PA. The PA of dA obtained with the most elaborated kinetic method (237.00 ± 0.07 kcal/mol) is consistent with the value of 237.0 kcal/mol obtained by a simple treatment of the relative intensities of the product ions generated by two couples of the proton bound dimers formed by the nucleoside and two reference amines. The kinetic method can be, therefore, confidently used to assess the proton affinity of the multifunctional molecules such as nucleosides and nucleobases

Paper Spray Tandem Mass Spectrometry for Assessing Oleic, Linoleic and Linolenic Acid Content in Edible Vegetable Oils

Oleic, linoleic and linolenic acids exert several beneficial effects on human health, some of which are also certified by recent European and U.S. regulations. The goal of the presented work was to develop an innovative methodology to evaluate their content in edible vegetable oils, in order to increase the value of oils from a nutraceutical perspective. The protocol is based on the use of paper spray ionization coupled with tandem mass spectrometry experiments, which allowed the recording of data very quickly and with high specificity. All investigated compounds gained a good linear relation (r2 higher than 0.98). Accuracy values are near 100% for all concentration levels examined, and the repeatability and reproducibility data result lower than 15%, highlighting the consistence of the methodology. The developed approach was successfully applied for the analysis of different real samples, and its robustness was confirmed by comparing the results obtained with those coming from the classical and official methodology

Hydroxytyrosol-Fortified Foods Obtained by Supercritical Fluid Extraction of Olive Oil

A new original process has been set-up to obtain hydroxytyrosol-enriched food by means of CO2 supercritical fluid extraction. The process is based on the direct adsorption of hydroxytyrosol on selected foodstuff (e.g., flour, whole-wheat flour, and sugar) when placed in contact with olive oil (which is known to contain this phenol) under controlled temperature and pressure conditions of supercritical CO2. The transfer of the nutraceutical to the foodstuff was initially evaluated using a fortified olive oil model and was then applied to commercial olive oil and foodstuff. The yield of the hydroxytyrosol transfer was demonstrated to be quantitative. In order to prove the suitability of the final products, hydroxytyrosol-enriched flour was used to prepare a bread roll, which maintained the nutraceutical characteristics after the cooking. Finally, DPPH based experiments were performed to prove the radical scavenging activity of the functionalized foodstuff